Abstract: Light curtain apparatus incorporating a cyclical scale generator has a light transmitter 12 which projects a light beam onto an optical scanning device 13 located at the focal point of a strip-like concave mirror 14. As a result a parallel scanning light beam 20, which is continuously displaced parallel to itself, is produced in the image space of the concave mirror 14. The scanning light beam 20 is directed through a monitored region 17 towards a retro-reflector 16 and light returned from the retro-reflector 16 is passed via a beam divider 27 to a first light receiving device 18. In this way interruption of the light beam, for example by an object 31, results in interruption of the signal from the first photoelectric receiving device 18.