Design Techniques and Applications Fields for Digital Micro-optics

Level: Intermediate Length: 4 hours Format: In-Person Lecture Intended Audience: Scientists, engineers, technicians, or managers who wish to learn more about how to design, model and fabricate micro-optics, diffractive optics and hybrid optics, and how such optics can be integrated effectively in consumer products. Basic knowledge in optics is assumed. Attendees will benefit maximally by attending the companion SPIE short course SC454 “Fabrication Technologies for Micro- and Nano-Optics”. Description: This course provides an overview of the various design and fabrication techniques available to the optical engineer for micro / nano optics, diffractive optics and holographic optics. Emphasis is put on DFM (Design For Manufacturing) for wafer scale fabrication, Diamond Turning Machining (DTM) and holographic origination. The course shows how design techniques can be tailored to address specific fabrication techniques' requirements and production equipment constraints. The course also addresses various current application fields as in display, imaging, sensing and metrology. It is built around 4 sections: (1) design, (2) modeling, (3) fabrication/mass production and (4) application fields. 1) The course reviews various design techniques used in standard optical CAD tools such as Zemax and CodeV to design Diffractive Optical Elements (DOEs), Micro-Lens Arrays (MLAs), hybrid optics and refractive micro-optics, Holographic Optical Element (HOE), as well as numerical design techniques for Computer Generated Holograms (CGHs). 2) Modeling single micro optics or complex micro-optical systems including MLAs, DOEs, HOEs, CGHs, and other hybrid elements can be a difficult task when using classical ray tracing algorithms. We review techniques using physical optics propagation to model all diffraction effects, along with systematic or random fabrication errors, multi-order propagation and other effects which cannot be modeled accurately through ray tracing. 3) Following the design (1) and modeling tasks (2), the optical engineer needs to perform a DFM process so that the resulting design can be fabricated by the desired manufacturing partner/vendor over a specific equipment. We will review such DFM for wafer fab via optical lithography (tape-out process), single point diamond turning (SPDT), or holographic recording specification. The course also reviews fracturing techniques to produce GDSII layout files for specific lithographic fabrication techniques and manufacturing equipment. 4) This section reviews current application fields for which micro-optics are providing an especially good match, quasi impossible to implement through traditional optics, such as depth mapping sensing (structured illumination based sensor) and augmented reality display (waveguide grating combiner optics). Applications examples in high resolution incremental/absolute optical encoders are also reviewed. Design and modeling techniques will be described for such applications fields, and optical hardware sub-system implementations and micro-optic elements will be shown and demonstrated at the end of the course. Learning Outcomes: This course will enable you to: - review the various micro-optics / diffractive optics design techniques used today in popular optical design software such as Zemax and CodeV - decide which design software would be best suited for a particular micro-optics design task - evaluate the various constraints linked to either ray tracing or physical optics propagation techniques, and develop custom numerical propagation algorithms - model systematic and random fabrication errors, especially for lithographic fabrication - compare the various constraints linked to mask layout generation for lithographic fabrication (GDSII) - review the different GDSII fabrication layout file architectures, and how to adapt them to various lithographic fabrication techniques such as the ones described in SC454 - learn about current hot application fields in consumer products, targeted to Augmented and Mixed Reality headsets, and review a few specific consumer products architectures such as the Kinect 360 and the Kinect One 3D sensors as well as the Hololens V1 MR headset and the Magic Leap One MR Headset. Instructor(s): Bernard C. Kress has been involved in the field of optics and specifically micro-optics for the past two decades as an associate professor, instructor, author, entrepreneur, engineer, team manager and engineering director. He has been instrumental in developing new optical technologies that have been included in various industrial, defense and consumer products, in fields such as laser materials processing, optical anti-counterfeiting, biotech sensors, optical telecom devices, optical data storage, optical computing, motion sensors, displays, depth map sensors, and more recently head-up and head mounted displays (smart glasses, AR, VR and MR). His is specifically involved in the field of micro-optics, wafer scale optics, holography and nanophotonics. Bernard has published numerous books and book chapters on micro-optics and has more than 50 patents granted worldwide. He is a short course instructor for the SPIE and is involved in numerous SPIE conferences as technical committee member and conference chair. He is chairing the SPIE Digital Optical Technologies and the SPIE AR/VR/MR conference series. He has been an SPIE fellow since 2013 and served as an SPIE Board Director from 2016 to 2019. He was elected in 2020 to the presidential chain of the SPIE, and serves currently as its Vice-President (2021). During the past decade, Bernard has been the principal optical architect on the Google Glass project and the partner optical architect on the Hololens team at Microsoft for the past decade. He is currently the Director for XR Engineering at Google Labs in Mountain View. Event: SPIE AR | VR | MR 2023 Course Held: 28 January 2023