KR20060088589A - Optical pointing apparatus and personal portable device having the optical pointing apparatus using an integrated illumination units of lens - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention enables pointing using the surface of a finger as a subject, and converts the optical path from vertical to horizontal to minimize the thickness of the optical system and to provide a sufficient focal length and personal portable device. It is an object to provide a terminal. The optical pointing device according to the present invention includes a cover glass in direct contact with a subject; An illumination unit formed of a SMD (Surface Mounted Device) type Chip LED and a convex lens-waveguide to efficiently irradiate light to the rear surface of the cover glass; And a light receiving unit that reflects the direction of light reflected by the subject through the cover glass in a predetermined direction, collects light in the predetermined direction, and captures the collected light.

The present invention enables pointing using a surface of a finger as a subject, and efficiently condenses a wide divergence angle of 120 to 90 °, which is characteristic of a small and slim SMD (Surface Mounted Device) type Chip LED, without loss. By transmitting light to the cover glass and forming a horizontal optical path, it is possible to minimize the thickness of the optical system of the optical pointing device and to provide a sufficient focal length, so as not to impair the beautiful appearance of the ultra-slim personal portable terminal. It also allows for convenient pointing.

Lighting parts, personal digital assistants, Surface Mounted Deivce (SMD), Chip Light Emitting Diode (LED), slimming                                    

Description

Optical pointing apparatus and personal portable device having the optical pointing apparatus using an integrated illumination units of lens}

1 is a view showing angles at which light is emitted from a surface mounted device (SMD) type chip emitting light emitting diode (LED).

2 is a view showing that the surface mounted device (SMD) type Chip-LED (Lighting Emitted Diode) emits light up, down, left, and right in three dimensions.

FIG. 3 illustrates that only light irradiated at a small angle from a small center of light emitted from a surface mounted device (SMD) type Chip-LED (Lighting Emitted Diode) is irradiated to an object plane to hit a finger (subject). Figure showing progression to offset.

FIG. 4 is a view illustrating an optical path in which light irradiated from side to side in an optical pointing device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention is efficiently transmitted to an object plane through an illumination system.

FIG. 5 is a view illustrating an optical path in which light irradiated up and down in an optical pointing device according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention is efficiently transmitted to an object plane through an illumination system.

6 is a three dimensional view of a lens used in an optical pointing device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 7 is a three dimensional view showing the lower end of a lens used in an optical pointing device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention. FIG.

8 is a block diagram of an optical pointing device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention.

9 is a view showing the appearance of a personal terminal adopting the optical pointing device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 10 is a block diagram illustrating a personal portable terminal of FIG. 9. FIG.

The present invention relates to a user interface device, and more particularly, to a personal portable terminal including an optical pointing device and an optical pointing device that can be mounted on an ultra-slim personal portable device such as a mobile phone.

In general, personal mobile terminals such as mobile phones and PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants) employ a user interface using a keypad. In more detail, the conventional personal portable terminal is provided with a keypad composed of a plurality of buttons for inputting numbers and characters, so that a user can input a telephone number or a sentence by inputting a button of the keypad.

In recent years, as wireless Internet services such as WIBRO (Wireless Broadband) services have been commercialized, a Windows operating system supporting a Graphical User Interface (GUI) has been adopted for personal portable terminals. Windows for the personal portable terminal includes Windows CE and the like. In addition, with the development of technology, personal portable terminals have various additional services, and a Windows operating system supporting a GUI is also adopted for convenient operation of the various additional services.

As described above, as the operating system of the GUI is adopted as the user interface of the personal portable terminal, the development of a pointing device suitable for the personal portable terminal is urgently required.

In general, pointing devices for a GUI include a ball mouse, an optical mouse, a laser optical mouse, a touch pad, a tablet, and the like. The pointing device is employed in a computer, and can theoretically be used as a pointing device for a personal portable terminal.

However, since the personal portable terminal is intended to be portable, it is difficult to employ a separate pointing device separated from the main body as a pointing device of the personal portable terminal. In addition, since a track ball-type or joystick-type pointing device physically occupies a predetermined space or more, it is difficult to be employed in a slip and small personal portable terminal.

In addition, the optical mouse input device used in the related art has not only a large module size because the mounting space is sufficient, but also a light source used as a lamp type LED has a large size and thus cannot be applied to a small portable device such as a mobile phone.

Here, since the lamp-type LED as described above cannot be used, a problem that occurs when using a SMD (Surface Mounted Device) type LED chip will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

Looking at Figure 1 it can be seen the irradiation angle of the SMD (Surface Mounted Device) type Chip LED. 1, 102 shows the shape of the light source to be irradiated. In general, the chip LED 101 has an irradiation angle of light ranging from 120 ° to 90 °.

In FIG. 2, such light irradiation is expressed three-dimensionally. The irradiation angle of the chip LED 101 does not have different irradiation angles up, down, left, and right, but is irradiated while spreading the same up, down, left, and right as shown in FIG. Therefore, when using a Chip LED having such a wide irradiation angle as shown in Figure 3, most of the light will pass through without being transmitted to the subject as shown in (202) of FIG. In this case, substantially the amount of light transmitted to the imaging system is very small, such as 203 of FIG. Therefore, the amount of light does not allow the image sensor to sufficiently transmit the amount of light that can distinguish the image, resulting in a slowing of the movement of the pointer (cursor) implemented on the display.

Therefore, in order to efficiently use the light emitted from the light source, the design of an illumination system capable of condensing a wide divergence angle is urgently desired.

The technical problem to be achieved by the present invention is to provide an optical pointing device and a personal portable terminal that can be pointed by using the surface of the finger as a subject, and also applicable to a device having a slim thickness by minimizing the thickness of the optical system. do.

In particular, in implementing an optical pointing device, the size of a light source used to manufacture a module size that can be mounted on a small portable device such as a mobile phone is also important.

Conventionally, in the case of a light source used in an optical mouse, the amount of light is large and the size of the light source is large by using a lamp type LED. Such lamp type LEDs cannot be used in small portable devices such as mobile phones because of their size. Therefore, small size SMD (Surface Mounted Device) type chip LED should be used for small portable devices such as mobile phones.

However, such an SMD type chip LED has a very wide irradiation angle of light up, down, left, and right (irradiation angle: 120-90 °), so that it cannot efficiently transmit light to an object plane.

Therefore, in order to efficiently transmit such wasted light to an object plane, an illumination system capable of condensing light to a certain portion is required. These lighting systems are also a big factor in determining the power consumption of early chip LEDs. This is because if an efficient illumination system can be used, the amount of light capable of generating an image to the object plane can be transmitted even if the initial light emission amount is small.

In order to efficiently collect a chip LED having a high irradiation angle, the lens must have a large aperture or a very small radius of curvature. However, in order to mount it on a small mobile device such as a mobile phone, the aperture of the lens cannot be large, so it is necessary to design an illumination lens having a small radius of curvature. In addition, even with a small radius of curvature, the aperture of the illumination system lens itself is small, so that only the waveguide type design using the reflective surface can sufficiently irradiate light onto the object plane.

As described above, the present invention can provide an optical pointing device and a personal portable terminal capable of minimizing the loss of light of the lighting unit to reduce the power consumption of the module.

The optical pointing device according to the present invention for achieving the above object and to solve the problems of the prior art comprises a cover glass in direct contact with the subject; An illumination unit formed of a SMD (Surface Mounted Device) type Chip LED and a convex lens-waveguide to efficiently irradiate light to the rear surface of the cover glass; And a light receiving unit that reflects the direction of light reflected by the subject through the cover glass in a predetermined direction, collects light in the predetermined direction, and captures the collected light.

In addition, a portable device widely referred to in the present specification refers to a mobile communication terminal such as a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) and a handheld PC, or a mobile phone having a predetermined memory and a predetermined microprocessor by mounting a predetermined microprocessor. Concept. In addition, the portable device is a portable multimedia playback device capable of playing multimedia files such as music or video, and may include all kinds of portable devices such as an MP3 player, an MP3 phone, a PDP, a PMP, a DMB receiver, and the like.

The present invention provides an optical pointing device that enables pointing using a surface of a finger as a subject, and more particularly, relates to an optical pointing device using an illumination system using a convex lens-waveguide structure to focus a wide divergence angle of a chip LED. .

Referring to the configuration of the present invention with reference to the following drawings.

4 is a view showing an optical path in which light irradiated from side to side in an optical pointing device according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention is efficiently transmitted to an object plane through an illumination system, and FIG. 5 is a preferred embodiment of the present invention. FIG. Is a view illustrating an optical path in which light irradiated up and down in an optical pointing device according to an embodiment is efficiently transmitted to an object plane through an illumination system.

4 to 5, the characteristics of the optical transmission of the preferred embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail.

4 is an illumination system-lens integrated module 300 of an optical pointing device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention, in which the light emitted from the SMD (Surface Mounted Device) type Chip LED 301 to the left and right is efficiently transmitted to the object plane. It is shown. The light emitted from the chip LED 301 to the left and right is reduced by the irradiation angle by the convex lens 302. The light 308 whose irradiation angle is reduced is moved by the reflecting surfaces 303 and 304 from the outside of the illumination waveguide 305 to the inner direction, and then again by the reflecting surface 306 toward the cover glass 309. The light is transmitted to.

FIG. 5 is an illumination system-lens integrated module 300 of an optical pointing device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention, in which light emitted up and down from a surface mounted device (SMD) type chip LED 301 is efficiently transmitted to an object plane. It is shown. Light emitted up and down by the Chip LED 301 is reduced by the convex lens 302 to reduce the irradiation angle. As the irradiation angle is reduced, the light 308 traveling toward the outside of the illumination system waveguide 305 is reflected on the upper and lower portions of the illumination system waveguide 305 to change the light propagation direction toward the center. The light thus changed is reflected on the reflective surface 306 to be efficiently transmitted to the cover glass 309. The transmitted light is reflected by the subject (finger) 311 so that the path of the light 310 is changed toward the condenser lens.

The angle of the reflective surface 306 is installed so that light is incident at a small angle to the back of the cover glass 309, to facilitate scanning the surface of the finger. In addition, the reflecting surfaces 303, 304, and 306 are polished to increase surface precision, thereby eliminating light loss and diffuse reflection that may occur when reflecting light.

4 and 5, the light can be efficiently transmitted to the cover glass 309 because most of the reflected light is incident inside the illumination system waveguide 305 while forming a total reflection angle. Accordingly, by efficiently adjusting the angle of the reflected surface, it becomes possible to design in which more light can be incident on the cover glass 309.

6 and 7 are three-dimensional modeling shapes of the illumination system-lens integrated module 300 of the optical pointing device according to the preferred embodiment of the present invention. By making the convex lens 302, the waveguide 305, the cover glass 309, and the imaging convex lens integrated waveguide lens 307 integrally, the irradiation angle of light incident on the cover glass 309 can be stably maintained. Easy assembly to maximize mass production.

8 shows an optical pointing device 400 according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention. 8 and 408 of FIG. 8 are wings that can serve as a guide role and a fixed role so that the position of the surface mounted device (SMD) type chip LED can be fixed constantly. This guide is necessary to increase the assemblability because the angle of the light incident on the convex lens-waveguide illumination system is changed according to the fixed position of the chip LED. Convex lens-waveguide illumination system 405, cover glass 409, convex lens-integrated waveguide lens 410 is formed integrally, the stop 411 that can block the light, second convex lens-integrated image waveguide The lens 412, the barrel 413, and the housing 414 are comprised.

This structure is adopted to reduce the thickness of the module to be applied to small portable devices such as mobile phones.

Therefore, the optical joystick having the same performance as that of an optical mouse used in a computer can be manufactured by applying such a structure.

As such, the present invention has been able to solve a problem that cannot be applied due to the limitation due to the size of the lamp-type LED applied to the conventional optical mouse. In addition, it is possible to efficiently transmit the light to the object plane (object plane or cover glass) has the effect of reducing the current consumption applied to the SMD (Surface Mounted Device) type chip LED.

The optical pointing device according to the preferred embodiment of the present invention described above can be mounted on a personal portable terminal.

Hereinafter, an example in which an optical pointing device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention is mounted on a mobile phone among personal portable terminals will be described.

9 illustrates an appearance of a mobile phone equipped with the optical pointing device, a predetermined portion of the mobile phone 500 may include an optical pointing device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention, and the mobile phone 500 A predetermined portion of the keypad 501 of the keypad 501 is provided with a cover glass 502 according to the embodiment to allow the user to move by pointing the surface of the finger as a subject.

The configuration of the mobile phone will be described with reference to FIG.

The control unit 600 of the mobile phone not only controls the mobile phone as a whole, but also receives information on a moving speed, direction, and distance of a finger, which is an object provided by the image processing unit 606, according to the present invention, and displays the information accordingly. The display device driver 602 is controlled to change the pointer displayed on the device 603. In addition, the control unit 600 performs an operation according to the operation of the click button provided in the keypad 604. The memory unit 601 stores various information including a processing program of the controller 600. The display device driver 602 displays a screen under the control of the controller 600 on the display device 603, and changes the position of the pointer displayed on the screen according to the present invention. The keypad 604 includes a plurality of keys to provide a signal according to a key input to the controller 600, and further includes a click button used for pointing in accordance with the present invention. The optical pointing device 605 captures a finger, which is a subject, and provides the image to the image processor 606. The image processor 606 generates pointer information on a moving speed, a direction, and a distance of a finger, which is a subject, using the sensing information and provides the generated information to the controller 600.

As described above, the mobile phone performs pointing according to the speed, direction, and distance of the movement of a finger as a subject.

As described above, the optical pointing device according to the present invention uses SMD (Surface Mounted Device) type chip LEDs, not lamp type LEDs, to be applied to ultra-slim modules. In addition, the convex lens-waveguide illumination system is used to transmit a wide irradiation angle to the object surface efficiently up, down, left and right, which is the characteristic of Chip LED.

In addition, by utilizing the convex lens-waveguide structure according to the present invention, the light emitted from the chip LED can be efficiently transmitted to the object plane without loss and stabilize the motion of the module. It was also possible to reduce the amount of emitted light by reducing the amount of battery consumption.

The optical pointing device having such a structure can be applied not only to a small portable device such as a mobile phone but also to an electronic device such as a digital camera, a camcorder, a notebook, etc. This will become an essential technology for applying to a graphical user interface (GUI) environment, such as a Windows environment of a computer, which is a future direction of technology.

As described above, the present invention has been described by way of limited embodiments and drawings, but the present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiments, which can be variously modified and modified by those skilled in the art to which the present invention pertains. Modifications are possible.

Accordingly, the scope of the present invention should be understood only by the claims set forth below, and all equivalent or equivalent modifications thereof will belong to the scope of the present invention.

Claims (5)

Surface Mounted Device (SMD) type Chip LEDs Convex lens to reduce the angle of light spreading up, down, left and right, and to adjust the angle of the top, bottom, left and right so that this light can be totally reflected and proceed to the leading area without loss. A waveguide for an illumination system acting as a slope; A first reflective surface positioned below the reading area for sensing a movement of a subject and a first convex lens unit configured to collect light reflected from the first reflective surface, wherein the first reflective surface and the first flat convex lens A first waveguide formed integrally with the addition; A second convex lens portion facing the first convex lens portion and a second reflecting surface for reflecting light incident from the second convex lens portion, wherein the second convex lens portion and the second reflecting surface are A second waveguide integrally formed; And An image sensor located below the second reflecting surface; Optical pointing device having a. The method of claim 1, The optical waveguide for an illumination system is integrally formed with a first waveguide including a cover glass of a reading area and an image convex lens portion. The method of claim 1, An imaging convex lens portion is spherical or aspherical. A terminal body including a display unit; A cover glass partially exposed from the terminal body; Manufactured integrally with the cover glass; Surface-mounted device (SMD) type Chip LEDs Convex lens to reduce the angle of light spreading up, down, left, and right, and reflecting surface by adjusting the angle of up, down, left and right so that such light can be totally reflected and proceed to the leading area without loss. A waveguide for an illumination system that serves as; A first waveguide including a first reflective surface positioned below the cover glass and a first convex lens portion configured to collect light reflected from the reflective surface, the first waveguide integrally formed with the first reflective surface and the first convex lens portion; A second convex lens portion facing the first convex lens portion and a second reflecting surface for reflecting light incident from the second convex lens portion, wherein the second convex lens portion and the second reflecting surface are A second waveguide integrally formed; An image sensor located below the second reflecting surface; And A controller to move the pointer displayed on the display according to the moving direction of the subject from the signal detected by the image sensor; Personal mobile terminal having a. The method of claim 4, wherein Further comprising a keypad having a click button, And the control unit performs an operation according to the operation of the click button.

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