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US 5,497,254 AGranted
Optical apparatus including a liquid crystal modulator
AssigneeSeiko Epson Corporation
InventorsJun Amako, Hirotsuna Miura, Tomio Sonehara, Yoshio Watanabe
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Abstract
An optical apparatus for controlling a wave front of a coherent light including at least a coherent light source, an electrically addressable liquid crystal device having a plurality of pixels receiving the light from said light source, and a signal generator for recording a complex amplitude distribution or hologram on the liquid crystal device.
Claims12
An optical apparatus for controlling the wave front of a coherent light by using phase distributions recorded in a spatial light modulator, comprising:
- at least one electrically addressed liquid crystal spatial light modulator, said liquid crystal spatial light modulator including a liquid crystal panel having a liquid crystal layer sandwiched between a pair of substrates, a plurality of discrete electrodes formed on at least one of said substrates, active elements connected to the respective electrodes, said electrodes and active elements defining an array of pixels and at least one director for orienting the molecules of said liquid crystal layer so that the liquid crystal molecules are oriented uniformly parallel to the panel substrates at the initial stage of operation;
- means for driving said liquid crystal spatial light modulator;
- means for polarizing the coherent light into a linearly polarized light before application to said at least one liquid crystal spatial light modulator, said polarized light having a direction parallel to a plane defined by a line normal to said substrates and by said director of the liquid crystal molecules.
An optical apparatus, comprising:
- a coherent light source for producing light;
- at least one electrically addressed liquid crystal spatial light modulator means for receiving said coherent light from said coherent light source and having a light emitting side;
- means for recording complex amplitude distributions in said liquid crystal spatial light modulator means so that said coherent light applied to said liquid crystal spatial light modulator means is modulated in response to said complex amplitude distributions;
- liquid photo-setting material responsive to light from said coherent light source;
- container means for carrying said photo-setting material and positioning said material in the path of light from the light emitting side of said liquid crystal spatial light modulator means;
- whereby said photo-setting material, when illuminated by said coherent light as modulated by the liquid crystal spatial light modulator means is set in accordance with an amplitude distribution from said recording means to create an image.
3 more elements
An optical apparatus, comprising:
- an electrically addressed liquid crystal spatial light modulator of a phase modulation type;
- an electrically addressed liquid crystal spatial light modulator of an amplitude and phase modulation type;
- means for driving said liquid crystal spatial light modulators independently of each other;
- a coherent light source;
- means for splitting the coherent light from said coherent light source into a first path and a second path;
- said liquid crystal spatial light modulator of a phase modulation type being disposed on said first path of split light, said liquid crystal spatial light modulator of an amplitude and phase modulation type being disposed on said second path of split light;
- means for causing the first and second light paths after passing through the respective liquid crystal spatial light modulators to interfere with each other;
- an optical recording medium responsive to the light from said coherent light source at the location where the first and second light paths interfere with each other;
- and
- recording means including said driving means for encoding the light wave front of said first path by use of a phase distribution of said liquid crystal spatial light modulator of the phase modulation type and for applying two-dimensional complex amplitude distributions representative of image information to the light wave front of said second path by use of said liquid crystal spatial light modulator of the amplitude and phase modulation type, thereby encoding the light wavefront of said first path for each two-dimensional complex amplitude distribution, and performing the multiplex recording of a plurality of the images of said two-dimensional complex amplitude distributions in said optical recording medium by interference exposure.
7 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.