Alternative use of reflection spatial light modulator in phase shifting digital Gabor holography

Abstract The aim of the present work is to present an alternative way of using SLM in the experimental phase shifting setup to obtain a hologram by using only an illuminating beam. This beam is modified using a Spatial Light Modulator (SLM), where a number of selected SLM pixels generate a plane-illuminating wave with determinate phase, and other pixels generate a plane wave for to be used as reference. The position of these pixels in the SLM is selected symmetrically, and the percentage of them regarding all the SLM pixels is used as a control of the intensity relation between the reference and object beams. An experimental setup of Phase-Shifting Digital Gabor Holography using a reflection SLM, model LR-C-1080 was created. An ad hoc software, that allows modifying the phase of illuminating beam and of course, the object wave phase, the hologram recording and the image reconstruction, was developed in this work. A human hair is used as testing sample, with diameter previously calibrated.