Optical Pickup Using Blazed Holographic Optical Element for Video Disc Players

Abstract

A blazed holographic optical element (HOE) was used in the development of an optical pickup for video disc players. In the analysis, an optical utilization efficiency of 13.2% was obtained by optimizing the groove profile, although the HOE includes various grating pitches (from 1.6 to 2.2 µm). The blazed HOE was fabricated on a glass substrate by the ion-milling technique with CHF3 gas etching. The signal-to-noise ratio of the video signal reproduced with this optical pickup was more than 48 dB, and the pickup showed good environmental stability.