VEHICLE OCCUPANT DETECTION DEVICE
First Claim
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1. A vehicle occupant detecting apparatus comprising:
- an image capturing unit disposed in a cabin of a vehicle, for sequentially outputting images, which are captured at predetermined image capturing intervals, of a predetermined area including a seat in the cabin of the vehicle;
a judging unit for judging whether or not a vehicle occupant is present on the seat in the predetermined area; and
a vehicle occupant state detecting unit for detecting a state of the vehicle occupant based on the images output from the image capturing unit;
the vehicle occupant detecting apparatus further comprising;
a control unit for controlling the image capturing intervals depending on a judged result from the judging unit,wherein the control unit controls the image capturing unit to capture the images in a high-speed mode, in which the image capturing intervals are relatively short, if the judging unit judges that the vehicle occupant is present, and controls the image capturing unit to capture the images in a low-speed mode, in which the image capturing intervals are relatively long, if the judging unit judges that the vehicle occupant is not present.
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Abstract
A vehicle occupant detection device for capturing as an image the behavior of a vehicle occupant, who is seated on a seat of a vehicle, by an image capture unit and detecting the position of a specific portion of the vehicle occupant. When the presence of the vehicle occupant is determined, a control unit controls the image capture unit so that image capture is performed in a high-speed mode in which image capture intervals are relatively small, and when it is determined that the occupant is not present, image capture is performed in a low-speed mode in which image capture intervals are relatively large.
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Citations
9 Claims
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1. A vehicle occupant detecting apparatus comprising:
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an image capturing unit disposed in a cabin of a vehicle, for sequentially outputting images, which are captured at predetermined image capturing intervals, of a predetermined area including a seat in the cabin of the vehicle; a judging unit for judging whether or not a vehicle occupant is present on the seat in the predetermined area; and a vehicle occupant state detecting unit for detecting a state of the vehicle occupant based on the images output from the image capturing unit; the vehicle occupant detecting apparatus further comprising; a control unit for controlling the image capturing intervals depending on a judged result from the judging unit, wherein the control unit controls the image capturing unit to capture the images in a high-speed mode, in which the image capturing intervals are relatively short, if the judging unit judges that the vehicle occupant is present, and controls the image capturing unit to capture the images in a low-speed mode, in which the image capturing intervals are relatively long, if the judging unit judges that the vehicle occupant is not present. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
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Specification