Patent ID: 7862182

Claim:
Optical system for a projector, comprising: at least one illumination source suitable for producing a source illumination beam; at least a first polarizing beam splitter for splitting the source illumination beam into a first illumination beam linearly polarized along a first direction and a second illumination beam polarized perpendicular to the first direction; a colour wheel intersecting said first and second polarized illumination beams in two different regions, such that, at any instant when the first polarized illumination beam intersects a first segment of said colour wheel associated with a first colour and produces a first colour beam linearly polarized along the first direction, then the second polarized illumination beam intersects a second segment of the same colour wheel associated with a second colour which is different from the first colour, is complementary for the first color, and produces a second colour beam polarized perpendicular to the first direction; a first imager illuminated by the first colour beam linearly polarized along the first direction and producing a first imaging beam; and a second imager illuminated by the perpendicularly polarized second colour beam and producing a second imaging beam.