New Approach to Enhance Contrast Ratio at Normal Incidence by Controlling the Retardation of Optical Compensation Film in Vertically Aligned Liquid Crystal Displays

We found that the light leakage at normal incidence of a vertically aligned liquid crystal display (VA-LCD) in black state is strongly affected by the polarization states of obliquely incident light. Experimental results were explained by a light scattering model of substrates on both sides of a liquid crystal layer. Applying this model, we found that the contrast ratio at normal incidence can be highly enhanced by controlling the retardation value of retardation films. This is a new, effective approach to enhancement of the contrast ratio in LCDs, different from the conventional approach of simply decreasing the depolarization of the scattering media.