Evans & Sutherland has incorporated nanopixel technology in its new ESLP Laser Video Projector. The company claims the nanopixel technology utilises cool, efficient solid-state laser light sources to deliver good resolution, brightness and contrast.
The second-generation ESLP introduces a hybrid arrangement of commercially available NECSEL diode lasers from Arasor, along with E&S’ own solid-state fibre laser technology. By using laser light sources, the ESLP is able to produce a much wider range of hues and colours. These continuous wave lasers are extremely efficient and reliable, and do not have the potentially damaging high power densities associated with other pulsed lasers.
Furthermore, the power output and wavelength of these lasers do not vary over time, thereby maintaining optimum performance throughout the life of the system, and eliminating the need for constant colour matching and tuning.
The ESLP requires no special power or environmental conditioning. And, because the E&S lasers are based on telecommunications technology and solid-state semiconductors, they are reliable and affordable. The laser light sources have lifetimes in excess of 30,000 hours.
The ESLP takes advantage of the nanopixel light modulator, which is a MEMS (micro electro-mechanical system) device fabricated on a silicon microchip. On this chip are thousands of moving reflective elements arranged in a line array. This array corresponds to an entire column of pixels on the display (up to 4096), and thereby allows all of those pixels to be drawn simultaneously.
By sweeping an entire column of light across all pixel rows of the image, the system can achieve unprecedented levels of resolution. The only moving mechanical part in the optical path is a horizontal scan mirror, which operates at 60 – 120 Hz refresh frequency.