Patent ID: 7453475

Claim:
An optical display device comprising: an optical modulator that has a plurality of pixels having optical propagation characteristics that can be controlled independently and a luminance adjusting element that has a plurality of pixels having optical propagation characteristics that can be controlled independently, the pixels in the optical modulator and the pixels in the luminance adjusting element being arranged to optically correspond at m:n, m and n being integers and m<n or n>m, the optical display device modulating light from a light source through the optical modulator and the luminance adjusting element and displaying an image; an average value calculating device to calculate an average value or weighted average value of color component values on a color-basis in pixel values corresponding to the n pixels based on the display image data; a luminance selecting device to select a luminance value corresponding to each of the pixels in the optical modulator among luminance component values in the pixel values corresponding to the n pixels based on the display image data; an optical propagation characteristic determining device to determine the optical propagation characteristic of each of the pixels in the optical modulator based on a result of calculation by the average value calculating device and a result of selection by the luminance selecting device; and a control value determining device to determine a control value for each of the pixels in the optical modulator based on optical propagation characteristics determined by the optical propagation characteristic determining device.