Wearable Action Camera Eye-Tracking for Parallax-Free Image Extraction
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing image pickup methods require manual direction adjustment, which distracts users from their experiences and surroundings, and wearable cameras suffer from parallax issues due to the distance between the user's view position and the camera, leading to inaccurate image extraction.
Innovation Solution
An image pickup apparatus worn on a user's body part other than the head, equipped with a first image pickup unit for wide-angle imaging, a memory device, and processors to detect the user's visual-line direction, set the observation direction parallel to it, correct image extraction positions, and record corrected images.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If a camera is fixed to the user's head using a fixing-to-head accessory, then the user can perform image pickup without manual direction adjustment, but the user's appearance is degraded and hairstyle becomes disheveled
Solution Approach 1:
The camera system is divided into two separate components: a wearable camera unit that captures images and a separate face-direction detection unit that analyzes user orientation. This segmentation allows the camera to be worn comfortably without interfering with the user's appearance, while still achieving automated image direction adjustment based on face orientation analysis.
Solution Approach 2:
A face-direction detection unit acts as an intermediary between the wearable camera and the image processing system. This intermediary analyzes the user's face direction from captured images and translates it into guidance information for automatically adjusting the camera's image pickup direction, eliminating the need for direct head mounting while maintaining automated operation.
2Shape
If a wearable camera is mounted on the user's body at a position other than the head, then the user's appearance is preserved, but parallax occurs between the visual-line direction and the actual image pickup area
Solution Approach 1:
The system continuously captures images of the user's face, analyzes their direction, and uses this feedback information to dynamically adjust the camera's image pickup direction. This closed-loop feedback mechanism compensates for the fixed spatial offset between the camera position and the user's eyes, maintaining accurate image extraction despite the camera being mounted away from the head.
Solution Approach 2:
The system changes the image pickup direction parameter based on the detected face direction. By dynamically adjusting the camera's orientation parameter according to the user's visual-line direction, the system compensates for the fixed spatial relationship between the camera position and the user's eyes, eliminating parallax errors in the extracted images.
3Measurement precision
If manual direction adjustment is performed during image pickup, then image extraction accuracy can be maintained, but the user cannot focus attention on their immediate surroundings
Solution Approach 1:
The camera system performs self-adjustment of its image pickup direction based on automated face-direction detection. The system serves itself by automatically analyzing the user's orientation and adjusting its own capture direction without requiring user intervention, thereby maintaining image accuracy while allowing the user to focus completely on their surroundings.
Data Source
AI summary
An image pickup apparatus that eliminates manual change of an image pickup direction during an image pickup operation. The image pickup apparatus is worn on a body part of a user other than a head and includes an image pickup unit that obtains a wide-angle image, a memory device that stores instructions, and a processor that executes the instructions to: detect a visual-line direction of the user, set an observation direction of the image pickup unit to be parallel to the visual-line direction, obtain an image extraction position from the wide-angle image, detect an object in the observation direction from the wide-angle image in picking up an image of the object, detect an object distance from the image pickup unit to the object, correct the image extraction position according to the visual-line direction and the object distance, and output and record a corrected image extraction position to a memory.