Capabilities of diffractive optical elements for real-time holographic displays

Abstract

This paper illustrates one of the various capabilities of static diffractive optical elements (DOE) beneficial to realtime holographic displays. Custom kinoform-type DOE can be used as elements for illumination of the spatial light modulator, i.e. the display where the video hologram is encoded. For an RGB application of diffractive optical elements, particular issues concerning the inherent wavelength-dependence have to be addressed. Multiorder DOE offer a way to compensate for chromatic as well as monochromatic aberrations. We will discuss concepts and performance of multi-order DOE, show their application in holographic displays, describe issues of fabrication and replication, and give experimental results of the multi-order DOE performance.