A Silicon Microsystem for Generation of Infrared Patterned Light

The use of patterned light for three-dimensional (3D) imaging and movement tracking has been in the last decade object of experimental investigations for industrial, scientific, and consumer applications. In this paper, we demonstrate the functionality of a compact silicon microsystem for patterned light generation suitable for 3D imaging. It incorporates a single-axis torsional MEMS mirror for steering a near-infrared beam on a diffractive silicon microstructure that projects light patterns on the target. We, here, report images, acquired with a CMOS camera, of the detected light patterns realized with different diffractive elements. As an example of application, we have illuminated 3D objects with a generated line pattern and then detected the deformation of the projected lines with the same camera. By image processing, from the line deformation, we have estimated the object depth that was found in agreement with the geometrical size.