A Review of Incoherent Digital Fresnel Holography

“We review three different methods of generating digital Fresnel holograms of 3-D real-existing objects illuminated by incoherent light. In the first method, a scanning hologram is generated by a unique scanning system in which Fresnel zone plates (FZP) are created by a homodyne rather than the common heterodyne interferometer. During the scanning, the FZP projected on the observed object is frozen rather than varied as previously. In each scanning period, the system produces an on-axis Fresnel hologram. The twin image problem is solved by a linear combination of at least three holograms taken with three FZPs with different phase values. The second hologram reviewed here is the digital incoherent modified Fresnel hologram. To calculate this hologram, multiple-viewpoint projections of the 3-D scene are acquired, and a Fresnel hologram of the 3-D scene is directly computed from these projections. This method enables to obtain digital holograms by using a simple digital camera, which operates under regular light conditions. The last digital hologram reviewed here is the Fresnel incoherent correlation hologram. In this motionless holographic technique, light is reflected from the 3-D scene, propagates through a diffractive optical element (DOE), and is recorded by a digital camera. Three holograms are recorded sequentially, each for a different phase factor of the DOE. The three holograms are superposed in the computer, such that the result is a complex-valued Fresnel hologram that does not contain a twin image. “