CPC G02B 27/0081 (2013.01) [G02B 6/005 (2013.01); G02B 6/0026 (2013.01); G02F 1/2955 (2013.01); G02F 2203/24 (2013.01)] | 20 Claims |
1. An apparatus for multiplying display resolution and field-of-view, the apparatus comprising:
an image projector for directing light from a plurality of pixels of a pixelated image source into unique angular directions wherein the image projector comprises a microdisplay panel optically connected to a projection lens;
an image processor electrically connected to the image projector for computing native images of the image source corresponding to first and second field-of-view portions and for computing shifted images in a predefined direction corresponding to the first and second field-of-view portions for sequential display by the image projector;
a first set of gratings comprising a first input grating optically coupled to the image projector and a first output grating, wherein the first set of gratings comprises at least one switchable grating switchable between a diffracting state and a non-diffracting state, wherein the first set of gratings have a native configuration for propagating the light of the native image and at least one shifted configuration for propagating the light of at least one shifted image, each with an angular displacement corresponding to an image shift in the predefined direction, where the image shift is equal to N+1/M times a pixel dimension, where N and M are integers and N includes zero; and
a second set of gratings comprising a second input grating optically coupled to the first output grating of the first set of gratings, wherein the second set of gratings comprises at least one switchable grating switchable between a diffracting state and a non-diffracting state, wherein the second set of gratings have a first configuration for projecting the first field-of-view portion and a second configuration for projecting the second field-of-view portion.
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