with reference to fig3 , an alternating pattern 26 of layers is formed on a flexible polymeric substrate 28 . the substrate material may be pet having a thickness of 25 to 100 microns . on a side of the substrate opposite to the alternating pattern is a layer of adhesive 30 and a release strip 32 . the release strip 32 is easily removed from the adhesive , allowing the adhesive layer to be used to couple the substrate and its layers to a member for which filtering is desired , such as a pdp . in another embodiment , the alternating pattern 26 is formed directly on a plasma display panel , but there are fabrication complication factors which must be addressed in this alternative embodiment . for example , it might be necessary to pass the panel through a sputter chamber for depositing the material which forms the layers . in forming the alternating pattern 26 of layers , it is desirable to deposit the materials on the polymeric substrate 28 at near room temperature . the alternating pattern includes at least eleven layers , with the layer nearest the substrate being a dielectric layer 34 . while not shown in fig3 , there may be a primer layer , an adhesion layer or other layers which promote the structural integrity of the filter 100 of fig3 . the alternating pattern 26 is formed to maximize the total quantity of silver , while maintaining a bluish reflected color , high transmission , and neutrality of transmission . in accordance with the invention , these properties are obtained with the use of five metallic layers 36 , 40 , 44 , 48 and 52 having a combined thickness greater than 50 nm . in the preferred embodiment , the metallic layers are silver or silver alloy layers . the silver alloy layers may be formed by first sputtering silver and then sputtering a titanium cap layer which is subsequently subjected to alloying and oxidation . moreover , it is shown that by annealing the metallic layers , sheet resistance can be reduced to 0 . 8 ohms / square . in the fabrication of the filter 100 of fig3 , the first dielectric layer 34 may be formed by sputtering dielectric material onto the substrate 28 . as previously defined , “ dielectric ” refers to a high refractive index layer ( i . e ., a refractive index greater than 1 . 0 ). in the preferred embodiment , the refractive index of each dielectric layer 34 , 38 , 42 , 46 , 50 and 54 is in the range of 1 . 8 to 2 . 5 . the thickness of the first dielectric layer is at least 10 nm , with a preferred range of 10 nm to 60 nm . a suitable material is an indium oxide , which may include indium tin oxide . alternatively , at least one dielectric “ layer ” of the alternating pattern may be a combination of dielectrics , such as ino x and tio x . formed atop the first dielectric layer 34 is the first metallic layer 36 . a “ metallic ” layer is a layer having a sufficiently low resistivity to promote an end product having the desired sheet resistance . each metallic layer may be silver or a silver alloy metal layer . the thickness of the first metallic layer is preferably in the range of 6 nm to 12 nm . a second dielectric / metallic pair in the alternating pattern 26 duplicates the materials of the first pair . the second dielectric layer 38 has a thickness in the range of 70 nm to 95 nm , while the second metallic layer 40 has a thickness in the range of 9 nm to 18 nm . the third and fourth metallic layers 44 and 48 have the same thickness as the second metallic layer 40 , within ± 20 percent , at least in the preferred embodiment . the thickness of the third , fourth and fifth dielectric layers 42 , 46 and 50 is preferably the same as the range of the second dielectric layer 38 . the final metallic layer 52 may be thinner than the middle metallic layers 40 , 44 and 48 . the thickness of the fifth metallic layer 52 is preferably in the range of 6 nm to 12 nm . similarly , the final dielectric layer 54 has a reduced thickness , similar to the first dielectric layer 34 . the first and sixth dielectric layers 34 and 54 may have a thickness in the range of 20 nm to 60 nm . the various layer thicknesses of the filter 100 can be adjusted within suitable ranges in order to achieve target optical properties for a particular application . if the dielectric layers are equal in thickness and the metallic layers are equal in thickness , a high transparency will result , but with a possible excessive color shift . therefore , a color correcting layer 56 may be included to provide a color shift that is in the opposite direction , so as to offset the color shift exhibited by the alternating pattern 26 . it has been determined that if fewer than five silver alloy layers are used , it is difficult to provide a sheet resistance below 1 . 2 ohms / square with low color shift with viewing angle . between the color correcting layer 56 and the alternating pattern 26 is a hardcoat layer 58 that can be included in order to protect the underlying layers from scratches and contamination . like the color correcting layer 56 , the hardcoat layer is included in the preferred embodiment . however , the hardcoat layer is less important if the filter 100 is to be used with a top antireflection coating 18 on a second polymeric substrate 20 , as shown in fig1 . the total thickness of the metallic layers 36 , 40 , 44 , 48 and 52 plays a significant role in achieving the desired optical properties . as previously noted , the total thickness should be greater than 50 nm . optical properties for a filter having six indium oxide layers and five silver layers , where the total thickness for the silver layers was less than 50 nm , were computed . specifically , the eleven layer thicknesses were 40 nm / 10 nm / 70 nm / 10 nm / 70 nm / 10 nm / 60 nm / 6 nm / 40 nm / 6 nm / 20 nm . this is consistent with example 5 in u . s . pat . no . 6 , 104 , 530 to okamura et al . transmission in the visible range of the spectrum ( t vis ), reflection in the visible range ( r vis ) and other optical properties were determined using an optical model calculation for this structure on pet , laminated with clear adhesive to glass and laminated with a commercial antireflective coating . the computed optical properties are shown in table a . generally , it is highly preferred that a plasma display have visible reflectance ( r vis ) of less than approximately five percent and that the reflected color at normal incidence ( 0 degrees ) should be such that − rb * is about 2 or more times larger than ra *. additionally , the color travel along the ra * axis should be less than approximately 10 cie units between viewing angles of 0 degrees and 60 degrees . from table a , it can be seen that the filter has a large positive rb * at 60 degrees , which would result in a brown or yellowish reflection appearance . in comparison , the filter 100 described with reference to fig3 provides a negative or neutral rb * at 60 degrees , corresponding to a neutral or bluish reflected color . generally , the filter formed in accordance with the present invention has rb * in the range of − 10 to − 20 at normal incidence , and rb * of less than 2 at 60 degrees . equally importantly , the sheet resistance may be less than 1 . 0 ohms / square . table a t vis ta * tb * r vis ra * rb * 0 ° 63 % − 7 . 0 2 . 5 6 . 0 % 10 . 5 4 . 8 60 ° 57 . 6 % − 11 . 4 − 4 . 4 12 . 9 % 1 . 1 11 . 4 the structure of fig3 may be fabricated using indium oxide as the dielectric material and silver as the metallic material . a thin titanium layer ( less than 2 nm thickness ) may be deposited on top of each silver layer prior to deposition of the dielectric material , so as to improve the silver conductivity . table b shows the materials and thicknesses for nineteen layers of one sample formed in accordance with the invention . the alternating pattern 26 of fig3 is comprised of layers 4 through 14 . this alternating pattern is formed on a first pet substrate ( layer 3 ) that is joined to a thicker substrate ( layer 1 ) by a layer of pressure sensitive adhesive . additionally , a color - correcting ar coating ( i . e ., an ar coating exhibiting a negative ra * shift with increasing angle of incidence ) is achieved by the combination of layers 17 , 18 and 19 . the color correction is a result of a proper selection of materials having particular indices of refraction . in the embodiment of table b , the indices of refraction for layers 17 through 19 are 1 . 9 , 2 . 3 and 1 . 5 , respectively . the color - correcting ar coating is formed on another pet substrate ( layer 16 ), which is coupled to layer 14 by a psa layer ( layer 15 ). table b layer # material thickness 1 sio 2 3 . 2e 6 2 psa 2 . 5e 4 3 pet 5e 4 4 ino x 40 nm 5 ag 9 nm 6 ino x 89 nm 7 ag 13 nm 8 ino x 85 nm 9 ag 13 nm 10 ino x 87 nm 11 ag 13 nm 12 ino x 90 nm 13 ag 8 nm 14 ino x 43 nm 15 psa 2 . 5e 4 16 pet 5e 4 17 ino x 55 nm 18 nbo x 95 nm 19 sio 2 87 nm table c shows the optical properties of a laminated plasma display filter having a two - layer antireflective coating under a c2 ° illuminant . the optical properties were measured at normal incidence , unless otherwise specified in the table . the sheet resistance was measured as 0 . 95 ohms / square using an inductive probe . table c ra * rb * ra * rb * t vis t 850 ta * tb * r vis ( 0 °) ( 0 °) ( 60 °) ( 60 °) 57 . 5 % 0 . 3 % 1 − 5 4 . 5 % 1 . 7 − 21 . 7 6 . 1 − 11 . 5 a sample of the structure formed in accordance with fig3 was laminated as in fig1 , with a commercial antireflective coating 18 . the structure was then annealed for 48 hours at 100 ° celsius in air . the annealing did not change the optical properties in transmission or in reflection . however , the sheet resistance was reduced from 0 . 96 ohms / square to 0 . 80 ohms / square . in another sample , the coating as described in example 1 was over - coated with an acrylic antiglare hardcoat , such as the hardcoat 58 in fig3 . the structure was then laminated to a glass sheet . the resulting sample exhibited excellent transmission and reflection characteristics . the sheet resistance was 1 . 0 ohms / square . fig4 shows plots of ra * for thicknesses of the first and fifth silver layers of a five - silver layer stack . here , the thicknesses of the two silver layers are equal . the thicknesses of the other three silver layers may also be equal ( e . g ., 13 nm ). in fig4 , there is a plot 60 of ra * as measured at 0 degrees and a second plot 62 of ra * as measured at 60 degrees . as shown in fig4 , when the thicknesses of the first and fifth silver layers are between 8 nm and 12 nm , there are desirable properties with respect to color shift with angle and sensitivity to color shift with metal thickness . this thickness range is also more tolerant to manufacturing variations . generally , for various layer thicknesses , it has been found that the layer sensitivity is minimized and the color shift with angle is minimized when the outer two metal layers have a thickness that is between 55 % and 85 % of the average metal layer thickness of the middle three silver layers . more preferably , the range is between 60 % and 80 %. however , it is not necessary for the two outer silver layers to have the same thickness , if they lie within the specified range . thus , the advantages of the described plasma display filter are less apparent when the total thickness of the silver layers is below 50 nm . moreover , for very thin silver layers , with a high optical bandwidth , it is difficult to achieve low transmission at 850 nm . the invention described above , which allows thicker silver layers to be used , is particularly useful in obtaining excellent infrared blocking properties .