A wavefront generator for complex pupil function synthesis and point spread function engineering

We describe a simple method to produce an arbitrary complex optical field u sing a ferroelectric liquid crystal spatial light modulator. The system is configured so as to act as a pupil plane filter in a confocal microscope. T he ability to tune the complex pupil function permits the system to be used both to modify the imaging performance by effectively engineering the poin t spread function as well as to remove optical aberrations present in the o ptical system.