Fast-response liquid-crystal lens for 3D displays

Abstract

Three-dimensional (3D) display has become an increasingly important technology trend for information display applications. Dozens of different 3D display solutions have been proposed. The autostereoscopic 3D display based on lenticular microlens array is a promising approach, and fast-switching microlens array enables this system to display both 3D and conventional 2D images. Here we report two different fast-response microlens array designs. The first one is a blue phase liquid crystal lens driven by the Pedot: PSS resistive film electrodes. This BPLC lens exhibits several attractive features, such as polarization insensitivity, fast response time, simple driving scheme, and relatively low driving voltage, as compared to other BPLC lens designs. The second lens design has a double-layered structure. The first layer is a polarization dependent polymer microlens array, and the second layer is a thin twisted-nematic (TN) liquid crystal cell. When the TN cell is switched on/off, the traversing light through the polymeric lens array is either focused or defocused, so that 2D/3D images are displayed correspondingly. This lens design has low driving voltage, fast response time, and simple driving scheme. Simulation and experiment demonstrate that the performance of both switchable lenses meet the requirement of 3D display system design.

Dual layer electrode liquid crystal lens for 2D/3D tunable endoscopy imaging system

“…However, high-dielectric layer increases the operating voltage to higher than 30volts. Therefore, high-resistive layer [18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27] was applied to generate linearly varying electrical potential from the center to the edge. The high-resistive layer for LC lens successfully demonstrated low operating voltage, fast response time, and high optical performance.…”

Liquid Crystal Microlenses for Autostereoscopic Displays

“…They need a ground voltage at the center of each lens to have a voltage gradient, reducing the advantage of tunability of modal LC lenses. Other works, propose the use of polymer stabilized blue phase LC materials to obtain fast-response LC lens for 3D displays [ 83 ]. Another advantage of these types of systems is that they are polarization independent.…”

Simulation Study on Polarization-Independent Microlens Arrays Utilizing Blue Phase Liquid Crystals with Spatially-Distributed Kerr Constants

“…Liquid crystal (LC) microlens arrays are important in applications of 2D/3D switching, fiber coupling, and sensors [1][2][3]. Most of proposed structures of LC microlens arrays require at least one polarizer.…”