Patents by Inventor Hirotoshi Ichikawa

Hirotoshi Ichikawa has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 7646527
    Abstract: Additional control flexibilities to generate more gray scales for an image display system is achieved by controlling the intensity distribution of the light projection from a light source to a deflecting mirror to further coordinate with the control of the intermediate states of the deflecting mirror. The control light source intensity distribution can provide incident light with wide varieties of intensity distributions including non-uniform, symmetrical and non-symmetrical, different distributions of polarizations, various cross sectional shapes of the incident lights and other combinations of all of the above variations. More stable and better control of gray scale control is also achieved by optimizing the intensity distributions of the incident light to produce the best visual effects of the image display.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 18, 2007
    Date of Patent: January 12, 2010
    Assignees: Silicon Quest Kabushiki-Kaisha, Olympus Corporation
    Inventors: Fusao Ishii, Yoshihiro Maeda, Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Kazuma Arai
  • Patent number: 7643195
    Abstract: A mirror device comprises: an electrode placed on a substrate; a hinge which is connected to the electrode and which has a flat part at an end part on a side opposite to the electrode; and a mirror placed on the flat part, wherein a protrusion part formed on the flat part is placed between the flat part and the mirror.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 25, 2008
    Date of Patent: January 5, 2010
    Assignees: Silicon Quest Kabushiki-Kaisha, Olympus Corporation
    Inventors: Fusao Ishii, Yoshihiro Maeda, Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Naoya Sugimoto
  • Publication number: 20090273825
    Abstract: The present invention aims at providing a mirror device, comprising a plurality of mirror elements, wherein each of the mirror elements comprises a deflectable mirror, and an elastic member for deflectably supporting the mirror, wherein the mirror allows to be controlled under a first deflection control state in which incident light is reflected toward a first direction, a second deflection control state in which the incident light is reflected toward a second direction, and a third deflection control state in which the mirror oscillates between the first deflection control state and second deflection control state, wherein the mirror device reproduces gradations by combining the first through third deflection control states, and the natural oscillation cycle T of the oscillation system constituted by the mirror and elastic member satisfies: 110 [?sec]>T=2?*?(I/K)>2 [?sec], where “I” is the moment of rotation of the oscillation system and “K” is the spring constant of the elastic member.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 4, 2008
    Publication date: November 5, 2009
    Inventors: Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Yoshihiro Maeda, Fusao Ishil
  • Patent number: 7605971
    Abstract: A mirror device comprises plural mirror elements, each of which comprises a mirror for reflecting illumination light emitted from a light source, a hinge for supporting the mirror placed on a substrate, a hinge structural body for supporting the hinge, and electrodes for controlling a deflection direction of the mirror placed on the substrate, and in each of which the hinge is placed so as to traverse the edge of the mirror or the border with an adjacent mirror. Also enabled is a configuration of a projection apparatus, which comprises the mirror device.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 18, 2007
    Date of Patent: October 20, 2009
    Assignees: Silicon Quest Kabushiki-Kaisha, Olympus Corporation
    Inventors: Fusao Ishii, Yoshihiro Maeda, Hirotoshi Ichikawa
  • Publication number: 20090257110
    Abstract: The present invention provides a mirror device, comprising: a plurality of deflectable mirrors; an elastic member for deflectably supporting the mirror; a drive electrode for driving the mirror; a control circuit for giving electric charge to the drive electrode and controlling the deflecting direction of the mirror; and a substrate on which the drive electrode and the elastic member, wherein the drive electrode is placed within an area on the substrate the mirror is projected on, has an outer form constituted by sides approximately in parallel to the outer peripheral lines of the present mirror and by sides approximately parallel to the deflection axis of the present mirror, or a form obtained by dividing the aforementioned outer form into a plurality thereof, and also fills the role of a stopper for regulating the deflection angle of the mirror.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 4, 2008
    Publication date: October 15, 2009
    Inventors: Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Yoshihiro Maeda, Fusao Ishii
  • Patent number: 7595927
    Abstract: An image projection device receives a light emitted from a light source through an illumination optic for projecting to a spatial light modulator (SLM) having a plurality of deflectable micromirrors The micromirrors further formed with a sub-wavelength microstructure on a reflective surface of the micromirrors having a reflection guided mode resonant grating to take advantage of an ultra-fine processing technology available in recent years used in semiconductor manufacture and micro-machining to fabricate a sub-wavelength grating (SWG) having a pitch between the grating ridges that is smaller than the wavelength of light.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 29, 2007
    Date of Patent: September 29, 2009
    Assignees: Olympus Corporation, Silicon Quest Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Fusao Ishii, Yoshihiro Maeda, Hirotoshi Ichikawa
  • Publication number: 20090231668
    Abstract: A micromirror device includes an elastic hinge for supporting a mirror on a substrate, and an address electrode for deflecting the mirror. The device further includes a protective layer and an oriented monolayer laid to cover a stopper also functioning as an address electrode provided below the mirror and between the mirror and the substrate.
    Type: Application
    Filed: May 2, 2008
    Publication date: September 17, 2009
    Inventors: Yoshihiro Maeda, Fusao Ishii, Kazuhiro Watanabe, Hirotoshi Ichikawa
  • Publication number: 20090231667
    Abstract: A micromirror device includes an elastic hinge for supporting a mirror on a substrate, and an address electrode for deflecting the mirror. The device further includes a protective layer and an oriented monolayer laid to cover a stopper also functioning as an address electrode provided below the mirror and between the mirror and the substrate.
    Type: Application
    Filed: May 2, 2008
    Publication date: September 17, 2009
    Inventors: Yoshihiro Maeda, Fusao Ishii, Kazuhiro Watanabe, Hirotoshi Ichikawa
  • Publication number: 20090225071
    Abstract: An image display system for displaying an image according to an input image signal, and comprises a light source for emitting an illumination light; a data converting circuit for receiving and converting the input image signal into non-binary data; a spatial light modulator for receiving and applying the non-binary data for modulating the illumination light; a light source control circuit for applying the non-binary data in coordination with the spatial light modulator for controlling the light source.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 25, 2009
    Publication date: September 10, 2009
    Inventors: Kazuma Arai, Yoshihiro Maeda, Fusao Ishil, Hirotoshi Ichikawa
  • Publication number: 20090206052
    Abstract: A method for manufacturing a device comprising an elastic member on a substrate includes steps of: forming a sacrificial layer by forming a plurality of sacrificial sub-layers on the substrate; forming a plate member in or on the sacrificial layers connected to the substrate and substantially parallel to a top surface of the substrate; and removing the sacrificial sub-layers after forming the plate member by removing the sacrificial sub-layers in an order different from the reverse order of forming the sacrificial sub-layers.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 12, 2009
    Publication date: August 20, 2009
    Inventors: Yoshihiro Maeda, Fusao Ishii, Kazuhiro Watanabe, Hirotoshi Ichikawa
  • Publication number: 20090207474
    Abstract: The present invention provides a mirror device, comprising: a mirror; an elastic hinge for supporting the mirror and the elastic hinge has a specific electric resistance. The mirror device further includes an electrode for controlling the mirror, wherein a voltage is applied to the elastic hinge for a predetermined period in synchronous with a change of an electric voltage applied to the electrode.
    Type: Application
    Filed: February 18, 2009
    Publication date: August 20, 2009
    Inventors: Fusao Ishii, Naoya Sugimoto, Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Yoshihiro Maeda
  • Publication number: 20090201568
    Abstract: The present invention provides a spatial light modulator, comprising a mirror modulating a light emitted from a light source, wherein the mirror is further controlled to operate with at least three stationary states whereby an image is projected with a gray scale expression through a combination of modulation of the light operated in the three stationary states.
    Type: Application
    Filed: February 18, 2009
    Publication date: August 13, 2009
    Inventors: Fusao Ishii, Naoya Sugimoto, Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Yoshihiro Maeda
  • Patent number: 7573633
    Abstract: Additional control flexibilities to generate more gray scales for an image display system is achieved by controlling the intensity distribution of the light projection from a light source to a deflecting mirror to further coordinate with the control of the intermediate states of the deflecting mirror. The control light source intensity distribution can provide incident light with wide varieties of intensity distributions including non-uniform, symmetrical and non-symmetrical, different distributions of polarizations, various cross sectional shapes of the incident lights and other combinations of all of the above variations. More stable and better control of gray scale control is also achieved by optimizing the intensity distributions of the incident light to produce the best visual effects of the image display.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 25, 2007
    Date of Patent: August 11, 2009
    Assignees: Silicon Quest Kabushiki-Kaisha, Olympus Corporation
    Inventors: Fusao Ishii, Yoshihiro Maeda, Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Kazuma Arai
  • Publication number: 20090185257
    Abstract: The present invention provides a mirror device, comprising: a substrate; a mirror disposed approximately in parallel to the substrate above the substrate; and a hinge supported on and extended approximately perpendicularly from the substrate for supporting the mirror, wherein the hinge is connected to the mirror with a first edge part of the hinge buried in the mirror.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 25, 2009
    Publication date: July 23, 2009
    Inventors: Yoshihiro Maeda, Fusao Ishii, Hirotoshi Ichikawa
  • Publication number: 20090180171
    Abstract: A projection apparatus comprising a micromirror device for reflecting and modulating a light emitted from a light source to project a display an image on a display screen. The projection apparatus further includes a projection optical system comprises an adjustable aperture for adjusting an aperture ratio to control an amount of output light reflected from the micromirror device to the image display screen.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 12, 2009
    Publication date: July 16, 2009
    Inventors: Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Fusao Ishii
  • Publication number: 20090180039
    Abstract: A video display system includes a plurality of primary color light sources; and a spatial light modulator (SLM) for modulating an illumination light emitted from at least one of the plurality of primary light sources. The video display system further includes a display controller for controlling a process to display a sequence of video images within a period of one frame comprising each of a plurality of primary colors and each of a plurality of complementary colors to minimize a number of emissions of each of the plurality of primary color light sources and also displaying the video images of the colors of the plurality of primary colors and the plurality of complementary colors in sequence.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 13, 2009
    Publication date: July 16, 2009
    Inventors: Taro Endo, Yoshihiro Maeda, Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Fusao Ishil
  • Patent number: 7561322
    Abstract: The present invention provides a projection display system comprising: illumination lights of plural colors emitted from plural laser light sources; an illumination optical system for illuminating the illumination light of at least one of the colors in an beam axis or in an illumination range, either of which is different from the other colors; a deflection mirror device for modulating the illumination lights of respective colors in the same deflection angle, with the modulation of each color being performed in sequence within one frame; a projection optical system for projecting the reflection light of the illumination light from the deflection mirror device; and a laser light source control circuit for controlling the intensity of the illumination light of each color, wherein the laser light source control circuit performs adjustment so that the ratio of intensity of each of the colors is a prescribed ratio.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 19, 2007
    Date of Patent: July 14, 2009
    Assignees: Silicon Quest Kabushiki-Kaisha, Olympus Corporation
    Inventors: Yoshihiro Maeda, Fusao Ishii, Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Kazuma Arai
  • Publication number: 20090174810
    Abstract: A video display system includes: an image processing unit receives continuously an input video signal including an input frame signal for generating an output video signal comprising an output frame signal having a higher frame rate than the input frame signal; and a spatial light modulator (SLM) applies the output frame signal for modulating an illumination light, wherein an amount of data in the output frame signal is smaller than the amount of data in the input frame signal.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 13, 2009
    Publication date: July 9, 2009
    Inventors: Taro Endo, Yoshihiro Maeda, Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Fusao Ishii
  • Publication number: 20090161199
    Abstract: A mirror device comprises: a plurality of electrodes disposed on a substrate; a hinge connected to at least one of the electrodes; a mirror connected to the hinge and corresponding to at least one of the electrodes. The mirror device further comprises a barrier layer is disposed between the hinge and mirror, and/or between the hinge and electrode. Also noted is a mirror device production method for producing such-configured mirror device. Furthermore, this invention discloses a projection apparatus implemented with a mirror device manufactured and assembled according to the configuration as described.
    Type: Application
    Filed: February 20, 2009
    Publication date: June 25, 2009
    Inventors: Fusao Ishii, Yoshihiro Maeda, Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Naoya Sugimoto
  • Publication number: 20090161198
    Abstract: The present invention provides a mirror device, comprising: an electrode placed on a substrate; a memory circuit connected to the electrode; an elastic hinge disposed near said electrode and extending from said substrate for supporting a mirror above said electrode wherein said elastic hinge having a negative temperature coefficient of resistance.
    Type: Application
    Filed: February 18, 2009
    Publication date: June 25, 2009
    Inventors: Fusao Ishii, Naoya Sugimoto, Hirotoshi Ichikawa, Yoshihiro Maeda