Joseph Raymond Bietry

25.4: A Laser-Based Digital Cinema Projector

A fully functional DCI capable prototype Laser Digital Cinema Projector has been developed by Eastman Kodak Company using an innovative optical architecture. The prototype demonstrates the potential of the long life and lower operational costs of lasers while minimizing the incremental costs to manufacture. The projector provides over 10,000:1 contrast ratio, an increased color gamut, and an integrated 3D capability that is significantly brighter than is common today in cinema. These attributes are delivered while addressing the impact of laser speckle, eye safety, and other potential impediments to commercialization.

Design and fabrication of diffractive optics at Eastman Kodak Company

Diffractive optics allow for increased optical performance, decreased size and weight, and decreased systems costs in numerous applications. Many types of optics can be fabricated using diffractive surfaces which are not possible, or not cost competitive, using standard refractive lenses. Diffractive optics technology has been developed at Kodak to the point where low cost, mass produced, plastic-molded diffractive optics are available on a commercial basis. Rotationally symmetric, aspheric, refractive/diffractive hybrid lenses have been injection molded in 100,000 part test runs and the lenses demonstrated consistent quality throughout the test. In this paper we will discuss design, analysis, and fabrication of diffractive optics for some typical applications. These applications include diffractive hybrid achromats for visual applications, such as fixed focus and zoom camera lenses, achromatized laser diode objectives, asymmetric anamorphic concentrating and spectral filtering lenses for rangefinding and autofocus applications, the use of diffractive optics in high quality, grayscale laser writers as beam deflectors and F(theta) lenses. Kodaks diamond turning capability for fabricating diffractive optics and our capacity for fabricating plastic injection mold tooling utilizing diamond turning is discussed. Finally, a discussion of our meteorology technology for examining diffractive surfaces will be discussed.