Arbitrary-phase-modulated Talbot illuminator

Arbitrary-phase-modulated array illuminator (APM-AIL) based on Talbot effect means that arbitrary-phase-modulated phase plate may generate the specific intensity distribution at the specific fractional Talbot distance. The previous understanding is that only the specific phase modulated Talbot illuminator is possible for this purpose. In this paper, we discussed how the condition of APM-AIL can be fulfilled. We found that APM-AIL is also a position- selective Talbot array illuminator, which is usually impossible to realize for the conventional Talbot illuminator. We have given two-dimensional experimental example of Talbot illuminator. We also present some of other experimental examples fabricated by binary-optics technology, e.g., nonseparable hexagonal illumination, random-intensity simulation of sky stars, optical square- beam transformation, and 1x3 beam splitting for readout of optical disk.