Patent ID: 7196743

Claim:
An image display apparatus comprising: a reflective liquid crystal display element; a luminous flux dividing system which divides light from a light source into a plurality of luminous fluxes; and a condensing optical system which leads the emerged luminous fluxes from the luminous flux dividing system to the reflective liquid crystal display element, wherein the condensing optical system comprises: a condenser lens which condenses the emerged luminous fluxes from the luminous flux dividing system; a field lens which makes the emerged luminous fluxes from the condenser lens substantially telecentric with respect to the reflective liquid crystal display element; a polarization beam splitter which splits the luminous fluxes emerged from the field lens in response to the polarization state; and a ¼ phase plate which is disposed between the polarization beam splitter and the reflective liquid crystal display element; and the following condition is satisfied: π/2×0.8<φ<π2×1.2 where φ represents a phase difference which the ¼ phase plate gives to a ray having the largest incident angle on the ¼ phase plate among rays excluding 0° made incident into the ¼ phase plate.