Multiple Cell Liquid Crystal Optical Device With Coupled Electric Field Control

A liquid crystal optical device of the type having two liquid crystal layers each provided between substrates bearing alignment layers, and a hole-patterned electrode arrangement with a weakly conductive material within an aperture of the arrangement configured to provide a spatially modulated electric field to each liquid crystal layer, characterized in that:

• the hole-patterned electrode arrangement includes at least one hole patterned electrode comprising a segmented hole-patterned electrode configured to apply asymmetric phase profiles for light beam tilting, optical image stabilization and light beam shifting, the hole-patterned electrode arrangement being structured to change a phase front in each liquid crystal layer by having one or more of:
• an electrically floating electrode structure external to the electrode arrangement over the aperture;
• and
• two weakly conductive layers, each weakly conductive layer corresponding to one of said liquid crystal layers.

A liquid crystal optical device including:

• a first liquid crystal layer acting on a first light polarization provided between substrates bearing first alignment layers, a first planar electrode, a first hole patterned electrode and at least one first weakly conductive layer located adjacent to said first hole patterned electrode;
• and
• a second liquid crystal layer acting on a second light polarization provided between substrates bearing second alignment layers, a second planar electrode, a second hole patterned electrode and at least one second weakly conductive layer located adjacent to said second hole patterned electrode,
• each hole patterned electrode and corresponding weakly conductive layer being configured to provide a spatially modulated electric field to a corresponding liquid crystal layer for changing a phase front in each liquid crystal layer, characterized in that:
• each hole-patterned electrode includes a segmented hole-patterned electrode configured to apply asymmetric phase profiles for light beam tilting, optical image stabilization and light beam shifting;
• and
• the device includes an electrically floating electrode structure external to the electrode arrangement over an aperture of the device.