Light positioning system using digital pulse recognition

• US 8,248,467 B1
• Filed: 03/16/2012
• Issued: 08/21/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 07/26/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: ABL IP Holding LLC (Acuity Brands, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Bytelight, Inc. (Acuity Brands, Inc.)
• Inventors: Ganick, Aaron, Ryan, Daniel
• Primary Examiner(s): WHIPKEY, JASON T
• Application Number:
  US13/422,580
• Time in Patent Office: 158 Days
• Field of Search: 340/13.24, 340/331, 340/332, 362/800, 348/113, 348/116, 348/308, 356/4.01, 398/118, 398/130, 398/202, 701/434
• US Class Current: 348/116
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/206 specially adapted for indoor navigation
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/745 Detection of flicker frequency or suppression of flicker wherein the flicker is caused by illumination, e.g. due to fluorescent tube illumination or pulsed LED illumination
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 64/00 Locating users or terminals or network equipment for network management purposes, e.g. mobility management
• CPC Class Codes: H05B 47/195 the transmission using visible or infrared light
• CPC Class Codes: H05B 47/1965 using handheld communication devices

Abstract

In one aspect, the present disclosure relates to a method of detecting information transmitted by a light source in a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) image sensor by detecting a frequency of light pulses produced by the light source. In some embodiments, the method includes capturing on the CMOS image sensor with a rolling shutter an image in which different portions of the CMOS image sensor are exposed at different points in time; detecting visible distortions that include alternating stripes in the image; measuring a width of the alternating stripes present in the image; and selecting a symbol based on the width of the alternating stripes present in the image to recover information encoded in the frequency of light pulses produced by the light source captured in the image.

Claims

1. A method of detecting information transmitted by a light source in a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) image sensor by detecting a frequency of light pulses produced by the light source, the method comprising:

capturing on the CMOS image sensor with a rolling shutter an image in which different portions of the CMOS image sensor are exposed at different points in time;

detecting visible distortions that include alternating stripes in the image;

measuring a width of the alternating stripes present in the image; and

selecting a symbol based on the width of the alternating stripes present in the image to recover information encoded in the frequency of light pulses produced by the light source captured in the image.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the information encoded in the frequency of light pulses produced by the light source includes digital data that is encoded in a pulse width modulated signal.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the symbol is one of a plurality of symbols and the plurality of symbols correspond to different stripe width ranges and each stripe width range corresponds to a frequency range of a pulse width modulated signal of the light source captured in the image.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

capturing on the CMOS image sensor a second image and detecting a second set of alternating stripes in the second image; and

measuring the width of the second set of alternating stripes in the second image and selecting a second symbol based on the width of the second set of alternating stripes presenting the second image.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

capturing a plurality of frames on the CMOS image sensor;

measuring in each frame the width of alternating stripes present in that frame; and

selecting one of a plurality of symbols for each measured width of alternating stripes to recover digital data encoded in the plurality of frames.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

recovering a plurality of symbols from a plurality of images captured on the CMOS image sensor of a mobile device to obtain an identification code that identifies the light source sending the frequency of light pulses; and

send the identification code from the mobile device to a server to obtain information that allows the mobile device to locate itself indoors.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the frequency of the light pulses captured in the image is between 60 hertz and 5000 hertz.

8. Logic encoded on at least one non-transitory computer readable medium that when executed is configured to:

capture from an image sensor with a rolling shutter an image in which different portions of the image sensor are exposed at different points in time;

detect visible distortions that include alternating stripes in the image captured from the image sensor;

measure a width of the alternating stripes present in the image captured from the image sensor; and

select a symbol based on the width of the alternating stripes present in the image to recover information encoded in pulses of light from a light source captured in the image.

9. The logic of claim 8, wherein the information encoded in the pulses of light includes digital data that is optically encoded in a pulse width modulated signal.

10. The logic of claim 8, wherein the symbol is one of a plurality of symbols and the plurality of symbols correspond to different stripe width ranges and each stripe width range corresponds to a frequency range of a pulse width modulated signal of the light source captured in the image.

11. The logic of claim 8, further comprising:

capturing a plurality of frames from the image sensor;

measuring in each frame the width of alternating stripes present in that frame; and

selecting one of a plurality of symbols for each measured width of alternating stripes to recover digital data encoded in the plurality of frames.

12. The logic of claim 8, further comprising:

recovering a plurality of symbols from a plurality of images captured from the image sensor of a mobile device to obtain an identification code that identifies the light source sending the frequency of light pulses; and

send the identification code from the mobile device to a server to obtain information that allows the mobile device to locate itself indoors.

13. The logic of claim 8, wherein the pulses of light from the light source captured in the image are between 60 hertz and 5000 hertz and wherein the image sensor is a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) image sensor.

14. An image detection apparatus that detects information transmitted by a light source in an image sensor by detecting a frequency of light pulses produced by the light source, the image detection apparatus comprising:

an image sensor with a rolling shutter that is configured to capture an image in which different portions of the image sensor are exposed at different points in time; and

a processor in communication with the image sensor that is configured to detect visible distortions that include alternating stripes in the image captured by the image sensor and measure a width of the alternating stripes to select a symbol based on the width of the alternating stripes to recover information encoded in the frequency of light pulses produced the light source captured in the image.

15. The image detection apparatus of claim 14, wherein the information encoded in the frequency of pulses of the light source includes digital data that is encoded in a pulse width modulated signal.

16. The image detection apparatus of claim 14, wherein the symbol is one of a plurality of symbols and the plurality of symbols correspond to different stripe width ranges and each stripe width range corresponds to a frequency range of a pulse width modulated signal of the light source captured in the image.

17. The image detection apparatus of claim 14, wherein the image sensor is a CMOS image sensor that is configured to capture a plurality of images each second and each image is captured in a frame that is sent to the processor to detect whether alternating stripes are present in the frame.

18. The image detection apparatus of claim 14, wherein the processor is configured to measure in each image of a plurality of images the width of alternating stripes present in that image and select one of a plurality of symbols for each measured width of alternating stripes to recover digital data encoded in the plurality of images.

19. The image detection apparatus of claim 14, wherein the processor is configured to recover a plurality of symbols from a plurality of images captured on the image sensor to obtain an identification code that identifies the light source sending the frequency of light pulses and further comprising:

a network adapter configure to send the identification code to a server to obtain information that allows the image detection apparatus to locate itself indoors.

20. The image detection apparatus of claim 14, wherein the frequency of the light pulses captured in the image is between 60 hertz and 5000 hertz.