Dynamic HUD Visibility via Eye Convergence Detection
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing user interfaces, particularly in vehicles and virtual reality environments, face challenges in minimizing distraction by ensuring that information displayed on transparent or head-up displays is not intrusive when the user is focused on the real world, potentially leading to safety risks.
Innovation Solution
An eye tracking system adjusts the visibility of display information based on the user's gaze convergence, making the information more transparent or subtle when the user is looking at real-world objects and enhancing it when they focus on the display, using eye tracking technology to determine the user's point of regard and depth of convergence.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If information is displayed on a transparent or head-up display, then the user can access critical information without looking away from the real world, but the display may become intrusive and distracting when the user is focused on real-world objects
Solution Approach 1:
The display visibility is made dynamic by continuously adjusting it based on real-time eye convergence detection. When the user's eyes converge on the display, it becomes visible; when they diverge to look at the real world, it becomes transparent or hidden. This dynamic adaptation resolves the contradiction by making the display helpful when needed and invisible when not needed.
Solution Approach 2:
The system uses eye tracking feedback to automatically control display visibility. The eye convergence detection provides continuous feedback about user attention, which triggers automatic adjustments to display opacity or visibility. This closed-loop feedback mechanism ensures the display adapts to user needs without manual intervention, preventing distraction while maintaining safety.
2Object-affected harmful factors
If the display information is made more transparent to reduce distraction, then user safety improves, but the user may miss critical information when not actively looking at the display
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary action by detecting eye convergence in advance of the user needing the information. When the eyes begin to converge on the display location, the system proactively increases visibility, ensuring the information is already prominent before the user fully focuses on it. This prevents both distraction and information loss.
Solution Approach 2:
The display visibility parameter is continuously adjusted based on eye convergence detection. The system changes the opacity, brightness, or other visual parameters dynamically according to the detected eye state, optimizing the balance between reducing distraction and ensuring information visibility at all times.
3Reliability
If eye tracking technology is implemented to adjust display visibility, then user distraction is reduced and safety is enhanced, but the device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The eye tracking system serves multiple functions: it detects user attention, controls display visibility, and potentially enables other interactive features. By making the eye tracker a multi-functional component, the patent justifies the added complexity through multiple benefits, including reduced distraction and improved safety.
Solution Approach 2:
The system uses the user's own eye movements as the control signal, requiring no additional input devices or manual adjustments. The eye tracker automatically detects convergence and triggers display adjustments without user intervention, making the complexity worthwhile by providing automatic, intuitive control.
Data Source
AI summary
Gaze information of a user can be determined by a computing device that analyzes images of the user. Gaze information of a user includes information such as the user's line of sight, point of regard information, the direction of the user's gaze, the depth of convergence of the user's gaze, and the like. The computing device is able to estimate the distance from the user at which the user is focusing (for example, at a screen near the user or at an object farther away). The visibility and display characteristics of objects displayed on the HUD may be based on the gaze information. For example, content on a heads-up display (HUD) on a windshield may be more transparent while the user is looking through the windshield and more opaque (or otherwise enhanced) while the user is focusing on the HUD.