Coordinated adjustment of display brightness

• US 10,255,880 B1
• Filed: 09/14/2016
• Issued: 04/09/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 09/14/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: F.lux Software LLC
• Original Assignee: F.lux Software LLC
• Inventors: Herf, Michael, Herf, Lorna
• Primary Examiner(s): Caschera, Antonio A
• Application Number:
  US15/265,133
• Time in Patent Office: 937 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/0653 Controlling or limiting the speed of brightness adjustment of the illumination source
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/0666 for control of colour parameters, e.g. colour temperature
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2354/00 Aspects of interface with display user
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2360/144 the light being ambient light
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 5/02 characterised by the way in which colour is displayed details of colour display specific for CRTs G09G1/28; specific for flat matrix panels other than liquid crystal displays G09G3/2003; specific for liquid crystal displays G09G3/3607
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 5/10 Intensity circuits

Abstract

A computer-implemented method and includes identifying a change to be made in a brightness level of the light-generating appliance, the identifying of the change being effected by an input external to the light-generating appliance; determining, with a component of the light-generating appliance and in response to identifying the change to be made in the brightness level, a level of change to be made in a nonbrightness-related lighting output parameter of the light-generating appliance, to maintain a level of user stimulating light for a user visually exposed to the light-generating appliance, the level being equal as before the change in brightness level is made and after the change in brightness level is made; and changing the brightness level of the light-generating appliance according to the identified change in the brightness level, and changing the nonbrightness-related lighting output parameter based on the determined level of change to be made in the nonbrightness-related lighting output parameter.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for controlling display of a light-generating appliance, the method comprising:

identifying a change in a first parameter for light delivered by the light-generating appliance, the identifying of the change being caused by an input external to the light-generating appliance;

determining, automatically with a component of the light-generating appliance and in response to identifying the change in the first parameter, a level of change to be made in a second parameter for light delivered by the light-generating appliance, wherein a direction of the change and amount of the change in the second parameter are selected so as to offset a change in circadian stimulation to a user of the device that results from the change in the first parameter, and wherein one of the first and second parameters is brightness and an other of the first and second parameter comprises a non-brightness parameter; and

changing the second parameter based on the determined level of change to be made in the second parameter, in association with the change of the first parameter,

wherein the offset comprises (a) decreasing color temperature value in response to an increase in brightness, (b) decreasing brightness in response to an increase in color temperature value, (c) increasing color temperature value in response to a decrease in brightness, or (d) increasing brightness in response to a decrease in color temperature value.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the change to be made in the first parameter is identified in response to a manual user input to change a brightness level of the light-generating appliance.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the change to be made in the first parameter is identified from an ambient brightness level sensed by a sensor of the light-generating appliance.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the light-generating appliance comprises a display of a computer and the first or second parameter is an overall color temperature level of the display.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 4, wherein the change to be made in the first parameter is identified in response to determining that a particular type of software application is, or is going to be, a focus on the display.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 4, wherein the level of change to be made in the overall color temperature level of the display is a function of an amount of stimulating light that a user of the electronic device has been determined to have received during a current day.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising determining an amount of stimulating light that the user of the light-generating appliance has received during the current day, including stimulating light from the light-generating appliance and stimulating light from sources other than the light-generating appliance.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein the light-generating appliance is a computer and the sources other than the light-generating appliance comprise natural and artificial ambient light sources.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 8, wherein light from the natural and artificial ambient light sources is sensed by a sensor that is part of the computer.

10. The computer-implemented method of claim 9, wherein the computer makes a determination whether an ambient light source is natural or artificial by analyzing one or more characteristics of the light sensed by the sensor, and provides a result of the determination to a sub-system for determining the level of change to be made in an overall color temperature level of a display of the computer.

11. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the light-generating appliance comprises a computer display, and as a result of determining that a brightness level of the computer display has gotten brighter, changing an overall color temperature of the computer display to a warmer color temperature than it was before the change to be made in the brightness level was identified.

12. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, further comprising selecting a speed, from multiple available speeds, with which the change in brightness level is made.

13. The computer-implemented method of claim 12, wherein speeds selected for dimming the display are faster than speeds selected for brightening the display.

14. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, where the determined level of change to be made in the overall color temperature of the display is made using a numeric model of a manner in which the display provides stimulating light to viewers of the display.

15. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the change to be made in the second parameter is selected to exactly cancel the change in level of circadian stimulation from the change in the first parameter.

16. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

identifying a change to be made in a brightness level of a second light-generating appliance associated with a user who is different than the user in the presence of the light-generating appliance;

determining a level of change to be made in a nonbrightness-related lighting output parameter of the second light-generating appliance, to achieve a desired level of user stimulating light for a user visually exposed to the second light-generating appliance; and

changing the brightness level of the second light-generating appliance according to the identified change in the brightness level and changing the nonbrightness-related lighting output parameter based on the determined level of change to be made in the nonbrightness-related lighting output parameter.

17. The computer-implemented method of claim 16, wherein the user and the second user are in the same physical space and exposed to the same ambient light.

18. One or more tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media having recorded thereon instructions, that when executed by one or more processors, perform operations that comprise:

identifying a change in a first parameter for light delivered by a light-generating appliance, the identifying of the change being caused by an input external to the light-generating appliance;

determining, automatically with a component of the light-generating appliance and in response to identifying the change in the first parameter, a level of change to be made in a second parameter for light delivered by the light-generating appliance, wherein a direction of the change and amount of the change in the second parameter are selected so as to offset a change in circadian stimulation to a user of the device that results from the change in the first parameter, and wherein one of the first and second parameters is brightness and an other of the first and second parameters comprises a non-brightness parameter; and

changing the second parameter based on the determined level of change to be made in the second parameter, in association with the change to the first parameter,

wherein the offset comprises (a) decreasing color temperature value in response to an increase in brightness, (b) decreasing brightness in response to an increase in color temperature value, (c) increasing color temperature value in response to a decrease in brightness, or (d) increasing brightness in response to a decrease in color temperature value.

19. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 18, wherein the change to be made in the first parameter is identified in response to a manual user input to change the first parameter of the light-generating appliance.

20. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 18, wherein the change to be made in the first parameter is identified from an ambient value sensed by a sensor of the light-generating appliance.

21. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 18, wherein the light-generating appliance comprises a display of a computer and the first or second parameter is an overall color temperature of the display.

22. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 21, wherein the change to be made in the first parameter is identified in response to determining that a particular type of software application is, or is going to be, a focus on the display.

23. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 21, wherein the level of change to be made in the overall color temperature level of the display is a function of an amount of stimulating light that a user of the electronic device has been determined to have received during a current day.

24. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 18, wherein an amount of stimulating light that the user of the light-generating appliance has been determined to have received during the current day comprises stimulating light from the light-generating appliance and stimulating light from sources other than the light-generating appliance.

25. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 24, wherein the light-generating appliance is a computer and the sources other than the light-generating appliance comprise natural and artificial ambient light sources.

26. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 25, wherein the light from the natural and artificial ambient light sources is sensed by a sensor that is part of the computer.

27. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 26, wherein the computer makes a determination whether an ambient light source is natural or artificial by analyzing one or more characteristics of the light sensed by the sensor, and provides a result of the determination to a sub-system for determining the level of change to be made in the overall color temperature level of a display of the computer.

28. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 18, wherein the light-generating appliance comprises a computer display, and as a result of determining that the brightness level of the computer display has gotten brighter, changing an overall color temperature of the computer display to a warmer color temperature than before the change to be made in the brightness level was identified.

29. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 28, wherein the operations further comprise selecting a speed, from multiple available speeds, with which the change in brightness level is made.

30. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 29, wherein speeds selected for dimming the computer display are faster than speeds selected for brightening the computer display.

31. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 28, wherein the determined level of change to be made in the overall color temperature of the computer display is made using a numeric model of a manner in which the computer display provides stimulating light to viewers of the computer display.

32. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 28, wherein the change to be made in brightness level is determined by the computer as a function of the level of change to be made in the overall color temperature of the computer display.

33. The tangible, non-transitory machine-readable media of claim 18, wherein the operations further comprise:

identifying a change to be made in a brightness level of a second light-generating appliance associated with a user who is different than the user in the presence of the light-generating appliance;

determining a level of change to be made in a nonbrightness-related lighting output parameter of the second light-generating appliance, to achieve a desired level of user stimulating light for a user visually exposed to the second light-generating appliance; and

changing the brightness level of the second light-generating appliance according to the identified change in the brightness level and changing the nonbrightness-related lighting output parameter based on the determined level of change to be made in the nonbrightness-related lighting output parameter.