Effect of intensity error correlation on the computed phase of phase-shifting interferometry

Abstract

The effect of intensity noise on the computed phase of phase-shifting interferometry is investigated. Using a simple Taylor expansion, one can easily show the sensitivity of the error in computed phase to frame-to-frame intensity noise correlation. The sensitivity of various algorithms to statistically independent intensity noise and intensity quantization noise is considered. Intensity-error cross correlations are found to increase the error in computed phase for the case of intensity quantization error.