In general, to represent light, we only show the electric field (and do not show the magnetic field)

because it is with the electric field that detectors (eye, photographic film, CCD, etc.) interact.
Ordinary'' light, or natural light, is in general non-polarized: the electric field is on average
oriented in an arbitrary direction, and has a very precise orientation for too short a time to be
measured by instruments.
Double refraction, also called birefringence, is an optical property in which a single ray of
unpolarized light entering an anisotropic medium is split into two rays, each traveling in a
different direction.
When light travels through an amorphous material, such as glass, it travels with a speed that is the
same in all directions. That is, glass has a single index of refraction. In certain crystalline
materials, however, such as calcite and quartz, the speed of light is not the same in all directions.
Such materials are characterized by two indices of refraction. Hence, they are often referred to as
double-refracting or birefringent materials.

The following figure illustrates what happens when a narrow beam of light is incident
perpendicular to a sheet of calcite whose optical axis lies in the plane of the diagram. The ray
splits: one component obeys Snells law, which in this case means it travels undeviated through
the sheet; the other component is deviated on entering the calcite. When the calcite sheet is rotated
about the incident ray the deviated ray rotates at the same rate.

In calcite the electric field of light with ordinary polarization is

acting in the plane in which the electrons are easy to move and
as a result the velocity of the ordinary rays is less than that of
the extraordinary ray.
Materials like calcite, in which the extraordinary rays travel faster than the ordinary rays are
called negative uniaxial materials. Conversely in the positive uniaxial materials the ordinary
rays travel faster than the extraordinary rays.

Upon entering a calcite crystal, an unpolarized light splits into two plane polarized rays that travel
with different velocities, corresponding to two angles of refraction. The two rays are polarized in
two mutually perpendicular directions. One ray, called the ordinary ray (o-ray), is characterized
by an index of refraction n0 that is the same in all directions. This means that if one could place a
point source of light inside the crystal, as shown in the figure to the right, the ordinary waves
would spread out from the source as spheres.
The second plane-polarized ray, called the extraordinary ray (e-ray), travels with different
speeds in different directions and hence is characterized by an index of refraction ne that varies
with the direction of propagation. The point source sends out an extraordinary wave having wave
fronts that are elliptical in cross-section. Note from the figure that there is one direction, called the
optic axis, along which the ordinary and extraordinary rays have the same speed, corresponding to
the direction for which n0 = ne (when the incident ray is parallel to the optic axis). The difference
in speed for the two rays is a maximum in the direction perpendicular to the optic axis (when the
incident ray is perpendicular to the optic axis).
Optical waveplates (also called wave plates or retarder plates) are transparent plates with a
carefully chosen amount of birefringence.

They are mostly used for manipulating the polarization state of light beams.

A waveplate has a slow axis and a fast axis, both being perpendicular to the beam direction, and
also to each other.

The most common types of waveplates are :

quarter-wave plates (/4 plates) and

half-wave plates (/2 plates),

Half (/2) Waveplate : A linearly polarized beam incident on a half wave crystal quartz waveplate
emerges as a linearly polarized beam but rotated such that its angle to the optical axis is twice that
of the incident beam.
When a light beam is linearly polarized, and the polarization direction is along one of the axes
(fast or slow axes) of the waveplate, the polarization remains unchanged.

When the incident polarization does not coincide with one of the axes, and the plate is a half-
wave plate, then the polarization stays linear, but the polarization direction is rotated. For
example, for an angle of 45 to the axes, the polarization direction is rotated by 90.

When the incident polarization is at an angle of 45 to the axes, a quarter-wave plate generates a
state of circular polarization.