Complete birefringence and Jones matrix characterization using arbitrary polarization

The study of the interaction of polarized light with any birefringent media can bring crucial information about their properties. Such investigations often rely on the precise control of polarized light to characterize the medium birefringence, while assuming ideal features. In this article, we perform polarimetric measurements of the Jones matrix of various transmissive and reflective components while not assuming ideal properties of the studied samples. The filtering of physically realizable Jones matrices, allows the analysis to extract complete birefringence from the Jones matrix, without any particular requirements for tuning the input polarization states by using arbitrary polarization states. This work provides a powerful means to evaluate complete birefringence and will lead to a better understanding of the origin and coupling of birefringence, and its effect in any optical system.