Cellophane as a half-wave plate and its use for converting a laptop computer screen into a three-dimensional display

It was experimentally verified that an ordinary 25-μm-thick cellophane sheet possesses properties of a wide wavelength spectrum half-wave plate. Moreover, cellophane displayed superior performance when used for rotating the direction of polarization of white light than a commercially available half-wave plate with a specified wavelength. The retardance of the cellophane was measured to be 170°. The availability of a half-wave plate of an extra large size with low cost opens up usages for large size displays. As an example of its application, an ordinary screen of a laptop personal computer was converted into that of a three-dimensional display by the cellophane half-wave plate. It may be added that the price per square cm² of the cellophane half-wave plate is about 1/3500 of that of a commercially available half-wave plate. © 2003 American Institute of Physics.