Light control material for displaying color information, and images

A method for creating a light control material comprising the steps of:

• providing a material body;
• producing a plurality of microstructures therein or thereon having a periodicity to reflect a particular bandwidth of light to form a multicolored image.

A method for displaying a color image comprising the steps of:

• forming a plurality of periodic structures in or on a material body, each structure comprised of a plurality of steps, each step having a step height equal to substantially one half of a wavelength of visible spectrum light wherein all of the steps comprising any one of said stepped structures have substantially equal step heights, wherein each stepped structure reflects one wavelength of phase coherent visible spectrum light, wherein the wavelength of phase coherent visible spectrum light reflected by any one of said stepped structures is equal to substantially twice the step height of the steps of the stepped structure, whereby said material displays a multicolor image.

A method for producing an image on a substrate, said method comprising the steps of:

• providing a substrate having a plurality of structural color microstructures disposed thereon or thereupon;
• selectively ablating a subset of said plurality of microstructures to create a multicolor image on said substrate.