A display device includes a transparent light guiding layer having a bottom face on which a light diffusing region is formed as a design, a retroreflective layer, a polarizing beam that allows light having a first polarization direction to pass therethrough, and an emission unit configured to emit into the light guiding layer the light having the first polarization direction, or light having a different second polarization direction. When light having the first polarization direction is emitted, light reflected by the light diffusing region passes through the polarizing beam splitter such that the design is viewable. When light having the second polarization direction is emitted, light reflected by the retroreflective layer passes through the polarizing beam splitter such that an aerial image of the design is viewable.

A directional illuminator includes a light source, a pupil-replicating lightguide, and a tiltable reflector coupling the light source to the pupil-replicating lightguide. The exit beam angle of the light outputted by the pupil-replicating lightguide follows the in-coupling angle, and accordingly depends on the tilting angle of the tiltable reflector. The directional illuminator with steered light beam may be used to illuminate a display panel. Steering the illuminating light by the tiltable reflector enables one to steer the exit pupil of the display device to match the user's eye location(s).

A sensing system includes a sensor with transmitters and detectors. A light source is optically coupled to a light guide disposed in the field of view of the sensor. The light guide is generally planar and the light source illuminates the light guide from an edge, or side, to illuminate the length of the light guide. A housing for the sensing system has a surface configured to reflect or diffract light from the light source towards the surrounding environment.

According to one embodiment, an illumination device, in which a plurality of light guides include a plurality of light guide pairs, each of the plurality of light guide pairs includes a first light guide and a second light guide, the plurality of light guide pairs are connected with their long sides opposed to each other, a plurality of laser light source elements include a plurality of first light source elements arranged to be opposed to a first side surface on a short side of the first light guide of the light guide pair, and a plurality of second light source elements arranged to be opposed to a second side surface of the second light guide of the light guide pair.

A local-dimming display generally includes a light source configured to generate a backlight, a first display aligned with the light source and having multiple first pixels, wherein each first pixel is configured to selectively pass and block the backlight, and a second display aligned with the first display and having multiple second pixels. A particular pixel is controlled to pass the backlight. The particular pixel corresponds with an aligned pixel and multiple parallax pixels of the first pixels controlled at a first transmit level, and multiple neighboring pixels of the first pixels controlled at one or more second transmit levels. The one or more second transmit levels are less than or equal to the first transmit level. The first pixels cooperating at the first transmit level and the second transmit levels selectively presents the backlight to the second display with a declining intensity pattern in the neighboring pixels.

An optical composite sheet is disclosed. In the optical composite sheet, optical functional elements such as a prism sheet and a light diffusion layer are combined, and a light absorbing layer that selectively absorbs light of a specific wavelength band is inserted, so that the optical performance and color gamut can be enhanced as compared with the prior art. In particular, the color transmittance of the optical composite sheet with respect to wavelength measured for each viewing angle satisfies a specific relationship, whereby it is possible to effectively reduce the color deviation with respect to the viewing angle.

In a projection display system, a light-emitting diode (LED) can generate unpolarized light. A light guide can receive the unpolarized light from a perimeter of the light guide and guide the unpolarized light between a light emission surface and an opposing surface as guided light. The light guide can include a plurality of light-extraction features that can direct a portion of the guided light out of the light guide through the light emission surface as unpolarized emitted light. A polarizing film can reflect at least some of a first polarization state of the unpolarized emitted light into the light guide through the light emission surface and can transmit at least some of a second polarization state of the unpolarized emitted light through the polarizing film to form a polarized light beam. An angular reduction film can reduce a range of propagation angles of the polarized light beam.

A display engine adapted for use in a head-mounted display (HMD) device includes a reflective liquid crystal on silicon (LCoS) spatial light modulator (SLM) that is illuminated using a backlight illumination module and a pair of optical prisms providing a total internal reflection (TIR) function. In an illustrative mixed-reality embodiment, the TIR prism pair guides light to the LCoS SLM from the backlight illumination module and projects virtual images reflected from the LCoS SLM, through projection optics, to a diffractive waveguide combiner for viewing by an HMD user.

A backlight module includes a light guide plate, a light source, a first optical film, and a second optical film. The light source is disposed on one side of a light incident surface of the light guide plate. The first optical film is disposed between the light guide plate and the second optical film. An illumination beam from the light source has a first polarization component and a second polarization component perpendicular to the first polarization component. A ratio of the first polarization component to the second polarization component is greater than or equal to 1.2 and less than or equal to 10. The second optical film includes a substrate and a plurality of prism structures disposed between the substrate and the light guide plate. An included angle between an extending direction of the prism structures and the light incident surface is less than 5 degrees.

Provided is a waveguide-type display device including a waveguide, an input coupler provided on the waveguide and configured to transmit an image to travel into the waveguide, an output coupler provided on the waveguide and configured to output the image traveling in the waveguide to an outside of the waveguide, and a field-of-view (FOV) expander configured to output an image having an expanded FOV by deflecting and outputting the image output from the output coupler in a certain direction based on polarization characteristics of the image.