OK! I'm going to offer an suggestion/opinion in a subject where I have little or no experience.

Everybody wants to see a direct image
of planet orbiting another star.
The problem is well known: The star's glare drowns out the light of the planet
by a factor of say a hundred-million to one.
That's the problem. The solution
maybe a combination of things.
(1) An "occulting-finger" in a telescope's imaging system to block out most of the starlight.
(2) Optical interferometry to cancel out
offending light waves.
(3) A telescope in space with a large mirror.

There's a fourth solution, I think:
A planet orbiting another star maybe [a guess] "greenish-bluish" in color for example...It's peak color.
The [primary] star maybe yellow-white...It's peak color.
The single "greenish-bluish" pixel of that planet will be buried in millions of pixels of its star's glare.

It's still like trying to find a "needle in a haystack".
But, pardon my poor analogy, if one could get a 'computerized sorter' to spread out [disperse] each of those millions of stalks that make up the haystack, the needle will eventually be found.

So, develop computer software that can "spread out" all those millions of photons detected of that distant star and planet, imaged in a CCD device [like spreading out numerous jigsaw pieces on a huge black-cloth until the one one you're looking for sticks out] until that single bluish-greenish" photon stands out.

cheers.

Jacob