56.1: Sunlight Readability of Digital Micro Shutter Based Display Technology

Abstract

The Pixtronix DMS™ (Digital Micro Shutter) display technology intrinsically provides exceptional image quality due to its optical architecture, device construction and device operation. This technology, based on MEMS micro‐shutters formed on active TFT backplanes, has enabled the development of color sequential, time division gray scale, direct‐view displays achieving breakthrough performance in wide color gamut, high brightness, high contrast ratio and wide view angles, all at roughly 1/4 the power consumption of competing TFT‐LCD or AMOLED displays of the same size and luminance. In addition, DMS™ technology also presents very good sunlight readability in transflective color modes. This readability can be attributed to reflective properties of the DMS™ optical architecture. This reflective nature enhances viewing characteristics of transmissive color modes in high ambient lighting conditions. The reflective performance is obtained without compromising transmissive mode performance as is typically the case in some of the existing display technologies. This paper will explain the performance of DMS™ display in reflective and transflective modes under high ambient lighting conditions.

62.1: Invited Paper: The Joys of Being Digital for Low‐Power, Mobile, Multi‐Media Devices

“…Pixtronix has developed a new MEMS-based display technology which has a highly advantageous digital architecture. The advantages of the general optical design and resultant FOS properties have previously been discussed at previous SID meetings (amongst other forums) [2][3][4][5][6]. They include low-power operation which derives from a 10× optical throughput efficiency over LCD, wide color gamut from the filter-free use of RGB LED's, [6][7] color-purity over a wide view angle due to absence of birefringent materials [11], and transflective feature inherent in the shutter architecture and its highly efficient recycling Back Light Unit (BLU).…”

Power reduction of micro‐electro‐mechanical system shutter display by temporal smoothing of image signal

“…Therefore, if the number of signal transition is reduced by temporal smoothing of the signal, the power consumption is reduced. Since most power is dissipated in the light source, the power saving by the proposed technique is small, but it is effective when the MEMS display is used in the reflective mode in which LEDs are turned off …”

“…Since most power is dissipated in the light source, the power saving by the proposed technique is small, but it is effective when the MEMS display is used in the reflective mode in which LEDs are turned off. 7 Generally, spatial signal variation of lower weight subfield is frequent in the natural image. For example, when the image shown in Fig.…”

“…Since the display does not use polarizers and color filters, utilization efficiency of the light is high. In addition, it can be used as reflective type display . In this paper, power saving technique is proposed for further reducing power consumption of MEMS shutter display.…”

“…In addition, it can be used as reflective type display. 7 In this paper, power saving technique is proposed for further reducing power consumption of MEMS shutter display. The technique temporally smoothes the display signal, resulting in reduction of power consumption related to actuation of MEMS shutter.…”