Device for measuring a retina reflected light amount and a gaze detecting apparatus using the same

• US 5,325,133 A
• Filed: 09/30/1992
• Issued: 06/28/1994
• Est. Priority Date: 10/07/1991
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Konami Digital Entertainment Company Limited (Konami Holdings Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Konami Co., Ltd.
• Inventors: Adachi, Toshiya
• Primary Examiner(s): Bertsch, Richard A.
• Assistant Examiner(s): RICHMAN, HOWARD
• Application Number:
  US07/954,765
• Time in Patent Office: 636 Days
• Field of Search: 351/209, 351/210, 250/221, 250/201.4, 340/705, 340/706, 340/709, 340/980, 345/158
• US Class Current: 351/209
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 3/113 for determining or recording eye movement
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 40/19 Sensors therefor
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 40/193 Preprocessing; Feature extraction

Abstract

A device for measuring a retina reflected light amount is provided with a light source for emitting a infrared ray, an image pick-up unit for receiving the infrared ray from a light emitting range at the same position as the light source, a reading unit for reading a pupil area from a face image picked up by the image pick-up unit, and an integrating unit for integrating an amount of light represented by signals which are generated by the image pick-up unit and are located at addresses within the read pupil area. This device is applicable to a gaze detecting apparatus, and provides data which can be used in medical and psychological fields.

Claims

1. An eye detecting apparatus comprising:

at least three light sources located at three different positions and adapted for emitting infrared rays within the same light emitting range;

image pick-up means corresponding to the respective light sources and mounted at the same positions as the respective light sources, the image pick-up means receiving the reflected infrared rays reflected from the pupil of a person'"'"'s eye;

reading means for reading each respective image pick-up means to provide an output representing pupil areas of images picked up by the image pick-up means;

pupil line calculating means for calculating pupil lines extending between said pupil areas read by the reading means and each position of each image pick-up means;

pupil position calculating means for obtaining the intersection of said calculated pupil lines to thereby provide a determination of the pupil position;

integrating means for integrating the amount of light represented by signals which are generated by each of said image pick-up means and which are located at different positions of the read pupil area;

storing means for storing characteristic light reflected by the retina relative to a displacement angle, said displacement angle being the angle between the direction of eye gaze and a line extending between the pupil and the image pick-up means;

displacement angle calculating means for calculating displacement angles based on outputs of the integrating means and the retina reflected light amount stored in the storing means; and

calculating means for calculating eye gaze based on the pupil position and the displacement angles.

2. An eye detecting apparatus comprising:

at last three light sources mounted at spaced locations and adapted for emitting infrared rays within the same light emitting range;

image pick-up means corresponding to the respective light sources disposed at spaced positions and receiving the reflected infrared rays reflected from the pupil of a person'"'"'s eye;

reading means for reading each respective image pick-up means to provide an output representing pupil areas of images picked up by the image pick-up means;

pupil line calculating means for calculating pupil lines extending between said pupil areas read by the reading means and each position of each image pick-up means;

pupil position calculating means for obtaining the intersection of said calculated pupil lines to thereby provide a determination of the pupil position;

integrating means for integrating the amount of light represented by signals which are generated by each of said image pick-up means and which are located at different positions of the read pupil area;

storing means for storing characteristic light reflected by the retina relative to a displacement angle, said displacement angle being the angle between the direction of eye gaze and a line extending between the pupil and the image pick-up means;

displacement angle calculating means for calculating displacement angles based on outputs of the integrating means and the retina reflected light amount stored in the storing means; and

calculating means for calculating eye gaze based on the pupil position and the displacement angles.