A near-to-eye (or near-eye, NR2I) display is a wearable device that creates a display in front of the user's field of vision. The display may be transparent or opaque, depending on the application. For example, a transparent display can overlay information and graphics on top on the real world, while an opaque display can provide an immersive theater-like experience.
Near-to-Eye displays can be broadly placed in two categories, immersive and see-through. Immersive near-to-eye displays block a user's view of the real world and create a large field of view image, typically 30°-60° degrees for cinema glasses and 90°+ degrees for virtual reality displays. See-through near-to-eye displays leave the user's view of the real world open and create either a transparent image or a very small opaque image that blocks only a small portion of the user's field of view. The see-through category can be broken down into two applications, augmented reality and smart glasses. Augmented reality headsets typically offer 20°-60° degree fields of view and overlay information and graphics on top of the user's view of the real world. Smart glasses, in contrast typically have a smaller field of view and a display at which the user glances periodically rather than looking through the display continuously.
It is often the case that images displayed by NR2Is contain text which is to be read by the user. It would be beneficial for users of such near-to-eye displays to have a means provided for enhancement of the presented text in order to improve its readability and legibility, as measured through improved reading speed and comprehension. Such enhancement can provide benefits both in the case of visually impaired users and non-visually impaired user where legibility is reduced by external factors (for example fog, glare, low-light conditions, etc.). It would be beneficial for both static images and real- and non-real-time video images to be processed by the near-to-eye displays when they contain text. In other instances, where text may in fact be legible without enhancement, the implementation of text enhancements may allow for faster reading speeds, greater information retention or improvement in other reading-quality metrics, such as minimization of fatigue.
It would be further beneficial for such enhancements to be compatible with the evolving low weight, low volume, low complexity, and low cost near-to-eye display systems and be thus provided to users, both with normal vision or with low-vision. Accordingly, the inventors have established methodologies and system enhancements that augment an image containing text to be viewed by an individual, whatever the source of the image, in order to aid the individual in poor viewing conditions and/or to overcome physiological or psychological visual defects affecting the individual or to simply improve the quality of the reading experience for the user.
Other aspects and features of the present invention will become apparent to those ordinarily skilled in the art upon review of the following description of specific embodiments of the invention in conjunction with the accompanying figures.