Pupil Size-Based Ambient Light Adjustment
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional methods for adjusting ambient light levels in a user's environment are either time-consuming and burdensome for users to manually control or fail to optimize light levels for the user's viewing context, leading to eye strain and suboptimal visualization of content.
Innovation Solution
An information handling device captures an image of a user's pupil, measures its size, and adjusts ambient light intensity levels using connected light-producing devices to maintain a threshold pupillary size range suitable for the user's viewing context, automatically optimizing lighting conditions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If manual control methods are used to adjust ambient light levels, then users can control lighting settings, but the process becomes time-consuming and burdensome
Solution Approach 1:
The system automatically adjusts ambient light levels by capturing pupil size images, measuring the pupil diameter, and controlling light-producing devices without requiring user intervention. The processor executes instructions to autonomously optimize lighting conditions based on real-time pupil size measurements, eliminating manual adjustment operations.
Solution Approach 2:
The system implements a closed-loop feedback mechanism where the camera continuously captures pupil size, the processor measures and evaluates the pupil diameter against optimal ranges, and the light-producing devices adjust illumination levels accordingly. This feedback cycle automatically maintains optimal lighting conditions without user input.
2Reliability
If conventional light adjustment methods are used, then ambient light can be changed, but the lighting levels fail to optimize for the user's viewing context, causing eye strain
Solution Approach 1:
The system dynamically adjusts the illumination intensity parameter of ambient light based on measured pupil size. The processor modifies light output levels to maintain pupil diameter within an optimal range (e.g., 2-4mm), ensuring lighting conditions are optimized for the user's specific viewing context and preventing eye strain caused by inappropriate brightness levels.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces manual mechanical adjustment of light switches or dimmers with an automated optical measurement and control system. The camera captures pupil size optically, the processor analyzes the image data to determine pupil diameter, and the system automatically controls light-producing devices, substituting manual mechanical control with an automated optical-electronic system that optimizes lighting based on physiological response.
3Extent of automation
If automated pupil-based control is implemented, then light levels are optimized automatically, but the device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system uses a camera, which is a common multi-functional device in modern information handling devices, to capture pupil size images. This existing component is repurposed for the additional function of pupillometry, avoiding the need for specialized expensive equipment and reducing overall system complexity while achieving automated control.
Solution Approach 2:
The processor acts as an intermediary that receives image data from the camera, extracts pupil size measurements, determines optimal lighting conditions, and sends control signals to light-producing devices. This centralized control architecture simplifies the system by using the existing processor to coordinate all components rather than requiring separate dedicated control hardware.
Data Source
AI summary
One embodiment provides a method, including: capturing, using a camera of an information handling device, an image of a user's pupil; measuring, using a processor, a size of the user's pupil in the captured image; determining, using a processor, whether the size of the user's pupil is within a threshold pupillary size range; and providing, responsive to determining that the size of the user's pupil is not within the threshold pupillary size range; an instruction to a light-producing device to adjust an ambient light intensity level until the size of the user's pupil is determined to be within the threshold pupillary size range. Other aspects are described and claimed.