Augmenting reality (AR) holds many benefits in how people perceive information and use it in their workflow or leisure activities. A cohesive AR experience has many components; nevertheless, the key is display technologies. The current industry standard for the core solution is still conventional stereoscopy, which has proven to be inadequate for near-work due to the caused vergence–accommodation conflict and the inability to precisely overlay the 3D content on the real world. To overcome this, next-generation technologies have been proposed. While the holographic method holds the highest potential of being the ultimate solution, its current level of maturity is not sufficient to yield a practical product. Consequently, the next solution for near-work-capable AR displays will be of another type. LightSpace Technologies have developed a static multifocal display architecture based on stacked liquid crystal-based optical diffuser elements and a synchronized high-refresh rate image projector. A stream of 2D image depth planes comprising a 3D scene is projected onto respective physically-separated diffuser elements, causing the viewer to perceive a scene as continuous and having all relevant physical as well as psychological depth cues. A system with six image depth planes yielding 6 cpd resolution and 72° horizontal field-of-view has been demonstrated to provide perceptually continuous accommodation over 3.2 Diopter range. A further optimization by using a conventional image combiner resulted in the compact and practical design of the AR display.

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Nowadays liquid crystal display (LCD) is an integral part of humans’ everyday life. High demand for new and innovative LCD products force LCD industry to develop and implement new types of LCDs. Bistable smectic-A (SmA) LCD is one of the most promising devices for smart glass applications due to long-term bistability, low haze at clear state, low transmittance at scatter state and low power consumption. The study describes the most relevant conclusions obtained from frequency response testing and electric current measurements of bistable SmA LCD samples. Bistable LCDs have two states: opaque (light scattering state) and focal conic (transparent state). Switching between clear and scatter states and vice versa is a frequency dependant process. The conducted research on bistable SmA LC frequency response provides important knowledge about operation principles of the smart glass devices.