Artificial Vision System on Digital Devices for Real-Time Head Tilt Control

• Published in: Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) Vol. 24; no. 12; p. 3756
• Main Authors: Miguel Ángel Tomé de la Torre, Antonio Álvarez Fernández-Balbuena, Bernárdez-Vilaboa, Ricardo, Daniel Vázquez Molini
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Basel MDPI AG 09.06.2024; MDPI
• Subjects: accommodative anomalies; algorithm; Algorithms; binocular anomalies; Calibration; Ergonomics; eye tracking; image processing software; Posture; Real time; Sensors; Software; visio-postural control
• ISSN: 1424-8220; 1424-8220
• DOI: 10.3390/s24123756

It is common to see cases in which, when performing tasks in close vision in front of a digital screen, the posture or position of the head is not adequate, especially in young people; it is essential to have a correct posture of the head to avoid visual, muscular, or joint problems. Most of the current systems to control head inclination require an external part attached to the subject’s head. The aim of this study is the validation of a procedure that, through a detection algorithm and eye tracking, can control the correct position of the head in real time when subjects are in front of a digital device. The system only needs a digital device with a CCD receiver and downloadable software through which we can detect the inclination of the head, indicating if a bad posture is adopted due to a visual problem or simply inadequate visual–postural habits, alerting us to the postural anomaly to correct it.The system was evaluated in subjects with disparate interpupillary distances, at different working distances in front of the digital device, and at each distance, different tilt angles were evaluated. The system evaluated favorably in different lighting environments, correctly detecting the subjects’ pupils. The results showed that for most of the variables, particularly good absolute and relative reliability values were found when measuring head tilt with lower accuracy than most of the existing systems. The evaluated results have been positive, making it a considerably inexpensive and easily affordable system for all users. It is the first application capable of measuring the head tilt of the subject at their working or reading distance in real time by tracking their eyes.