Recently the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office officially granted Apple a patent that relates to a head mounted device in the form of glasses. The displays may be housed in optical modules. Lenses may be mounted in the optical modules. Images on the displays may be viewed through the lenses. Three-dimensional cameras may gather information for use in placing virtual objects in a scene containing real-world and virtual content. The cameras may also be used as part of a visual odometry system and/or other imaging systems.
Smartglasses
Apple's invention cover a head-mounted device in the form of glasses. The housing may include a frame with left and right openings that receive respective left and right optical modules that present images to a user's eyes. Each optical module may have a lens and display that presents an image through the lens. The left and right modules may be moved relative to each other to accommodate different user interpupillary distances.
Camera support members may be coupled to respective left and right peripheral portions of the frame. Each camera support member may have openings configured to receive cameras. During operation of the glasses, the camera support member helps to maintain alignment between the cameras that are mounted to the camera support member.
Radio-frequency signals may be handled using antennas in the glasses. Antennas may be formed on one or both camera support members. For example, a first antenna may overlap a first area of a camera support member and a second antenna may overlap a second area of a camera support member.
The glasses device may have wireless communications circuitry to communicate with external equipment such as a Mac, iPhone, iPad or other computing device. This allows the external equipment to provide the glasses with content for viewing. The wireless communications circuitry may include multiple antennas.
As shown in FIG. 4 below, one or more component support structures such as camera support structure #50 may be coupled to frame 12I (e.g., left and right camera support structures #50 may be attached to respective left and right peripheral edges such as edge portions #12I-E of frame #12I). Support structures for the glasses (device #10) such as frame #12I and camera support structure #50 may be formed from polymer, glass, ceramic, metal, carbon-fiber composite material or other fiber-composite material, other materials, and/or combinations of these materials (e.g., sheets of rigid polymer or other material, and/or other structural members).
There may be multiple component support structures coupled to the frame. For example, there may be a right-hand camera support structure #50 coupled to a right side of frame #12I and a left-hand camera support structure coupled to a left side of frame.
The front face of the glasses (#device 10) may be covered with an inactive housing wall (e.g., a polymer layer). In the example of patent FIG. 5 above, the front face #F of the glasses are covered by display #14F (e.g., an organic light-emitting diode display, a microLED display, an electrophoretic display, liquid crystal display, etc.). The pixels of display 14F may be covered with an outer protective display cover layer (e.g., a layer of glass, a layer of clear polymer, etc.).
Optical windows such as camera windows #62 may be provided in the display cover layer. The camera windows may be formed from portions of the display cover layer or from clear window structures that are mounted in openings in the display cover layer. Each optical window may overlap a corresponding optical component and may allow light from the component to be emitted through the optical window and/or may allow ambient light from the environment to pass to the optical component. The camera windows (e.g., camera windows in the display cover layer for display #14F and/or optical windows formed in other portions of housing #12) may have optical characteristics that allow an associated optical component to operate satisfactorily.
The Cameras #46 may be sensitive to any suitable wavelengths of light (e.g., infrared, visible, both infrared and visible, and/or other wavelengths), may be stereoscopic (three-dimensional) cameras or two-dimensional cameras, may be time-of-flight cameras, may be structured light three-dimensional cameras may be cameras that gather information for use in placing virtual objects in a scene containing real-world and virtual content, may be cameras that are used as part of a visual odometry system, and/or may be other imaging systems.
Translated from: patentlyapple
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