Patent ID: 7222967

Claim:
An image display optical system comprising: an illumination optical system; a plurality of image display elements, which modulate light incident thereon to emit image light; a color separationlcombination optical system which separates illumination light from said illumination optical system into a plurality of color components of the illumination light to cause the separated light to be incident on said plurality of image display elements and combines the image light emitted from each of said plurality of image display elements; a projection optical system which projects the image light combined by said color separation/combination optical system onto a projection surface; and a light guide element which is disposed between said illumination optical system and said color separation/combination optical system, reflects the illumination light from said illumination optical system with a reflectivity of substantially 100% to guide the reflected light to said color separation/combination optical system and transmits the image light from said color separation/combination optical system to said projection optical system, wherein each optical path of the illumination light and each optical path of the mage light are different from each other in said light guide element and said color separation/combination optical system, and said projection optical system is an eccentric optical system.