OPO-based compact laser projection display

In this paper we discuss our red, green, and blue (RGB) optical parametric oscillator (OPO) based laser projection display. The complete projection display consists of two subsystems, the RGB-OPO laser head and the light modulation unit. The RGB lights from rack-mounted laser head are fibers coupled to the projection unit for independent placement. The light source consists of a diode-pumped pump laser and a LBO-based OPO. Based on our Nd:YLF gain-module design, the pump laser is frequency doubled to serve as the pump source for the OPO. The unconverted pump power is recycled as the green light for projection. The singly resonant, non-critically phase-matched (NCPM) OPO has, to date, generated 13 W of 898-nm signal power and an estimated 9.3 W of intra-cavity idler power at 1256 rim. With similar to76% of pump depletion, the power of the residual green light for projection is about 5.8 W. We have extra-cavity doubled the signal to produce similar to3.5 W of 449-nm blue light and intra-cavity doubled the idler to produce similar to6 W of 628-nm red light. The OPO-based RGB source generates about 4000 lumens of D65-balanced white light. The overall electrical power (excluding the water chiller) luminous efficiency is about 11 lumens/Watt. The light modulation unit is based on a commercially available JVCs three-panel D-ILA (reflective LCD) projector with the arc-lamp removed and extensive modifications. The projector has a native resolution of 1365 x 1024 and the expected on screen lumens from our laser display is about 1200 lumens.