Quantitative space-bandwidth product analysis in digital holography

The space-bandwidth product (SBP) is a measure for the information capacity an optical system possesses. The two information processing steps in digital holography, recording, and reconstruction are analyzed with respect to the SBP. The recording setups for a Fresnel hologram, Fourier hologram, and image-plane hologram, which represent the most commonly used setup configurations in digital holography, are investigated. For the recording process, the required SBP to ensure the recording of the entire object information is calculated. This is accomplished by analyzing the recorded interference pattern in the hologram-plane. The paraxial diffraction model is used in order to simulate the light propagation from the object to hologram-plane. The SBP in the reconstruction process is represented by the product of the reconstructed field-of-view and spatial frequency bandwidth. The outcome of this analysis results in the best SBP adapted digital holographic setup. (C) 2011 Optical Society of America