AUTOMATIC VEHICLE EQUIPMENT MONITORING, WARNING, AND CONTROL SYSTEM
First Claim
1. An automatic vehicle equipment control system comprising:
- at least one imager configured to acquire a continuous sequence of high dynamic range single frame images, and said at least one imager comprising a pixel array;
a processor in communication with said at least one imager, and configured to process said continuous sequence of said high dynamic range images;
a color spectral filter array in optical communication with said at least one imager, said color spectral filter array comprising a plurality of color filters, at least a portion of which are different colors, and pixels of said pixel array being in optical communication with substantially one said spectral color filter; and
a lens in optical communication with said at least one imager and said color spectral filter array;
wherein said imager is configured to capture a non-saturated image of nearby oncoming headlamps and at least one of a diffuse lane marking and a distant tail lamp in one image frame of said continuous sequence of high dynamic range single frame images, and the automatic vehicle equipment control system configured to detect at least one of said highway markings and said tail lamps, and quantify light from said oncoming headlamp from data in said one image frame.
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Accused Products
Abstract
An automatic vehicle equipment control system and methods thereof are provided, the system includes at least one imager configured to acquire a continuous sequence of high dynamic range single frame images, a processor, a color spectral filter array including a plurality of color filters, at least a portion of which are different colors, and pixels of an imager pixel array being in optical communication with substantially one spectral color filter, and a lens, wherein the imager is configured to capture a non-saturated image of nearby oncoming headlamps and at least one of a diffuse lane marking and a distant tail lamp in one image frame of the continuous sequence of high dynamic range single frame images, and the system configured to detect at least one of said highway markings and said tail lamps, and quantify light from the oncoming headlamp from data in the one image frame.
117 Citations
86 Claims
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1. An automatic vehicle equipment control system comprising:
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at least one imager configured to acquire a continuous sequence of high dynamic range single frame images, and said at least one imager comprising a pixel array; a processor in communication with said at least one imager, and configured to process said continuous sequence of said high dynamic range images; a color spectral filter array in optical communication with said at least one imager, said color spectral filter array comprising a plurality of color filters, at least a portion of which are different colors, and pixels of said pixel array being in optical communication with substantially one said spectral color filter; and a lens in optical communication with said at least one imager and said color spectral filter array; wherein said imager is configured to capture a non-saturated image of nearby oncoming headlamps and at least one of a diffuse lane marking and a distant tail lamp in one image frame of said continuous sequence of high dynamic range single frame images, and the automatic vehicle equipment control system configured to detect at least one of said highway markings and said tail lamps, and quantify light from said oncoming headlamp from data in said one image frame. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66)
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67. An automatic vehicle equipment control system comprising:
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at least one imager configured to acquire a continuous sequence of high dynamic range single frame images, and said at least one imager comprising a pixel array; a color spectral filter array in optical communication with said at least one imager, said color spectral filter array comprising a plurality of color filters, at least a portion of which are different colors, and pixels of said pixel array being in optical communication with substantially one said spectral color filter; a lens in optical communication with said at least one imager and said color spectral filter array; and a processor in communication with said at least one imager, and configured to process said continuous sequence of high dynamic range images, wherein said processor is further configured to use color information from pixels of said pixel array to enhance yellow colored features in said high dynamic range images to detect yellow lane markers.
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68. An automatic vehicle equipment control system comprising:
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at least one imager configured to acquire a continuous sequence of high dynamic range single frame images, and said at least one imager comprising a pixel array; a color spectral filter array in optical communication with said at least one imager, said color spectral filter array comprising a plurality of color filters, at least a portion of which are different colors, and pixels of said pixel array being in optical communication with substantially one said spectral color filter; a lens in optical communication with said at least one imager and said color spectral filter array; and a processor in communication with said at least one imager, wherein said processor is further configured to aggregate a plurality of bright pixels into a single light source object in at least one image of said continuous sequence of high dynamic range images.
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69. An automatic vehicle equipment control system comprising:
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at least one imager configured to acquire a continuous sequence of high dynamic range single frame images, and said at least one imager comprising a pixel array; a color spectral filter array in optical communication with said at least one imager, said color spectral filter array comprising a plurality of color filters, at least a portion of which are different colors, and each said pixel being in optical communication with substantially one said spectral color filter; a lens in optical communication with said at least one imager and said color spectral filter array; and a processor in communication with said at least one imager, said processor being configured to detect an alternating current (AC) light source in said continuous sequence of high dynamic range images, wherein said at least one imager is configured to have a sampling image repetition period that is longer than that of a flicker cycle period of said AC light source.
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70. A method of generating a lane departure warning, said method comprising the steps of:
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populating a world coordinate system grid for incoming pixel data; scoring marker points; processing said scored marker points; determining a type of lane lines based upon said processed and scored marker points; computing a vehicle departure from said lane lines; and determining if a warning should be emitted. - View Dependent Claims (71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79)
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80. A method for generating a control signal for vehicle headlamp control, said method comprising the steps of:
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extracting a list of light objects; combining single-peak light sources into multi-peak light objects; connecting current light sources to light sources contained in previous images; calculating at least one light source attribute; and determining an appropriate state of a vehicle'"'"'s headlamp. - View Dependent Claims (81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86)
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Specification