Systems for displaying images involving transflective liquid crystal displays

1 . A system for displaying images comprising:

a transflective liquid crystal display panel, comprising:

a liquid crystal display element; and

a retro-reflector disposed at the bottom of the liquid crystal display element;

wherein an incident ray of light incident upon the retro-reflector is internally reflected twice such that the ray is redirected as a reflected ray that travels substantially parallel to the incident ray yet in an opposing direction.

2 . The system as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the retro-reflector comprises a retro-reflector element operative to reflect incident light and a transmissive element operative to transmit incident light.

3 . The system as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the retro-reflective element comprises a trigonal pyramid shape.

4 . The system as claimed in claim 2 , wherein the retro-reflective element comprises three faces, with any two of the three faces being perpendicular to each other.

5 . The system as claimed in claim 2 , wherein the retro-reflective element comprises three faces, with any two of the three faces defining an included angle in a range of 90±10 degrees.

6 . The system as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the liquid crystal layer comprises twisted nematic mode liquid crystal material.

7 . The system as claimed in claim 1 , further comprising a first polarizer adjacent to the liquid crystal display element; and a second polarizer located between the liquid crystal display element and the retro-reflector.

8 . The system as claimed in claim 1 , further comprising a compensation structure disposed under the retro-reflector.

9 . A system for displaying image comprising:

a transflective liquid crystal display panel, comprising:

a first substrate having a plurality of pixels, each of the pixels comprising a reflective region and a transmissive region;

a second substrate;

a twisted nematic liquid crystal layer located between the first substrate and the second substrate;

a first polarizer on the first substrate;

a second polarizer between the second substrate and the retro-reflector; and

a retro-reflector disposed on the second substrate with a plurality of retro-reflective elements and transmissive elements, each of the retro-reflective elements corresponding to one of the reflection regions and each of the transmissive elements corresponding to one of the transmissive regions.

10 . The system as claimed in claim 9 , wherein at least one of the retro-reflective elements comprises a trigonal pyramid shape.

11 . The system as claimed in claim 9 , wherein the retro-reflective element comprises three faces, with any two of the three faces defining an included angle in a range of 90±10 degrees.

12 . The system as claimed in claim 9 , wherein the transmissive elements are substantially planar.

13 . The system as claimed in claim 9 , wherein the system comprises a transflective liquid crystal display device, comprising

the transflective liquid crystal display panel; and

the system further comprises a controller coupled to the transflective liquid crystal display panel to control the panel to render an image in accordance with an input.

14 . The system as claimed in claim 13 , wherein the system comprises an electronic device comprising

the transflective liquid crystal display device.

15 . The system as claimed in claim 14 , wherein the electronic device is a laptop computer.

16 . The system as claimed in claim 9 , wherein the system comprises

the transflective liquid crystal display panel; and

the system further comprises

means for controlling the panel.