An interpolating polynomial method for liquid crystal display optics

Optics for a planar display device demand solutions of a system of differential equations for numerous different wavelengths and angles of incidence. Berreman's midpoint piece-wise stratification method is generally used to compute display optics because it converges rapidly to the true solution of the differential system. Two algebraic variants of Berreman's approach, the eigenvector method and the Cayley-Hamilton method, are widely known and implemented. A new variant is introduced here that computes the same approximate solutions as the other techniques, but is faster because it requires less arithmetic.