Abstract

It has become increasingly important to include a hologram or HOE in an optical system for serious applications. It is, therefore, necessary to calculate quantitatively the wavefront reconstructed from a hologram. We have tried two methods to perform the calculation¹: the optical path difference method; the tangent plane intersection (TPI) method. For holograms with simple geometries, such as those with planar or spherical waves, both methods yield the same results. For general holograms, particularly for those with small f/Nos. and large aberrations, the results are quite different. Our experiments show that the TPI method produces results more consistent with the assumptions. We are unable to explain why these two methods yielded different results.

© 1987 Optical Society of America