Sony Corporation

Isao Sawachika

Akira Ogihara

Masami Torizuka

Yoshiro Muraoka

Yoshio Okoshi

Ichiro Kosugi

Tetsuya Yagi

Atsushi Koide

Daiji Takahashi

The characteristic of a visual-field angle is improved by improving a characteristic of the contrast of a liquid-crystal display element employed in a head mounted display apparatus which is used as an optical visualizing apparatus mounted on the head of an image viewer for viewing an image appearing in front of both eyes of an image viewer. The liquid-crystal display element for displaying an image comprises a liquid-crystal board as well as first and second polarizing boards sandwiching the liquid-crystal board wherein the polarization directions of the first and second polarizing boards are inclined in a slanting orientations so that the contrast characteristic in the horizontal direction can be kept unchanged while the characteristic of the contrast in the vertical direction can be changed. In this way, the angle of the visual field can be enhanced.

Optical visualizing apparatus

An optical visualizing apparatus for use in a head mounted display unit contains a liquid crystal shutter designed to allow a viewer to see both an image display and scenery outside of the image display at the same time. The apparatus contains a screen placed in front of the viewer's eyes, an optical visualizing unit to display an image on the screen, a mounting unit for supporting the optical visualizing unit in front of the viewer's face, and a control unit that can either suspend transmission of the image and allow clear sighting through the screen without the image or, if desired, simultaneous display of the image and sighting of scenery outside of the image. The control unit preferably controls a liquid crystal shutter that can adjust the amount of external light entering the display apparatus over two ranges, one range corresponding to the image area and the other range corresponding to the area surrounding the image area, so that the user can view a displayed image and external scenery clearly and simultaneously.

Head-mounted image display having selective image suspension control and

An automatic image regulating arrangement for a head-mounted image display device includes a sensor for detected conditions, such as outside ambient light, or vibration, applied to display elements of the display device and a regulating portion to control display of the images so as to compensate for conditions detected by the sensor so as to maintain good image visibility in various viewing environments.

Automatic image regulating arrangement for head-mounted image display

Growing community of inventors

Kanagawa, Japan

Isao Sawachika