Company type | Public |
---|---|
Industry | Electronics |
Founded | 1998 (as Micropix) 2004 (as CRLO Displays Ltd) 2005 (as Forth Dimension Displays) 2011 (acquired by Kopin Corporation but remained as Forth Dimension Displays until 2024) |
Headquarters | Dalgety Bay, Fife, Scotland, United Kingdom |
Products | Microdisplays |
Revenue | US$ 6 million (2010) |
Number of employees | 30 (2021) |
Website | www.kopin.com |
Forth Dimension Displays (ForthDD) is a British optoelectronics company based in Dalgety Bay, Fife, United Kingdom. Since January 2024 the products have been integrated into the portfolio of its parent company Kopin.
Founded in 1998 as Micropix and known later as CRL Opto and CRLO Displays, ForthDD makes high resolution microdisplays and spatial light modulators (SLM). The microdisplays are used in near-to-eye (NTE) applications for the military training and simulation, medical imagery, virtual reality and high definition image processing industries. The SLMs are used for structured light projection in 3D optical metrology and 3D super resolution microscopy. Previously funded by venture capitalists, in January 2011 ForthDD was acquired by Kopin Corporation, a NASDAQ listed company based in Westborough, Massachusetts, USA. [1]
ForthDD's microdisplays and SLMs are based on a proprietary, high-speed, reflective ferroelectric liquid crystal on silicon (LCOS) platform, protected by a number of patents. For the generation of colour and greyscale, the microdisplays use a process called Time Domain Imaging (TDI™). [2] This process involves rendering the red, green and blue colour components which make up an image sequentially over time at high speed. This happens so fast that the human visual system integrates the components into a single, full colour image. This enables the microdisplays to use the same pixel mirror for all three colour components, and avoids the artifacts associated with sub-pixels. [3]
LCOS Technology History
The first LCOS device originated in 1973, followed by a development of a liquid-crystal light valve ten years later. It was not until 1993, that a microdisplay with a resolution sufficient for use as a display was reported by DisplayTech (now Citizen Finedevices). It was capable of full red–green–blue image generation, enabled by the use of a fast-switching ferroelectric liquid crystal.
During the early part of the 21st century, many microdisplay manufacturers focused on applying the technology to rear-projection-based high-definition television (HDTV) systems. However, due to developments in the manufacturing process of large-panel Liquid Crystal Display Televisions (LCD TVs) and resulting drops in the cost of components, LCD based TVs matured into the more popular consumer choice. By late 2007 almost all microdisplay Rear Projection Television (RPTV) manufacturers had withdrawn their TVs from production. [4]
As a result, a number of microdisplay manufacturers either disappeared completely or started working on other technologies. Some companies diversified, whilst others concentrated on a niche market instead.
ForthDD/Kopin is a supplier of microdisplays for Near-To-Eye (NTE) applications and spatial light modulators for fringe projection systems. [5]
The product portfolio comprises full colour, all digital WQHD (2560 x 1440 pixels), 2K (2048 x 2048 pixels), QXGA (2048 × 1536), SXGA (1280 × 1024) and WXGA (1280 × 768) microdisplays. These products are available as chipsets and board level based products. [6]
ForthDD's/Kopin's microdisplays are typically used in the following application areas: Training and Virtual Environments, Medical Systems and 3D Optical Metrology. Later system developments have allowed expansion into markets using phase modulation, Super-resolution microscopy. [7]
Training and Virtual Environments
ForthDD's/Kopin's microdisplays can be found in various training and simulation applications across military and civilian environments within devices such as virtual binoculars, monocular viewers and most commonly, immersive HMDs [8] (for example, in NVIS HMDs [9] [10] ). By using HMDs to immerse the user in the virtual 3D environment, different scenarios, which may be too dangerous or expensive to replicate in the real world, can be explored.
3D Optical Metrology
ForthDD's/Kopin's microdisplays are used for fast fringe projection quality inspection systems like 3D Automated Optical Inspection and 3D Solder Paste Inspection placed in-line surface mount production lines.
Medical systems
Microdisplays can be used in high-end medical/surgical microscopes in order to either replace the optical image or overlay data on the image (e.g. an MRI scan). [11] When combined with a microdisplay the microscope becomes a more powerful tool and permits users to navigate the desired surface in real time with a very high degree of accuracy. [12]
Film and Television
The microdisplays are used in Electronic Viewfinders (EVFs) for HD digital cinema cameras. [13] ARRI used ForthDD's technology in its EVF1. [14]
A liquid-crystal display (LCD) is a flat-panel display or other electronically modulated optical device that uses the light-modulating properties of liquid crystals combined with polarizers to display information. Liquid crystals do not emit light directly but instead use a backlight or reflector to produce images in color or monochrome.
An LCD projector is a type of video projector for displaying video, images or computer data on a screen or other flat surface. It is a modern equivalent of the slide projector or overhead projector. To display images, LCD projectors typically send light from a metal-halide lamp through a prism or series of dichroic filters that separates light to three polysilicon panels – one each for the red, green and blue components of the video signal. As polarized light passes through the panels, individual pixels can be opened to allow light to pass or closed to block the light. The combination of open and closed pixels can produce a wide range of colors and shades in the projected image.
Liquid crystal on silicon is a miniaturized reflective active-matrix liquid-crystal display or "microdisplay" using a liquid crystal layer on top of a silicon backplane. It is also known as a spatial light modulator. LCoS initially was developed for projection televisions, but has since found additional uses in wavelength selective switching, structured illumination, near-eye displays and optical pulse shaping.
A video projector is an image projector that receives a video signal and projects the corresponding image onto a projection screen using a lens system. Video projectors use a very bright ultra-high-performance lamp, Xenon arc lamp, metal halide lamp, LED or solid state blue, RB, RGB or fiber-optic lasers to provide the illumination required to project the image. Most modern projectors can correct any curves, blurriness and other inconsistencies through manual settings.
A spatial light modulator (SLM) is a device that can control the intensity, phase, or polarization of light in a spatially varying manner. A simple example is an overhead projector transparency. Usually when the term SLM is used, it means that the transparency can be controlled by a computer.
The display resolution or display modes of a digital television, computer monitor, or other display device is the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by different factors in cathode ray tube (CRT) displays, flat-panel displays and projection displays using fixed picture-element (pixel) arrays.
A television set or television receiver is an electronic device for the purpose of viewing and hearing television broadcasts, or as a computer monitor. It combines a tuner, display, and loudspeakers. Introduced in the late 1920s in mechanical form, television sets became a popular consumer product after World War II in electronic form, using cathode ray tube (CRT) technology. The addition of color to broadcast television after 1953 further increased the popularity of television sets in the 1960s, and an outdoor antenna became a common feature of suburban homes. The ubiquitous television set became the display device for the first recorded media for consumer use in the 1970s, such as Betamax, VHS; these were later succeeded by DVD. It has been used as a display device since the first generation of home computers and dedicated video game consoles in the 1980s. By the early 2010s, flat-panel television incorporating liquid-crystal display (LCD) technology, especially LED-backlit LCD technology, largely replaced CRT and other display technologies. Modern flat-panel TVs are typically capable of high-definition display and can also play content from a USB device. Starting in the late 2010s, most flat-panel TVs began to offer 4K and 8K resolutions.
A volumetric display device is a display device that forms a visual representation of an object in three physical dimensions, as opposed to the planar image of traditional screens that simulate depth through a number of different visual effects. One definition offered by pioneers in the field is that volumetric displays create 3D imagery via the emission, scattering, or relaying of illumination from well-defined regions in (x,y,z) space.
A head-mounted display (HMD) is a display device, worn on the head or as part of a helmet, that has a small display optic in front of one or each eye. HMDs have many uses including gaming, aviation, engineering, and medicine.
A handheld projector is an image projector in a handheld device. It was developed as a computer display device for compact portable devices such as mobile phones, personal digital assistants, and digital cameras, which have sufficient storage capacity to handle presentation materials but are too small to accommodate a display screen that an audience can see easily. Handheld projectors involve miniaturized hardware, and software that can project digital images onto a nearby viewing surface.
An active shutter 3D system is a technique of displaying stereoscopic 3D images. It works by only presenting the image intended for the left eye while blocking the right eye's view, then presenting the right-eye image while blocking the left eye, and repeating this so rapidly that the interruptions do not interfere with the perceived fusion of the two images into a single 3D image.
The grating light valve (GLV) is a "micro projection" technology that operates using a dynamically adjustable diffraction grating. It competes with other light valve technologies such as Digital Light Processing (DLP) and liquid crystal on silicon (LCoS) for implementation in video projector devices such as rear-projection televisions. The use of microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) in optical applications, which is known as optical MEMS or micro-opto-electro-mechanical structures (MOEMS), has enabled the possibility to combine the mechanical, electrical, and optical components in tiny-scale.
RealD 3D is a digital stereoscopic projection technology made and sold by RealD. It is currently the most widely used technology for watching 3D films in theaters. Worldwide, RealD 3D is installed in more than 26,500 auditoriums by approximately 1,200 exhibitors in 72 countries as of June 2015.
Fulldome refers to immersive dome-based video display environments. The dome, horizontal or tilted, is filled with real-time (interactive) or pre-rendered (linear) computer animations, live capture images, or composited environments.
Liquid Fidelity is a "microdisplay" technology applied in high-definition televisions. It incorporates Liquid Crystal on Silicon technology capable of producing true 1080p resolution with two million pixels on a single display chip.
A structured-light 3D scanner is a device that measures the three-dimensional shape of an object by projecting light patterns—such as grids or stripes—onto it and capturing their deformation with cameras. This technique allows for precise surface reconstruction by analyzing the displacement of the projected patterns, which are processed into detailed 3D models using specialized algorithms.
Ferroelectric liquid-crystal display (FLCD) is a display technology based on the ferroelectric properties of chiral smectic liquid crystals as proposed in 1980 by Clark and Lagerwall. Reportedly discovered in 1975, several companies pursued the development of FLCD technologies, notably Canon and Central Research Laboratories (CRL), along with others including Seiko, Sharp, Mitsubishi and GEC. Canon and CRL pursued different technological approaches with regard to the switching of display cells, these providing the individual pixels or subpixels, and the production of intermediate pixel intensities between full transparency and full opacity, these differing approaches being adopted by other companies seeking to develop FLCD products.
Electrically operated display devices have developed from electromechanical systems for display of text, up to all-electronic devices capable of full-motion 3D color graphic displays. Electromagnetic devices, using a solenoid coil to control a visible flag or flap, were the earliest type, and were used for text displays such as stock market prices and arrival/departure display times. The cathode ray tube was the workhorse of text and video display technology for several decades until being displaced by plasma, liquid crystal (LCD), and solid-state devices such as thin-film transistors (TFTs), LEDs and OLEDs. With the advent of metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistors (MOSFETs), integrated circuit (IC) chips, microprocessors, and microelectronic devices, many more individual picture elements ("pixels") could be incorporated into one display device, allowing graphic displays and video.
Himax Technologies, Inc. is a fabless semiconductor manufacturer headquartered in Tainan City, Taiwan founded on 12 June 2001. The company is publicly traded and listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market under the symbol HIMX. Himax Technologies Limited functions as a holding under the Cayman Islands Companies Law.
The Kopin Corporation is a Westborough, Massachusetts-based electronics manufacturer, best known for its display devices for mobile electronics.