A dark field digital holographic microscope and associated metrology method is disclosed which is configured to determine a characteristic of interest of a structure. The dark field digital holographic microscope includes an illumination branch for providing illumination radiation to illuminate the structure; a detection arrangement for capturing object radiation resulting from diffraction of the illumination radiation by the structure; and a reference branch for providing reference radiation for interfering with the object radiation to obtain an image of an interference pattern formed by the illumination radiation and reference radiation. The reference branch has an optical element operable to vary a characteristic of the reference radiation so as to reduce and/or minimize variation in a contrast metric of the image within a field of view of the dark field digital holographic microscope at a detector plane.

A holographic camera system includes an imaging lens, a polarizer configured to circularly polarize light incident from the imaging lens, a geometric phase lens with a phase delay of λ/4, and an image sensor configured to replicate an interference pattern through self-interference of light output from the geometric phase.

Method for obtaining an image of a sample (10), comprising: a) illuminating the sample using a light source (11); b) acquiring, using an image sensor (16), a first image (I.sub.1,P0) of the sample (10), said image being formed in the detection plane (P.sub.0), the first image being representative of an exposure light wave (14) propagating, from the sample, to the image sensor, along a first optical path (L.sub.1);
the method comprising, following b) c) modifying an optical refractive index, between the image sensor and the sample; d) following c), acquiring a second image (I.sub.2,P0) of the sample, said image being representative of the exposure light wave (14) along a second optical path (L.sub.2); e) implementing an iterative algorithm that combines the first and second images so as to obtain an image of the sample.

The present disclosure relates to improved holographic reconstruction device and a method. In one aspect, the present disclosure relates to improved holographic reconstruction device and method that can measure a digital hologram regardless of optical characteristics of an object to be measured, by an all-in-one type system integrating a transmissive system that measures an object transmitting light and a reflective system that measures an object reflecting light.

A deflection optical element, which diffracts incident light, includes a substrate having translucency, and a holographic material layer disposed so as to overlap the substrate, the holographic material layer being formed with a diffraction grating composed of interference fringes, wherein the holographic material layer is formed with an alignment mark where the interference fringes are discontinuous, and the alignment mark is located in an optically effective area where the holographic material layer diffracts the incident light.

There is provided a lighting device arranged to produce a controllable light beam for illuminating a scene. The device comprises an addressable spatial light modulator arranged to provide a selectable phase delay distribution to a beam of incident light. The device further comprises Fourier optics arranged to receive phase-modulated light from the spatial light modulator and form a light distribution. The device further comprises projection optics arranged to project the light distribution to form a pattern of illumination as said controllable light beam.

An apparatus and method are disclosed for actinic inspection of semiconductor masks intended for extended ultraviolet (EUV) lithography, or similar objects, with feature sizes less than 100 nm. The approach uses a coherent light source with wavelength less than 120 nm. Inside a vacuum system, an optical system directs the light to an object, i.e., the mask or mask blank, and directs the resulting reflected or transmitted light to an imaging sensor. A computational system processes the imaging sensor data to generate phase and amplitude images of the object. The preferred imaging modality, a form of digital holography, produces images of buried structures and phase objects, as well as amplitude or reflectance images, with nanometer resolution less than or equal to the feature size of the mask.

A backlight device includes: a light source to emit coherent light; an optical path difference generator on the light source, the optical path difference generator including an incident surface and a plurality of light emitting surfaces, the light emitting surfaces being parallel to the incident surface and having different separation distances from the incident surface; a light condenser on the optical path difference generator; a diffuser on the light condenser; and a collimator on the diffuser.

A deflection optical element, which diffracts incident light, includes a substrate having translucency, and a holographic material layer disposed so as to overlap the substrate, the holographic material layer being formed with a diffraction grating composed of interference fringes, wherein the holographic material layer is formed with an alignment mark where the interference fringes are discontinuous, and the alignment mark is located in an optically effective area where the holographic material layer diffracts the incident light.

The present disclosure relates to improved holographic reconstruction device and a method. In one aspect, the present disclosure relates to improved holographic reconstruction device and method that can measure a digital hologram regardless of optical characteristics of an object to be measured, by an all-in-one type system integrating a transmissive system that measures an object transmitting light and a reflective system that measures an object reflecting light.