Fig. 1. Schematic diagram and diffraction property of a director-varying LC fork grating with m=1. The color variation from blue to red indicates the director varying from 0 to π continuously, and the gray sticks label the local director orientations. The polarization vectors observed along the light propagation direction are marked with arrows. LCP, left circularly polarized; LP, linearly polarized; RCP, right circularly polarized.

Fig. 2. DMD-based micro-lithography setup consists of a light emission component, a dynamic pattern generation component, an image focusing component, and a monitor component. Three out of all 18 exposure sum-regions from FPGs with m=2, as well as with m=1 and p=1, are shown as examples, with corresponding polarizer angles listed below.

Fig. 3. (a) Theoretical, (b) measured director distribution, and (c) POM micrograph of an FPG with m=2. (d) Micrograph of a reconfigured FPG with m=10. The color bars indicate the director varying from 0 to π continuously, and the scale bars are all 100 μm.

Fig. 4. Dependencies of diffraction efficiency on (a) applied voltage and (b) incident polarization at 2.31  Vrms. Top images are the diffraction patterns on different polarization conditions marked with circles in corresponding color on the curves. The color bar indicates the relative optical intensity in all diffraction patterns.

Fig. 5. Theoretical director distributions, micrographs, measured director distributions, and diffraction patterns of samples with (a) m=1 and p=1, (b) m=1 and p=2, (c) m=2.5, and (d) m=2.5 and p=1. The scale bars are all 100 μm. Incident polarizations are labeled in the images; clockwise/counterclockwise indicates left/right circularly polarized light.