Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha Corporation

Sharp Display Technology Corporation

Andrew Kay

Michael James Brownlow

Graham Andrew Cairns

Kenji Maeda

Benjamin John Broughton

Paul Antony Gass

Allan Evans

Christopher James Brown

Nathan James Smith

Tatsuo Watanabe

Jean Mugiraneza

Hywel Hopkin

Yoshimitsu Inamori

Takashi Yasumoto

Dauren Slamkul

Vincent Zammit

Paul Philip Boca

Michael Geraint Robinson

David James Montgomery

Jonathan Francis Mather

Emma Jayne Walton

Harry Garth Walton

Yukio Watanabe

Craig Tombling

Graham Roger Jones

James Rowland Suckling

Diego Gallardo

Koichi Nishida

William Frederick Smith

Ryoji Sakurai

Masahiro Esashi

Yuuichi Sato

Hirofumi Oda

Alex Yudin

Toshio Nomura

Yasunori Kanazawa

Shinichi Miyazaki

Marc Paul Servais

Taro Sugita

Richard Miller

An organic light-emitting device (OLED) display is provided. The OLED display includes a thin-film transistor (TFT) substrate having a plurality of TFTs and a plurality of data lines that control the plurality of TFTs. The OLED display also includes a conductive shielding layer disposed over the TFT substrate and an OLED layer disposed over the conductive shielding layer. The OLED layer includes a plurality of OLEDs that are driven by the plurality of TFTs. The OLED layer also includes a touch panel layer disposed over the OLED layer. The conductive shielding layer is configured to reduce noise coupling between the TFT substrate and the touch panel layer.

Touch-sensitive display with shielding layer

A flexible touch panel apparatus includes a series of first electrodes extending along a first direction, at least one second electrode extending along a second direction and defining a bending axis of the flexible touch panel. An elastomeric layer is located between the series of first electrodes at least second electrode. A series of third electrodes are extending along the second direction parallel to the bending axis, and an insulator layer is located between at least one second electrode and the series of third electrodes. At least one second electrode is capacitively coupled to at least one of the series of first electrodes for bend sensing in the flexible touch panel along the bending axis, and the third electrodes are capacitively coupled to the first electrodes for touch sensing on the flexible touch panel.

Touch panel integrating bending sensor for foldable OLED display

A touch panel display includes a display panel having a plurality of pixel regions that emit light, and a touch sensor having an electrode configuration that overlays the display panel. The electrode configuration includes a first electrode and a second electrode that are separated by an insulating region. The electrode separation distance between the first and second electrodes is in a range whereby (1) with increasing electrode separation distance a first rate of proportional decrease in mutual capacitance between the first and second electrodes is greater than a second rate of proportional decrease in signal magnitude of an output signal, and (2) a ratio (R) of the first rate to the second rate satisfies the relationship 1.0&#x3c;R&#x3c;2.5. With such parameters, the electrode separation distance may be from 30 &#x3bc;m to 50 &#x3bc;m, and/or from 0.5 to 0.75 times a pixel pitch of the pixel regions.

Touch panel sensor with optimal electrode separation for improved performance

A flexible electronic device is used to receive user inputs via flex gestures. The electronic device includes a flexible substrate, a shape sensor configured to determine an axis of bending and a degree of flex of the flexible substrate, and a processor coupled to the shape sensor and configured to determine a flex gesture associated with the axis of bending and the degree of flex, wherein the processor updates an output of the electronic device based on the flex gesture. The output includes display information, user interface elements, and a flex gesture input for a device that is coupled to the electronic device. The flex gestures can be assigned to functions such as moving, zooming, scrolling, cropping, rotating, and selection to manipulate content associated with the flexible electronic device.

System and method for multidimensional flexible display device input

A capacitive touch panel that improves detection of non-conductive objects includes a substrate; a first drive line; a first and second sense line disposed on the substrate; a first plurality of electrode elements, each electrode element of the first plurality of electrode elements is coupled to the first drive line, and the first plurality of electrode elements includes a first drive element; a second plurality of electrode elements, each electrode element of the second plurality of electrode elements is coupled to the first sense line, and the second plurality of electrode elements includes a first sense element disposed adjacent to the drive element; and a third plurality of electrode, each electrode element of the third plurality of electrode elements is coupled to the second sense line, and the third plurality of sensor elements includes a second sense element disposed in a nearest neighbor position relative to the first drive element.

Reduced line count touch panel for mutual capacitance measurements

A micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) array system is configured to apply suction forces for the manipulation of objects. The MEMS system includes includes a two-dimensional MEMS array of a plurality of individual MEMS elements. Each MEMS element comprises: a casing structure; a flexible membrane attached to the casing structure; and an electrode structure, wherein a voltage applied to the electrode structure actuates the MEMS element to cause the flexible membrane to flex relative to the casing structure. The flexible membrane and the casing structure define a gap into which the flexible membrane may flex, and a foot extends from the flexible membrane in a direction away from the casing structure, wherein the foot and the flexible membrane define a clearance region on an opposite side of the flexible membrane from the gap. When the MEMS element interacts with an object to be manipulated the foot spaces the membrane apart from the object. The MEMS array system further includes a control circuit that selectively actuates one or more of the MEMS elements of the MEMS array.

MEMS array system and method of manipulating objects

A capacitive touch sensor includes an array of electrode elements, each electrode element including a drive electrode and a sense electrode, the drive electrode and the sense electrode forming at least one mutual coupling capacitor in each electrode element. A controller is operatively coupled to the array of electrode elements, the controller configured to measure the at least one mutual coupling capacitance over at least one measurement period. In addition, excitation signals applied during the at least one measurement period are balanced to reduce the effect of baseline capacitance.

Capacitive touch panel with balanced parallel driving

A display device is provided that comprises a liquid crystal display panel () for displaying an image by spatial light modulation. The image is represented by a plurality of image elements each having an image data value (). The display device further comprises a display controller () arranged to determine a signal voltage to be applied to the panel () for each image element in dependence upon its image data value () and a secondary data value () for the element, there being a predetermined mapping between the data values and the signal voltage. The secondary data values () are arranged to vary across the image so as to introduce variations in luminance as a result of the mapping. The mapping and secondary data values () are mutually arranged to take account of the signal voltage to on-axis luminance response of the panel () so that the luminance variations introduced on-axis tend to balance locally through spatial averaging to, and hence would not be perceivable by, an on-axis viewer (). The panel () furthermore has a non-linear off-axis luminance to on-axis luminance relationship, so that at least some of the luminance variations introduced off-axis do not balance locally through spatial averaging to, and hence would be perceivable by, an off-axis viewer ().

Display device

A mutual capacitance touch sensor includes a substrate, and an array of electrode elements formed on the substrate. Each electrode element includes at least one of a first electrode group having at least two drive electrodes and at least one sense electrode, or a second electrode group having at least two sense electrodes and at least one drive electrode. The respective electrodes of the first or second group are arranged to form multiple capacitances over different coupling distances. A controller is operatively coupled to the array of electrode elements, the controller configured to assign an input object as a conductive object when measurements of the multiple capacitances decrease as the input object approaches the touch sensor, and assign the input object as non-conductive object when measurements of at least one of the multiple capacitances increase as the input object approaches the touch sensor.

Discriminative capacitive touch panel

A method of processing image data for display by a display panel of a display device is provided. The method comprises receiving main image pixel data representing a main and side image pixel data representing a side image. In a first processing step, a mapping is performed of the pixel data to signals used to drive the display panel. The mapping is arranged to produce an average on-axis luminance which is dependent mainly on the main image pixel data and an average off-axis luminance which is dependent at least to some extent on the side image pixel data. In a second processing step, the received side image pixel data are processed to emphasize at least one feature of the side image which might otherwise be perceived by a viewer as being de-emphasized in the side image displayed off axis as a result of the first processing step.

Apparatus, display device, and method thereof for processing image data for display by a display panel

A method of processing image data for display by a display panel of a display device. The method comprises receiving main image pixel data representing a main image and side image pixel data representing a side image, and performing a mapping of the pixel data to signals used to drive the display panel. The mapping is arranged to produce an average on-axis luminance which is dependent mainly on the main image pixel data and an average off-axis luminance which is dependent at least to some extent on the side image pixel data. A compression of the main image pixel data is performed in advance of or at least partly incorporated into the mapping, the compression being performed at least partly in dependence upon the main image pixel data and at least partly in dependence upon how the off-axis luminance varies with pixel data input to the mapping.

Method, apparatus and program for processing image data for display by a display panel of a display device, and a display device

A display device having a display panel for displaying an image by spatial light modulation includes a plurality of pixel groups, each pixel group including a first pixel having a first type of luminance against viewing angle response, and a second pixel having a second type of luminance against viewing angle response, wherein the first and second luminance against viewing angle responses are different from one another. The display device further includes a controller operatively coupled to each of the plurality of pixel groups, wherein the controller is configured to drive each of the plurality of pixel groups such that on average the plurality of pixel groups simultaneously provide a predetermined on-axis luminance and an predetermined off-axis luminance for a region of the image corresponding to each pixel group.

Angular dependent pixels for trick view

A camera flash comprises a light guide arranged to extract light at least through one surface; and one or more light sources arranged, in use, to emit light into the lightguide. Each light source is an LED or a laser diode. The camera flash is connectable, in use, to drive circuitry, the drive circuitry being for driving the light source(s) to emit a pulse of light. The waveguide spreads out the light from the light source(s), so that a flash of light from the camera flash does not present a safety risk, while minimizing loss of the light from the light source(s). The camera flash can thus provide a high overall optical output, spread over an extended area (as defined by the waveguide). The lightguide may for example be disposed around a camera module of a mobile telephone camera.

Camera flash, a camera, and a method of generating a flash

A technique is provided for detecting errors in persistent memory, such as flash memory, where values of data items are stored at memory locations added consecutively to one end of the already-allocated memory segment. When a new location is added, a pointer to the address of the new location is stored at the location of a preceding value for that item. The address of the latest location is determined () whenever power is reapplied. The pointer fields of the locations are searched () for any pointer whose value is greater than the address of the last location. If such a pointer value is found, this indicates that an error occurred when writing the pointer value, for example because power was removed before completion of the pointer writing cycle. The error can be corrected by changing the pointer value to the address of the last location ().

Method of and apparatus for detecting an error in writing to persistent memory

A technique is provided for storing updated values of a data item in a segment of memory in which stored values cannot be individually overwritten, such as a flash memory. Each updated value is stored at an address which has space for a far pointer and a local pointer. When a new value is stored, the local pointer of the previous value is set to point to the address of the new value. When a chain of nodes of this type has been established and a further update value is to be stored, it is entered at a new node and a far pointer at a much earlier node of the chain is set to point to the new node so that the most recent value can be found without having to follow the local pointers in all of the previous nodes.

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Oxford, United Kingdom

Andrew Kay