Adaptive liquid crystal lens arrays for Integral Imaging

Integral Imaging offers an interesting alternative to holography for recording and displaying three dimensional information. For 3D displays large area refractive lens arrays with flexible adjustable optical design parameters are needed. To our knowledge, commercial lens arrays are not able to satisfy these requirements, therefore we have developed an inexpensive manufacturing tool that can produce large area lens arrays in polymers like PC or PMMA. Our system allows the combination of different lens types (convex, concave, spheric, aspheric) with user defined focal length, aperture and position. The fabrication method and the optical quality of the lenses are presented. The next step is to apply liquid crystal techniques that allows to tune the focal length of the lenses dynamically. We expect that a significant improvement of Integral Imaging systems is achievable. Although the tool is designed for Integral Imaging it can be applied to other lens array applications.