New Eye Tracking Techniques Improve Realism Of Aircraft Simulators.
A simulated flight environment for pilot training may soon be made more realistic through the use of eye-tracking technology developed by researchers at the University of Toronto's Institute of Biomedical Engineering (IMBE).
Many safety and cost benefits are obtained by training aircraft pilots under simulated conditions, but to be effective the simulation must be convicingly realistic. At present, th e training facilities use large domes and gimballed projectors, or an array of video screens, to display computer-generated images. But these installations are very expensive and image resolution is low. Further, it would take an enormous amount of addi to improve image quality significantly throughout the whole viewed scene.
However, based on the visual properties of the eye, realism can be obtained by providing a high-resolution "area of interest" insert within a large, low-resolution field of view. If the image-generating computer "knows" where the pilot's fixation is, it mage there.
The technology to make this possible was developed by a research team headed by Professor Richard Frecker and Professor Moshe Eizenman. The work was carried out in collaboration with CAE Electronics Ltd. of Montreal with financial support from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.
Their eye-tracker can record and analyze accurately up to 500 eye positions per second. The system works by means of capturing and processing the reflections of a low-level beam o f invisible infra-red light shone onto the eye.
Multi-element arrays capture the image of the eye and digitize the information, which is then processed in real time by a fast, dedicated signal processing unit. The difference in position between the ligh tre of the pupil reveals the instantaneous direction of gaze.
Developments by the IBME team have significantly increased the speed of signal processing in addition to enhancing accuracy of eye position estimates.