Magic Leap, Inc.

Inphase Technologies, Inc.

Lucent Technologies Inc.

Reald Inc.

Hitachi, Ltd.

Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd.

Akonia Holographics LLC

Hitachi Consumer Electronics Co., Ltd.

Reald Luxe, LLC

Imphase Technologies

Kevin R Curtis

Hui-Chuan Cheng

Bradley Jay Sissom

Michael C Tackitt

Ken E Anderson

Scott Patrick Campbell

Clinton Carlisle

Jahja I Trisnadi

William Hudson Welch

Pierre St Hilaire

Miller Harry Schuck, Iii

Gary Dean Sharp

Hyunsun Chung

William L Wilson

Chulwoo Oh

Mark R Ayres

Samarth Bhargava

Eric C Browy

Paul M Greco

Tatsuro Ide

Heidi Leising Hall

William Larry Wilson

Thomas J Richardson

Michael Anthony Klug

Takeshi Shimano

Lionel Ernest Edwin

David A Coleman

Jan Hoogland

Harukazu Miyamoto

Friso Schlottau

Ernest Y Chuang

Ken'ichi Shimada

Brian T Schowengerdt

Douglas J McKnight

Ivan Li Chuen Yeoh

Partha Pratim Mitra

Adrian J Hill

Tod R Earhart

Kenton Pharris

Will Loechel

Vikramjit Singh

Miller H Schuck

Andrew Ian Russell

Kenichi Shimada

Robert Blake Taylor

Kevin Messer

Kenneth E Anderson

David Tinch

Clifford Eric Martin

Lisa Dhar

Peter M Winkler

Brian S Riley

Brian M King

Miller Schuck

Alan Hoskins

Howard Russell Cohen

Erik Heath Arend

Melinda G Schnoes

Wilhelm Taylor

Yunping Yang

Frank Y Xu

Michael Nevin Miller

Howard Edan Katz

Victor Kai Liu

Ravi Kumar Komanduri

Robert Dale Tekolste

Shuqiang Yang

Kang Luo

Masahiko Takahashi

Evgeni Poliakov

Robert D TeKolste

Aaron Wegner

Marcia Lea Schilling

Kristina Uhlendorf

Michal Beau Dennison Vaughn

Yoshiyuki Matsumura

Peter Brent Littlewood

Alexander Lowe Harris

Shigeki Hori

Mark DiLullo

Kazuya Kogure

Michael Tackitt

Vicki L Colvin

Wei Chen Lin

Curt Shuman

Adrian John Hill

Mark Dilullo

Douglas J Mcknight

An apparatus including a set of three illumination sources disposed in a first plane. Each of the set of three illumination sources is disposed at a position in the first plane offset from others of the set of three illumination sources by 120 degrees measured in polar coordinates. The apparatus also includes a set of three waveguide layers disposed adjacent the set of three illumination sources. Each of the set of three waveguide layers includes an incoupling diffractive element disposed at a lateral position offset by 180 degrees from a corresponding illumination source of the set of three illumination sources.

Illumination layout for compact projection system

In some embodiments, an interconnect electrical connects a light emitter to wiring on a substrate. The interconnect may be deposited by 3D printing and lays flat on the light emitter and substrate. In some embodiments, the interconnect has a generally rectangular or oval cross-sectional profile and extends above the light emitter to a height of about 50 μm or less, or about 35 μm or less. This small height allows close spacing between an overlying optical structure and the light emitter, thereby providing high efficiency in the injection of light from the light emitter into the optical structure, such as a light pipe.

Low profile interconnect for light emitter

This disclosure describes a wearable display system configured to project light to the eye(s) of a user to display virtual (e.g., augmented reality) image content in a vision field of the user. The system can include light source(s) that output light, spatial light modulator(s) that modulate the light to provide the virtual image content, and an eyepiece configured to convey the modulated light toward the eye(s) of the user. The eyepiece can include waveguide(s) and a plurality of in-coupling optical elements arranged on or in the waveguide(s) to in-couple the modulated light received from the spatial light modulator(s) into the waveguide(s) to be guided toward the user's eye(s). The spatial light modulator(s) may be movable, and/or may include movable components, to direct different portions of the modulated light toward different ones of the in-coupling optical elements at different times.

Tilting array based display

A method and system for increasing dynamic digitized wavefront resolution, i.e., the density of output beamlets, can include receiving a single collimated source light beam and producing multiple output beamlets spatially offset when out-coupled from a waveguide. The multiple output beamlets can be obtained by offsetting and replicating a collimated source light beam. Alternatively, the multiple output beamlets can be obtained by using a collimated incoming source light beam having multiple input beams with different wavelengths in the vicinity of the nominal wavelength of a particular color. The collimated incoming source light beam can be in-coupled into the eyepiece designed for the nominal wavelength. The input beams with multiple wavelengths take different paths when they undergo total internal reflection in the waveguide, which produces multiple output beamlets.

Method and system for high resolution digitized display

An optical device may include a light turning element. The optical device can include a first surface that is parallel to a horizontal axis and a second surface opposite to the first surface. The optical device may include a light module that includes a plurality of light emitters. The light module can be configured to combine light for the plurality of emitters. The optical device can further include a light input surface that is between the first and the second surfaces and is disposed with respect to the light module to receive light emitted from the plurality of emitters. The optical device may include an end reflector that is disposed on a side opposite the light input surface. The second surface may be inclined such that a height of the light input surface is less than a height of the side opposite the light input surface. The light coupled into the light turning element may be reflected by the end reflector and/or reflected from the second surface towards the first surface.

Methods, devices, and systems for illuminating spatial light modulators

In some embodiments, optical systems with a reflector and a lens proximate a light output opening of the reflector provide light output with high spatial uniformity and high efficiency. The reflectors are shaped to provide substantially angularly uniform light output and the lens is configured to transform this angularly uniform light output into spatially uniform light output. The light output may be directed into a spatial light modulator, which modulates the light to project an image.

Light output system with reflector and lens for highly spatially uniform light output

In some embodiments, a display system is provided. The display system comprises a plurality of light pipes and a plurality of light sources configured to emit light into the light pipes. The display system also comprises a spatial light modulator configured to modulate light received from the light pipes to form images. The display system may also comprise one or more waveguides configured to receive modulated light from the spatial light modulator and to relay that light to a viewer.

Display system having a plurality of light pipes for a plurality of light emitters

A method of reducing optical artifacts includes injecting a light beam generated by an illumination source into a polarizing beam splitter (PBS), reflecting a spatially defined portion of the light beam from a display panel, reflecting, at an interface in the PBS, the spatially defined portion of the light beam towards a projector lens, passing at least a portion of the spatially defined portion of the light beam through a circular polarizer disposed between the PBS and the projector lens, reflecting, by one or more elements of the projector lens, a return portion of the spatially defined portion of the light beam, and attenuating, at the circular polarizer, the return portion of the spatially defined portion of the light beam.

Method of reducing optical artifacts

An eyepiece for projecting an image includes a first planar waveguide positioned in a first lateral plane. The first planar waveguide comprises a first diffractive optical element (DOE) disposed at a first lateral position. The eyepiece also includes a second planar waveguide positioned in a second lateral plane adjacent to the first lateral plane. The second planar waveguide comprises a second DOE disposed at a second lateral position different from the first lateral position. The eyepiece further includes a third planar waveguide positioned in a third lateral plane adjacent to the second lateral plane. The third planar waveguide comprises a third DOE disposed at a third lateral position different from the first lateral position and the second lateral position. The eyepiece also includes an optical filter positioned between the second planar waveguide and the third planar waveguide. The optical filter is disposed at the third lateral position.

Projector architecture incorporating artifact mitigation

An optical device may include a light turning element. The optical device can include a first surface that is parallel to a horizontal axis and a second surface opposite to the first surface. The optical device may include a light module that includes a plurality of light emitters. The light module can be configured to combine light for the plurality of emitters. The optical device can further include a light input surface that is between the first and the second surfaces and is disposed with respect to the light module to receive light emitted from the plurality of emitters. The optical device may include an end reflector that is disposed on a side opposite the light input surface. The light coupled into the light turning element may be reflected by the end reflector and/or reflected from the second surface towards the first surface.

An optical system for an augmented reality head mounted display eyepiece that is configured to deliver images to the eye wherein the optical system includes optics. The optics are disposed so as to receive light output from the light source. The optics further arranged with respect to a spatial light modulator such that the light received from the light source passes through the optics and illuminates the spatial light modulator. The light illuminating the spatial light modulator is redirected back through the optics and is coupled into at least one waveguide through at least one in-coupling optical element. At least a portion of the coupled light is ejected from at least one waveguide by at least one out-coupling optical element and directed to the eye of the user.

Waveguide illuminator

A wearable display system includes one or more emissive micro-displays, e.g., micro-LED displays. The micro-displays may be monochrome micro-displays or full-color micro-displays. The micro-displays may include arrays of light emitters. Light collimators may be utilized to narrow the angular emission profile of light emitted by the light emitters. Where a plurality of emissive micro-displays is utilized, the micro-displays may be positioned at different sides of an optical combiner, e.g., an X-cube prism which receives light rays from different micro-displays and outputs the light rays from the same face of the cube. The optical combiner directs the light to projection optics, which outputs the light to an eyepiece that relays the light to a user's eye. The eyepiece may output the light to the user's eye with different amounts of wavefront divergence, to place virtual content on different depth planes.

Virtual and augmented reality display systems with emissive micro-displays

Very high refractive index (n>2.2) lightguide substrates enable the production of 70° field of view eyepieces with all three color primaries in a single eyepiece layer. Disclosed herein are viewing optics assembly architectures that make use of such eyepieces to reduce size and cost, simplifying manufacturing and assembly, and better-accommodating novel microdisplay designs.

Very high index eyepiece substrate-based viewing optics assembly architectures

A wearable display system includes a light projection system having one or more emissive microdisplays, e.g., micro-LED displays. The light projection system projects time-multiplexed left-eye and right-eye images, which pass through an optical router having a polarizer and a switchable polarization rotator. The optical router is synchronized with the generation of images by the light projection system to impart a first polarization to left-eye images and a second different polarization to right-eye images. Light of the first polarization is incoupled into an eyepiece having one or more waveguides for outputting light to one of the left and right eyes, while light of the second polarization may be incoupled into another eyepiece having one or more waveguides for outputting light to the other of the left and right eyes. Each eyepiece may output incoupled light with variable amounts of wavefront divergence, to elicit different accommodation responses from the user's eyes.

Augmented and virtual reality display systems with shared display for left and right eyes

An optical device may include a wedge-shaped light turning element. The optical device can include a first surface that is parallel to a horizontal axis and a second surface opposite to the first surface that is inclined with respect to the horizontal axis by a wedge angle. The optical device may include a light module that includes a plurality of light emitters. The light module can be configured to combine light for the plurality of emitters. The optical device can further include a light input surface that is between the first and the second surfaces and is disposed with respect to the light module to receive light emitted from the plurality of emitters. The optical device may include an end reflector that is disposed on a side opposite the light input surface. The second surface may be inclined such that a height of the light input surface is less than a height of the side opposite the light input surface. The light coupled into the wedge-shaped light turning element may be reflected by the end reflector and/or reflected from the second surface towards the first surface.

Growing community of inventors

Longmont, CO, United States of America

Kevin R Curtis