Bird's-eye view video generation with reference object orientation inversion
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing bird's-eye view video technologies struggle to accurately display the relative positional relationship between a vehicle and its surroundings, particularly when reference objects like wheel stoppers or park marking lines are not aligned with the vehicle's longitudinal direction, making it difficult for drivers to properly orient the vehicle during parking.
Innovation Solution
A bird's-eye view video generation device that uses multiple cameras to capture a 180-degree field of view around the vehicle, with a controller processing the video data to generate a bird's-eye view and superimpose reference orientation icons representing the orientation of objects like wheel stoppers or park marking lines relative to the vehicle, allowing for improved alignment during parking.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Stability of the object's composition
If the vehicle icon orientation is fixed in the bird's-eye view video, then the display is simple and stable, but the relative orientation of reference objects varies with steering operation making it difficult to determine how to steer
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of keeping the vehicle icon fixed and having reference objects vary (which causes the problem), the patent inverts the approach by making the reference object orientation fixed and allowing the vehicle icon to vary. This is achieved by specifying a predetermined orientation for the reference object and calculating the vehicle icon's orientation based on the difference between the reference object's fixed orientation and the actual reference object orientation, thereby solving the contradiction between stability and ease of operation.
2Device complexity
If the bird's-eye view video is generated based on a fixed vehicle icon orientation, then the video generation is simple, but it is not applicable when reference objects like linear frame lines not extending in the vehicle longitudinal direction are present outside the display area
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies dynamics by making the reference object orientation specifiable and changeable rather than fixed. The system allows the reference object orientation to be set to any value, and the vehicle icon orientation is dynamically calculated based on this specifiable reference orientation and the detected actual reference object orientation. This dynamic approach enables the system to adapt to various reference objects including linear frame lines at different orientations, thereby increasing versatility without significantly increasing complexity.
3Loss of information
If reference objects are used for parking assistance, then parking guidance is provided, but accurate determination of vehicle orientation relative to reference objects is difficult when they are not aligned with the vehicle's longitudinal direction
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an intermediary concept of reference object orientation specification. Instead of directly comparing the vehicle icon with the reference object (which causes measurement errors when misaligned), the system uses a predetermined reference object orientation as an intermediary reference frame. The vehicle icon orientation is calculated as the difference between this intermediary reference and the actual reference object orientation, thereby enabling accurate determination of relative positional relationships regardless of alignment.
Data Source
Figure 1
Figure 2~3
Figure 4
AI summary
A bird's-eye view video generation device includes a video data acquiring unit 42 configured to acquire video data of surroundings video of a vehicle captured by cameras; a bird's-eye view video generator 44 configured to generate a bird's-eye view video that displays a predetermined display area around the vehicle by performing a viewpoint conversion processing and synthesizing processing on the video data of the surroundings videos acquired by the video data acquiring unit 42 with a vehicle icon representing the vehicle; a reference object detector 45 configured to detect at least one reference object around the vehicle; an orientation specifying unit 46 configured to specify a relative orientation of the reference object detected by the reference object detector 45 with respect to the vehicle; a superimposing processor 48 configured to generate a superimposed bird's-eye view video by superimposing information representing the relative orientation of the reference object with respect to the vehicle on the bird's-eye view video generated by the bird's-eye view video generator 44 based on the vehicle icon as a reference; and a display controller 49 configured to cause a display panel 31 to display the superimposed bird's-eye view video generated by the superimposing processor 48.