AUTOMATIC ANTI-GLARE SYSTEM FOR NIGHT TIME DRIVING USING LIQUID CRYSTAL SCREENS

Abstract

This paper proposes a prototype model for an automatic anti-glare system to reduce the risk of accidents during night time driving. The architecture consists of an aperture assembly and sensors. The aperture assembly is a two dimensional array of aperture elements, and their transmittances can be independently controllable. According to the transmittance, each aperture element will act either as opaque or transparent. The intensity of light ray is modulated by the transmittance of aperture elements, which causes the reduction of intensity of light passing through it. The prototype is implemented using liquid crystal display (LCD) and photovoltaic sensors. This system provides an automated mechanism to control the illumination according to the direction of incoming light. The fundamental idea is to measure the incoming light and using measured values to generate patterns on the LCD to reduce the illumination. The proposed prototype can be implemented in two ways: i) as spectacles with liquid crystal sheets placed in front of the glasses, which can be used while driving, ii) by placing large liquid crystal sheets in front of the windshields of vehicles. This method provides a flexible low cost implementation to build simple, reliable device to reduce the intensity of the light on-the-fly.