The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
May. 07, 2002
Filed:
Mar. 18, 1998
Takenaka Corporation, Osaka, JP;
Abstract
Over an information input space to which an information inputting person comes, a pair of near-infrared light illuminators are arranged in such a manner that the illumination ranges thereof are adjusted so as to illuminate the information inputting person from different directions. A pair of near-infrared-light-sensitive video cameras are also arranged in different positions so as to correspond to the illuminators. The image pickup range of the video cameras is adjusted so that it is out of the range on the floor surface illuminated by the corresponding illuminator, while the information inputting person is within the image pickup range. A controller allows one illuminator at a time to be switched on/off. An image of the information inputting person is picked up by the video camera corresponding to the switched-on illuminator. The information inputting person is extracted based on the images picked up by the video cameras, whereby the position or direction pointed to by the information inputting person is determined.