Fundamental precision limits of full Stokes polarimeters based on DoFP polarization cameras for an arbitrary number of acquisitions

As an emerging technology, division-of-focal-plane (DoFP) polarization cameras have raised attention due to their integrated structure. In this paper, we address the fundamental precision limits of full Stokes polarimeters based on a linear DoFP polarization camera and a controllable retarder in the presence of additive and Poisson shot noise. We demonstrate that if the number of image acquisitions is greater than or equal to three, there exists retarder configurations that reach the theoretical lower bound on estimation variance. Examples of such configurations are one rotatable retarder with fixed retardant of 125.26 degrees or two rotatable quarter-waveplates (QWPs) in pair. In contrast, the lower bound cannot be reached with a single QWP or a single variable retarder with fixed orientation. These results are important to get the most out of DoFP polarization imagers in real applications. (C) 2019 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement