Étendue shaping using faceted arrays

An apparatus for providing a light beam comprising:

• a) at least one solid-state laser that is energizable to emit, along an emission axis, an input laser light beam, wherein the optical invariant of the input laser light beam with respect to a first direction is less than half the optical invariant of the input laser light beam with respect to a second direction that is orthogonal to the first direction;
• b) a first cylindrical lens that is disposed to collimate the input laser light beam with respect to the first direction;
• c) a first faceted array having a plurality of light-redirecting facets, with one or more of the light-redirecting facets in the path of the emitted input laser light beam and disposed to redirect at least a portion of the laser light beam from the at least one solid-state laser toward a second faceted array that is spaced apart from the first faceted array by a light propagation distance;
• and
• d) the second faceted array having a plurality of light-collimating facets that define an output axis for directing the redirected laser light along the output axis.

An apparatus for combining light comprising:

• a) an illumination source having a plurality of solid-state light sources, wherein each light source is energizable to emit light;
• b) at least one collimating optical element in the path of light from each of the solid-state light sources;
• c) a first faceted array in the path of the emitted, collimated light from the illumination source, the first faceted array having at least a first light-redirecting facet and an adjacent second light-redirecting facet;
• and
• d) a second faceted array, spaced apart from the first faceted array by a light propagation distance and having at least a first light-collimating facet and a second light-collimating facet, wherein the first and second light-collimating facets define an output axis and wherein the emitted light that is redirected from the first light-redirecting facet is incident to the first light-collimating facet and directed along the output axis and wherein the emitted light that is redirected from the second light-redirecting facet is incident to the second light-collimating facet and directed along the output axis,
• and wherein the light propagation distance between the first and second faceted arrays exceeds a distance between adjacent edges of the first and the second light-redirecting facets by more than a factor of six.