Anti-eye strain apparatus and method
First Claim
1. An automatic screen brightness controller for reducing eye strain, comprising:
- brightness control software stored in a machine readable storage media;
a processor operatively connected to said storage media; and
a display of the type that permits the brightness to be varied;
said brightness control software including instructions that direct the brightness of substantially the entire display to be varied during a plurality of sequential time intervals in accordance with a predetermined pattern that gradually varies the brightness over an extended time interval during at least a portion of each of the plurality of the sequential time intervals to reduce the eye strain and exercise the eye muscles of a person observing the display.
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Accused Products
Abstract
An anti-eye strain apparatus and method which automatically adjusts the brightness of a display to cause the muscles of the eyes of the user to adjust and refocus such that eye fatigue or tiredness is reduced or eliminated. The brightness is varied within a particular range and the brightness within this range is occasionally or periodically adjusted. The changing brightness preferably follows a predetermined pattern or cycle. These brightness changes may be perceptible or imperceptible to the viewer. The brightness of the display may be adjusted electronically or mechanically, for example by a potentiometer, by a computer attached to a monitor, for example by an application or software, or by changing the palette of colors or the gray scale.
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Citations
89 Claims
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1. An automatic screen brightness controller for reducing eye strain, comprising:
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brightness control software stored in a machine readable storage media; a processor operatively connected to said storage media; and a display of the type that permits the brightness to be varied; said brightness control software including instructions that direct the brightness of substantially the entire display to be varied during a plurality of sequential time intervals in accordance with a predetermined pattern that gradually varies the brightness over an extended time interval during at least a portion of each of the plurality of the sequential time intervals to reduce the eye strain and exercise the eye muscles of a person observing the display. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16)
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17. A method of adjusting the brightness of a screen to reduce eye strain, said method comprising:
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providing brightness control software stored in a machine readable media; providing a processor operatively connected to said storage media; providing a display; and automatically varying the brightness of the display over a series of sequential time intervals in accordance with a pattern that varies the brightness gradually during at least a portion of the series of sequential time intervals; wherein the brightness is varied for at least one second during a portion of the sequential time intervals; and wherein said method acts to exercise the eye muscles. - View Dependent Claims (18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23)
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24. An apparatus for varying the intensity of a display, comprising:
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a central processing unit; a backlight driver, said central processing unit sending one or more calls to said backlight driver to adjust the backlight of the display; and a backlight control, said backlight control receiving a signal from said backlight driver to control the backlight of the display; wherein the backlight of the display is adjusted over a series of sequential time intervals in accordance with a predetermined pattern; wherein the time intervals and pattern are such that the variation of the intensity of the display is done gradually over an extended time interval during at least a portion of the pattern and wherein the intensity variation occurs whether or not there are changes in the ambient environment in which the display resides. - View Dependent Claims (25, 26, 27, 28, 29)
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30. An apparatus for varying the intensity of a display, comprising:
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a processor; a controller interface; an electronically controlled potentiometer; and means for periodically and automatically varying the intensity of the display in accordance with a repeating predetermined pattern; wherein the intensity of the display is varied for at least one second during at least a portion of the repeating pattern. - View Dependent Claims (31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36)
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37. An apparatus for varying the intensity of a display, comprising:
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a processor generating a signal to change the intensity of substantially the entire display in accordance with a predetermined pattern, the intensity of the display changing gradually over an extended time interval during at least a portion of the pattern and the intensity change occurs whether or not there are changes in the ambient environment in which the display resides; a controller interface responsive to said signal from said processor; and an electronically controlled potentiometer to vary the brightness of the display.
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38. An apparatus for varying the intensity of a screen display, comprising:
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an input signal; a first potentiometer to manually adjust a level of said input signal; and a second potentiometer cooperating with said first potentiometer to automatically adjust the level of said input signal; wherein the intensity of the screen display is varied over a series of sequential time intervals in accordance with a predetermined pattern; wherein the time intervals and pattern are such that the variation of the intensity of the display is done gradually over an extended time interval during at least a substantial portion of the pattern and wherein the intensity variation occurs whether or not there are changes in the ambient environment in which the display resides. - View Dependent Claims (39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44)
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45. An apparatus for varying the intensity of a display, comprising:
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a first potentiometer to manually adjust the intensity of the display, said first potentiometer having a first range of intensity; and a second potentiometer to automatically adjust the intensity of the display, said second potentiometer having a second range of intensity; wherein the intensity of the display varies within said second range of intensity according to a predetermined pattern and wherein the brightness is varied for at least one second during a portion of the pattern to exercise the eye muscles of a person observing the display. - View Dependent Claims (46, 47, 48)
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49. An apparatus for varying the intensity of a screen display, comprising:
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a first brightness control device; a second brightness control device; and means for continuously and automatically adjusting said second brightness control device throughout each of a series of sequential time intervals; wherein the adjusting of said second brightness control device is done gradually over an extended time interval during at least a portion of the sequential time intervals and wherein the adjusting of said second brightness control device occurs whether or not there are changes in the ambient environment in which the screen display resides. - View Dependent Claims (50)
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51. An apparatus, comprising:
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a data storage medium; a color palette stored in said data storage medium, said color palette using numbers to identify color shades; and a color shade controller to continuously and automatically vary the color shades of a color display over a series of sequential time intervals; wherein the color shade is varied within a desired range and in accordance with a desired pattern; and wherein the color shade is gradually varied over an extended time interval during at least a portion of the series of sequential time intervals.
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52. An apparatus, comprising:
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a data storage medium; a gray scale stored in said data storage medium, said gray scale using numbers to identity a level of said gray scale; and a grey scale controller to automatically vary the level of said grey scale such that the eye muscles of a person observing the screen are exercised over a series of sequential time intervals; wherein the grey scale is varied within a desired range and in accordance with a desired pattern; and wherein the grey scale is gradually varied over an extended time interval during at least a portion of the series of sequential time intervals.
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53. A method of varying the intensity of a screen display to reduce eye strain comprising,
providing a screen display; -
providing a plurality of patterns, each of said patterns having a desired range in which the intensity of the screen display is varied and a desired time period in which the intensity of the screen display is varied; selecting a pattern from the plurality of patterns; and continuously and automatically varying the intensity of the screen display over a series of sequential time intervals in accordance with said selected pattern; wherein each pattern includes a portion that gradually varies the intensity over an extended time interval. - View Dependent Claims (54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64)
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65. A system for varying the intensity of a screen display, comprising:
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a first automatically controlled potentiometer; a second automatically controlled potentiometer; and a manually controlled potentiometer, said first automatically controlled potentiometer connected in series with said manually controlled potentiometer, said second automatically controlled potentiometer connected in parallel with said manually controlled potentiometer, the system manually and automatically controlling the intensity of the screen display; wherein the intensity of the screen display is randomly varied during, at least a portion of a series of sequential time intervals. - View Dependent Claims (66, 67)
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68. An apparatus for varying the intensity of a screen display to reduce eye strain, comprising means for providing a plurality of patterns, each of said patterns having a desired range in which the intensity of the screen display is varied and a desired time period in which the intensity of the screen display is varied;
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means for selecting a pattern from the plurality of patterns; and means for continuously and automatically varying the intensity of the screen display over a series of sequential time intervals in accordance with the selected pattern; wherein each pattern includes a portion that varies the intensity for at least one second. - View Dependent Claims (69)
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70. A screen display intensity controller to reduce eye strain, comprising:
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software instructions stored in storage media; a plurality of patterns stored in said storage media, each of said patterns having a desired range of intensity and a desired time period in which the intensity of the screen display is varied; and a processor responsive to said software instructions to continuously vary the intensity of a screen display for at least one second in accordance with a selected pattern from the plurality of patterns. - View Dependent Claims (71, 72, 73)
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74. Software stored on a machine readable media;
- said software including instructions continuously directing the intensity of a screen display to be varied over time in accordance with a predetermined pattern in which the intensity of the screen display is gradually varied for at least one second during a portion of the pattern to reduce eye strain of a person viewing the screen display.
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75. An automatic screen controller for reducing eye strain, comprising:
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control software stored in a machine readable storage media; a processor operatively connected to said storage media; and a display of the type that the intensity can be varied; said control software including instructions that direct the intensity of the display to be varied over a series of sequential time intervals in accordance with one or more predetermined patterns; wherein the time intervals and patterns are such that the variation of the intensity of the display gradually changes over an extended time interval during at least a portion of the patterns; and wherein these variations occur whether or not there are changes in the ambient environment in which the display resides. - View Dependent Claims (76, 77)
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78. An automatic screen controller for reducing eye strain, comprising:
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control software stored in a machine readable storage media; a processor operatively connected to said storage media; and a display of the type that permits the intensity to be varied; said control software including instructions that direct the intensity of the display to be varied over a series of sequential time intervals in accordance with a predetermined pattern, wherein the intensity is varied for at least one second during a portion of the sequential time intervals.
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79. A method of gradually adjusting a display to prevent eye strain, said method comprising:
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providing control software stored in a machine readable media; providing a processor operatively connected to the storage media; providing a display; varying the display within a selected range, the display being varied by adjusting one or more of the following;
intensity, brightness, contrast, backlight, gray scale and color levels;varying the display within a selected time period, the display being varied by adjusting one or more of the following;
intensity, brightness, contrast, backlight, gray scale and color levels; andvarying the display according to a selected pattern, the display being varied by adjusting one or more of the following;
intensity, brightness, contrast, backlight, gray scale and color levels;wherein the display is gradually changed over an extended time interval during at least a portion of the time period; and wherein a person observing the display periodically refocuses, moves or adjusts their eyes because of the display variations.
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80. A method to reduce eye strain, comprising:
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providing a display; and varying the display for at least one second during a series of sequential time intervals, the display being varied by varying one or more of the following;
intensity, brightness, contrast, backlight, gray scale and color level;wherein the display is varied according to a preselected range, the display being varied by varying one or more of the following;
intensity, brightness, contrast, backlight, gray scale and color level; andwherein the display is varied according to a preselected pattern, the display being varied by varying one or more of the following;
intensity, brightness, contrast, backlight, gray scale and color level;wherein the display is gradually changed during the one second. - View Dependent Claims (81, 82, 83)
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84. A method of setting a screen display to reduce eye strain of a person viewing the screen display, comprising:
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selecting a pattern from a plurality of patterns in accordance with which a display is desired to be varied, the display being varied by varying one or more of the following;
intensity, brightness, contrast, backlight, gray scale and color level;selecting a range in accordance with which the display is desired to be varied, the display being varied by varying one or more of the following;
intensity, brightness, contrast, backlight, gray scale and color level; andselecting a time for an interval during which the display is desired to be varied in accordance with the selected pattern and range; wherein each pattern includes a portion that gradually varies the display over an extended time interval.
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85. An automatic screen controller for reducing eye strain, comprising:
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control software stored in a machine readable storage media; a processor operatively connected to said storage media; and a display of the type that permits the intensity to be varied; said control software including instructions that direct the intensity of the display to be varied for at least one second during at least a portion of a series of sequential time intervals in accordance with a predetermined pattern; wherein the eyes of a person observing the display are adjusted or refocused during at least a portion of the series of time intervals because of the intensity variation. - View Dependent Claims (86, 87, 88)
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89. A method of adjusting the brightness of a screen to reduce eye strain, said method comprising:
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providing brightness control software stored in a machine readable media; providing a processor operatively connected to said storage media; providing a display; and automatically varying the brightness of the display over time in accordance with a pattern; wherein the brightness is varied for at least one second.
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Specification