Monochrome and color digital display systems and methods for implementing the same
First Claim
Patent Images
1. A spatial light modulator (SLM) comprising:
- an array of pixel elements;
an array of memory cells coupled to the array of pixel elements, wherein each memory cell controls the state of one of the pixel elements; and
a blanking signal source, coupled to the pixel elements, for simultaneously forcing all pixel elements to an off state in response to a blanking signal without clearing the content of the memory cells.
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Abstract
Methods and apparatus for producing a pulse-width-modulated (PWM) grayscale or color image using a binary spatial light modulator. By staggering and re-quantizing the PWM intervals to a clock of a period based on the frame time divided by number of rows in the display, the system'"'"'s peak bandwidth requirements are optimized for displays of arbitrary resolution and arbitrary choice of PWM waveform. Additionally, a gating circuit increases the optical efficiency of a spatial light modulator using this PWM method in a field-sequential color system by reducing the duration of the blanking period between color fields.
47 Citations
50 Claims
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1. A spatial light modulator (SLM) comprising:
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an array of pixel elements;
an array of memory cells coupled to the array of pixel elements, wherein each memory cell controls the state of one of the pixel elements; and
a blanking signal source, coupled to the pixel elements, for simultaneously forcing all pixel elements to an off state in response to a blanking signal without clearing the content of the memory cells. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3)
a plurality of gating circuits, each gating circuit being coupled to one of the pixel elements;
a signal line coupled to each gating circuit for simultaneously applying the blanking signal to each gating circuit.
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3. The SLM of claim 1, wherein the blanking signal source includes a switching circuit coupled to each of the pixel elements for providing a bias voltage to the pixel elements, wherein when the bias voltage is at a first level the state of each pixel is controlled by the control voltage from the respective memory cell, and wherein when the bias voltage is at a second level the pixel elements are in an off state, wherein when the blanking signal is applied to the switching circuit, the switching circuit switches to the bias voltage such that the pixel elements are simultaneously forced to the off state.
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4. A method for displaying an image comprising:
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providing a spatial light modulator having a plurality of pixels;
displaying a plurality of frames on the spatial light modulator, each frame comprising a plurality of bitplanes, each bitplane having a corresponding bitplane weighting, and each bitplane weighting corresponds to a waveform segment duration;
subdividing each frame into a plurality of stagger intervals;
subdividing each stagger interval into a plurality of subintervals;
during each subinterval, updating a subset of said plurality of pixels with pixel data corresponding to the subset of pixels and a bitplane of the plurality of bitplanes;
wherein the stagger intervals are not an integer multiple of the shortest waveform segment duration. - View Dependent Claims (5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15)
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16. A method for displaying an image comprising:
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providing a spatial light modulator having a plurality of pixels;
displaying a plurality of frames on the spatial light modulator, each frame comprising a plurality of bitplanes;
subdividing each frame into a plurality of stagger intervals;
subdividing each stagger interval into a plurality of subintervals;
during each subinterval, updating a subset of said plurality of pixels with pixel data corresponding to the subset of pixels and a bitplane of the plurality of bitplanes;
wherein the updatings within the corresponding stagger interval are irregularly distributed within the stagger interval.
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17. A method for displaying an image comprising a plurality of bitplanes, each bitplane having a bitplane weighting, the method comprising:
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displaying a plurality of frames on a spatial light modulator having a plurality of pixels;
wherein during a frame of the plurality of frames, a pixel is updated at a plurality of update events, each of the update events corresponding to a bitplane of the image;
wherein the update events are temporally separated by a plurality of bitplane durations, the bitplane durations being proportional to the bitplane weightings;
wherein the plurality of bitplane durations has a shortest bitplane duration; and
wherein a bitplane duration of the plurality of bitplane durations is not an integer multiple of the shortest bitplane duration.
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18. A spatial light modulator comprising
an array of light modulating pixels; -
an external data bus;
a FIFO buffer between the external data bus and the array of light modulating pixels;
wherein the FIFO buffer is of a size sufficient to store N rows, where N is the number of bitplanes in the image to be displayed;
and wherein the bus is capable of loading rows of pixel data into said FIFO buffer during a stagger interval, and wherein the FIFO buffer is capable of subsequently loading the rows of pixel data into the array of light modulating pixels at an irregular rate during the stagger interval.
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19. A spatial light modulator comprising
an array of light modulating pixels; -
an external data bus; and
a FIFO Buffer between the external data bus and the array of light modulating pixels;
wherein the FIFO buffer is constructed so as to allow data to be loaded from an external controller via said external data bus into the FIFO buffer at a constant rate within each stagger interval, and constructed so as to allow data loading from the FIFO buffer to the array of light modulating pixels at an irregular rate.
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20. A method for displaying an image comprising;
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providing a spatial light modulator having a plurality of pixels;
displaying a plurality of frames on the spatial light modulator, each frame comprising a plurality of bitplanes;
subdividing each frame into a plurality of stagger intervals;
subdividing each stagger interval into a plurality of subintervals;
during each subinterval, updating a subset of said plurality of pixels with pixel data corresponding to the subset of pixels and a bitplane of the plurality of bitplanes;
wherein said pixel data is stored in a buffer via a first bus, and wherein the subsets of the plurality of pixels are updated with the pixel data stored in the buffer via a second bus coupling the buffer to the plurality of pixels; and
wherein the subintervals are irregular within the stagger intervals, and the data signals from the buffer are provided to each subset of pixels at irregular subintervals.
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21. A method for displaying an image comprising:
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providing a spatial light modulator having a plurality of pixels;
displaying a plurality of frames on the spatial light modulator, each frame comprising a plurality of bitplanes;
subdividing each frame into a plurality of stagger intervals;
subdividing each stagger interval into a plurality of subintervals;
during each subinterval, updating a subset of said plurality of pixels with pixel data corresponding to the subset of pixels and a bitplane of the plurality of bitplanes;
wherein said pixel data is stored in a buffer via a first bus, and wherein the subsets of the plurality of pixels are updated with the pixel data stored in the buffer via a second bus coupling the buffer to the plurality of pixels; and
wherein the updating with pixel data in the first bus is slower than that in the second bus.
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22. A method for displaying an image comprising:
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providing a spatial light modulator having a plurality of pixels;
displaying a plurality of frames on the spatial light modulator, each frame comprising a plurality of bitplanes;
subdividing each frame into a plurality of stagger intervals;
subdividing each stagger interval into a plurality of subintervals;
during each subinterval, updating a subset of said plurality of pixels with pixel data corresponding to the subset of pixels and a bitplane of the plurality of bitplanes;
wherein the average number of pixel subsets that are updated within the stagger intervals is greater than or equal to the bit depth.
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23. A method comprising,
providing a pulse width modulation waveform to drive a plurality of pixels in a spatial light modulator; -
the waveform comprising repeating frame durations within which the waveform is modulated on and off for a plurality of frame segments of predetermined durations within a frame;
wherein a frame segment having the shortest length in time is a least significant bit;
wherein the plurality of pixels is made up of a plurality of pixel subsets, where the waveform is staggered by a stagger interval between pixel subsets; and
wherein the stagger interval is not equal to an integer multiple of the least significant bit duration. - View Dependent Claims (24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46)
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47. A method for operating a spatial light modulator (SLM) comprising:
providing a spatial light modulator having an array of pixel elements and an array of memory cells coupled to the array of pixel elements, wherein each memory cell controls the state of one of the pixel elements;
providing a blanking signal during a blanking interval to the pixel elements to simultaneously force all pixel elements to an off state; and
preloading the spatial light modulator with data during the blanking interval, wherein the blanking signal is provided by a plurality of gating circuits, each gating circuit being coupled to one of the pixel elements; and
a signal line coupled to each gating circuit for simultaneously applying the blanking signal to each gating circuit.
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48. A method for operating a spatial light modulator (SLM) comprising:
providing a spatial light modulator having an array of pixel elements and an array of memory cells coupled to the array of pixel elements, wherein each memory cell controls the state of one of the pixel elements;
providing a blanking signal during a blanking interval to the pixel elements to simultaneously force all pixel elements to an off state; and
preloading the spatial light modulator with data during the blanking interval, wherein the blanking signal is provided by a switching circuit coupled to each of the pixel elements for providing a bias voltage to the pixel elements, wherein when the bias voltage is at a first level the state of each pixel is controlled by the control voltage from the respective memory cell, and wherein when the bias voltage is at a second level the pixel elements are in an off state, wherein when the blanking signal is applied to the switching circuit, the switching circuit switches to the bias voltage such that the pixel elements are simultaneously forced to the off state.
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49. A method for displaying an image comprising:
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providing a spatial light modulator having a plurality of pixels;
displaying a plurality of frames on the spatial light modulator, each frame comprising a plurality of bitplanes;
subdividing each frame into a plurality of stagger intervals;
subdividing each stagger interval into a plurality of subintervals;
during each subinterval, updating a row or column of said plurality of pixels with pixel corresponding to the row or column of pixels and a bitplane of the plurality of bitplanes;
wherein the updating of the row or column is in a spatially non-sequential order.
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50. A method for displaying an image comprising:
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providing a spatial light modulator having a plurality of pixels;
displaying a plurality of frames on the spatial light modulator, each frame comprising a plurality of bitplanes, each bitplane having a corresponding bitplane weighting, and each bitplane weighting corresponds to a waveform segment duration;
subdividing each frame into a plurality of stagger intervals;
subdividing each stagger interval into a plurality of subintervals;
during each subinterval, updating a subset of said plurality of pixels with pixel data corresponding to the subset of pixels and a bitplane of the plurality of bitplanes;
wherein, during a frame, a subset of said plurality of pixels is updated at a sequence of subset update events, and wherein the ordering of bitplanes of the update events in a subinterval is different than the ordering of bitplanes of the update events of said subset of pixels during a frame.
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Specification