Image display apparatus

• US 5,589,956 A
• Filed: 04/04/1996
• Issued: 12/31/1996
• Est. Priority Date: 07/31/1992
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha (Canon Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha (Canon Inc.)
• Inventors: Taniguchi, Naosato, Morishima, Hideki, Kobayashi, Shin, Kaneko, Tadashi, Sudo, Toshiyuki, Matsumura, Susumu, Yoshinaga, Yoko
• Primary Examiner(s): Nguyen, Thong
• Assistant Examiner(s): Schuberg, Darren E.
• Application Number:
  US08/626,901
• Time in Patent Office: 271 Days
• Field of Search: 359/1, 359/13, 359/14, 359/15, 359/16, 359/22, 359/24, 359/32, 359/33, 359/25, 359/23, 345/4, 345/7-9, 345/32, 345/55, 345/58, 348/40
• US Class Current: 359/15
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 2027/0132 comprising binocular systems
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 2027/0145 creating an intermediate image
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 2027/0165 associated with a head-down display
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 2027/0178 Eyeglass type eyeglass details G02C
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 27/0101 characterised by optical features G02B27/0172 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 27/0103 comprising holographic elements
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 27/017 Head mounted
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 27/0172 characterised by optical features
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 5/32 Holograms used as optical elements
• CPC Class Codes: G03H 2001/2231 Reflection reconstruction
• CPC Class Codes: G03H 2001/306 Tiled identical sub-holograms

Abstract

An image display apparatus includes a plurality of image display elements respectively assigned to different partial image information regions of an image to be displayed, and a hologram optical element for diffracting a plurality of light beams from the plurality of image display elements and displaying the diffracted light beams as continuous single image information. By including a plurality of image display elements, each of the image display elements having a large number of pixels, and a hologram optical element for forming a synthesized image by diffracting a plurality of image light beams from the image display elements, the hologram optical element diffracts the plurality of image light beams so as to display a synthesized image by interpolating information between pixels of a plurality of images to be synthesized.

Claims

1. An image display apparatus comprising:

a plurality of image display elements; and

a hologram optical element provided with a plurality of elementary hologram optical elements having an optical power corresponding to said plurality of image display elements, wherein

each of said elementary hologram optical elements diffracts light from a corresponding one of said image display elements, said plurality of diffracted light traveling to a single pupil of an observer positioned at a predetermined position with respect to said hologram optical element, so that a virtual image by each said image display element is formed on the same virtual image plane to allow the observer to observe the virtual image as a single continuous virtual image.

2. An apparatus according to claim 1, wherein each of said elementary hologram optical elements is a volume phase type hologram.

3. An apparatus according to claim 1, wherein an incident angle formed when a light beam from one of said image display elements not corresponding to a certain elementary hologram optical element is incident on said certain elementary hologram optical element is different from a predetermined incident angle determined by angular selectivity characteristics of said one elementary hologram optical element.

4. An apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a spatial arrangement of said plurality of image display elements is different from a spatial arrangement of said plurality of elementary hologram optical elements corresponding to said image display elements.

5. An image display apparatus comprising:

a plurality of image display elements respectively assigned to different partial image information regions of an image to be displayed; and

a hologram optical element provided with a plurality of elementary hologram optical elements having an optical power corresponding to said plurality of image display elements, wherein

each of said elementary hologram optical elements diffracts light from a corresponding one of said image display elements, said plurality of diffracted light traveling to a single pupil of an observer positioned at a predetermined position with respect to said hologram optical element, so that a virtual image by each said image display element is formed on the same virtual image plane to allow the observer to observe the virtual image as a single continuous virtual image.

6. An apparatus according to claim 5, wherein a pixel density of said image display element assigned to a central image information region of the image to be displayed is different from pixel densities of said image display elements assigned to other partial image information regions.

7. An apparatus according to claim 5 a distance between said hologram optical element and said image display element assigned to a central image information region of the image to be displayed is different from distances between said hologram optical element and said image display elements assigned to other partial image information regions.

8. An image display apparatus comprising:

a plurality of image display elements, each of said image display elements having a plurality of pixels; and

a hologram optical element provided with a plurality of elementary hologram optical elements having an optical power corresponding to said plurality of image display elements, wherein

each of said elementary hologram optical elements diffracts light from a corresponding one of said image display elements, said plurality of diffracted light traveling to a single pupil of an observer positioned at a predetermined position with respect to said hologram optical element, so that a virtual image by each said image display element is formed on the same virtual image plane to allow the observer to observe the virtual image as a single continuous virtual image, and

wherein said hologram optical element diffracts the plurality of image light beams so as to display a synthesized image by interpolating information between pixels of a plurality of images to be synthesized.

9. An apparatus according to claim 8, wherein the synthesized image is displayed on a predetermined plane via said hologram optical element as a virtual image.

10. An apparatus according to claim 8, wherein said hologram optical element is formed by multiple exposure.

11. An apparatus according to claim 8, wherein said elementary hologram optical elements correspond in number to said plurality of image display elements.

12. An apparatus according to claim 8, wherein said hologram optical element has selectivity of wave length for reflexively-diffracting only a light beam having a specific wavelength component of light beams from said image display elements, and transmitting light beams having other wavelength components.

13. An image display apparatus according to claim 8, wherein the synthesized image is displayed on a predetermined plane via said hologram optical element as a real image.

14. A 3-dimensional image display apparatus, which allows recognition of a 3-dimensional image by presenting two pieces of image information having a parallax therebetween to two systems for right and left eyes, comprising:

first image display means for the right eye;

second image display means for the left eye;

each of said first and second image display means having a plurality of image display elements, and said plurality of image display elements being assigned to different partial image information regions of an image to be displayed,

first deflection means for the right eye; and

second deflection means for the left eye,

each of said first and second deflection means having a plurality of elementary hologram optical elements having an optical power corresponding to said plurality of image display elements, wherein

each of said elementary hologram optical elements diffracts light from a corresponding one of said image display elements, said plurality of diffracted light traveling to a single pupil of an observer positioned at a predetermined position with respect to said first and second deflection means, so that a virtual image by each said image display element is formed on the same virtual image plane to allow the observer to observe the virtual image as a single continuous virtual image.

15. A 3-dimensional image display apparatus, which allows recognition of a 3-dimensional image by presenting two pieces of image information having a parallax therebetween to two systems for right and left eyes, comprising:

first image display means for the right eye;

second image display means for the left eye;

each of said first and second image display means having a plurality of image display elements, and each of said plurality of image display elements having a plurality of pixels,

first deflection means for the right eye; and

second deflection means for the left eye,

each of said first and second deflection means having a plurality of elementary hologram optical elements having an optical power corresponding to said plurality of image display elements, wherein

each of said elementary hologram optical elements diffracts light from a corresponding one of said image display elements, said plurality of diffracted light traveling to a single pupil of an observer disposed at a predetermined position with respect to said first and second deflection means, so that a virtual image by each said each image display element is formed on the same virtual image plane to allow the observer to observe the virtual image as a single continuous virtual image.