JP7616032B2 - Video Recording Device - Google Patents

Description

This disclosure relates to a video recording device.

Patent Document 1 describes a technology in which a drive recorder stores captured images in a memory unit based on the results of comparing the output signal from an acceleration sensor with a judgment threshold, and by changing the judgment threshold based on changes in a signal that detects the parking state of the vehicle, it is possible to detect small vibrations that could not be detected before the vehicle was parked.

JP 2010-128610 A

The technology described in Patent Document 1 detects vibrations caused by closing the door when getting in or out of the vehicle as vibrations when the vehicle is parked, and as a result, unnecessary video continues to be recorded, which may result in video that should be saved being overwritten and erased.

This disclosure has been made in consideration of the above, and aims to provide a video recording device that can prevent unnecessary video from being continuously recorded.

The video recording device according to the first aspect includes a first control unit that starts recording video of the interior of the vehicle or the surroundings of the vehicle when vehicle vibration is detected, and a second control unit that stops the video recording when a door opening/closing signal of the vehicle is detected within a predetermined time after the vehicle vibration is detected.

In the first aspect, even if vibrations caused by the vehicle door closing are detected and video recording is started by the video recording device before the vehicle door opening/closing signal is detected by the video recording device, video recording is stopped at the point in time when the door opening/closing signal is detected by the video recording device. Therefore, according to the first aspect, it is possible to prevent unnecessary video from being continuously recorded.

This disclosure has the effect of preventing unnecessary video from being continuously recorded.

1 is a block diagram showing a schematic configuration of an in-vehicle system according to an embodiment; FIG. 2 is a functional block diagram of the video recording device. 4 is a flowchart showing a parking process executed by the video recording device.

An example of an embodiment of the present disclosure will be described in detail below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 shows an in-vehicle system 10 according to this embodiment. In the in-vehicle system 10, an acceleration sensor unit 14, a door opening/closing sensor unit 20, a video recording device 30, and a car navigation device 50 are communicatively connected to a system bus 12 that complies with standards such as CAN (Controller Area Network). In addition, a camera unit 26 is connected to the video recording device 30.

The acceleration sensor unit 14 includes an acceleration sensor 16 that detects the acceleration applied to the vehicle, and a communication unit 18 that transmits the acceleration detection result (acceleration signal) by the acceleration sensor 16 to the video recording device 30 via the system bus 12 at regular intervals. The acceleration sensor 16 also functions as a vibration sensor that detects vibrations of the vehicle.

The door opening/closing sensor unit 20 includes door opening/closing sensors 22 that are provided corresponding to the doors of the vehicle and detect the opening/closing of the doors of the vehicle, and a communication unit 24 that transmits the detection result of the door opening/closing by the door opening/closing sensor 22 (door opening/closing signal) to the video recording device 30 via the system bus 12 at regular intervals. In this embodiment, the transmission period of the door opening/closing signal from the door opening/closing sensor unit 20 is set longer than the transmission period of the acceleration signal from the acceleration sensor unit 14.

The camera unit 26 includes one or more cameras 28 capable of capturing images of the surroundings of the vehicle (hereinafter referred to as the subject vehicle) in which the in-vehicle system 10 is mounted or the interior of the subject vehicle. The cameras 28 capture images of the surroundings of the subject vehicle or the interior of the subject vehicle in response to instructions from the video recording device 30. The camera unit 26 also transmits images captured by the cameras 28 to the video recording device 30.

The video recording device (drive recorder) 30 includes a CPU (Central Processing Unit) 32 and a memory 34 such as a ROM (Read Only Memory) and a RAM (Random Access Memory). The video recording device 30 also includes a non-volatile storage unit 36 such as a HDD (Hard Disk Drive) or SSD (Solid State Drive), and a communication unit 38 that controls communication with the car navigation device 50 of the in-vehicle system 10. The CPU 32, memory 34, storage unit 36, and communication unit 38 are connected to each other via an internal bus 40 so that they can communicate with each other.

The storage unit 36 stores a video recording program 42 in advance, and has a video recording area 44 for recording video captured by the camera 28. The video recording device 30 may have a configuration in which the video recording area 44 is provided on a non-volatile recording medium (such as a micro USB (Universal Serial Bus) card) that is detachable from the video recording device 30. The video recording device 30 functions as the first control unit 46 and the second control unit 48 shown in FIG. 2 by reading the video recording program 42 from the storage unit 36 and expanding it in the memory 34, and executing the video recording program 42 expanded in the memory 34 by the CPU 32.

When the acceleration sensor 16 of the acceleration sensor unit 14 detects vibration of the vehicle, the first control unit 46 causes the camera 28 of the camera unit 26 to start recording video of the interior of the vehicle or the surroundings of the vehicle. In addition, when the second control unit 48 detects that the door opening/closing signal from the door opening/closing sensor unit 20 has changed from door open to door closed within a predetermined time after the acceleration sensor 16 of the acceleration sensor unit 14 detects vibration of the vehicle, the second control unit 48 causes the camera 28 of the camera unit 26 to stop recording video.

The car navigation device 50 includes a display unit 52 capable of displaying images such as maps, an input unit 54 capable of inputting information, and a USB slot 56 into which a USB memory or the like can be inserted. The display unit 52 and the input unit 54 are used as devices that realize the UI (User Interface) of the video recording device 30, for example, when searching for video recorded in the video recording area 44 of the video recording device 30 or when recording video to a USB memory inserted in the USB slot 56.

The operation of this embodiment will now be described. When the ignition switch of the vehicle is on, the video recording device 30 performs normal processing. In this normal processing, the video recording device 30 causes the camera 28 of the camera unit 26 to capture video, and records the video captured by the camera 28 in the video recording area 44 as video that can be overwritten.

In addition, during normal processing, each time the video recording device 30 receives an acceleration signal from the acceleration sensor 16 of the acceleration sensor unit 14, it determines whether the acceleration G represented by the received acceleration signal (the acceleration G detected by the acceleration sensor 16) is equal to or greater than a preset normal acceleration threshold Gth1. If it determines that the acceleration G is equal to or greater than the normal acceleration threshold Gth1, it records the video captured for a predetermined period of time by the camera 28 of the camera unit 26 in the video recording area 44 as video that cannot be overwritten.

Note that during normal processing, it is possible to omit video recording during periods when the acceleration G is less than the normal acceleration threshold Gth1.

Next, with reference to FIG. 3, we will explain the parking process executed by the video recording device 30 when the ignition switch of the vehicle is turned off and the vehicle is parked.

In step 100 of the parking process, the first control unit 46 waits until it receives an acceleration signal from the acceleration sensor unit 14, and determines whether the acceleration G represented by the acceleration signal received from the acceleration sensor unit 14 is equal to or greater than a preset acceleration threshold value Gth2. Note that the acceleration threshold value Gth2 may be Gth2=Gth1 or may be Gth2<Gth1. If the determination in step 100 is negative, the process proceeds to step 102.

In step 102, the first control unit 46 determines whether the ignition switch of the vehicle is turned on. If the determination in step 102 is negative, the process returns to step 100, and steps 100 and 102 are repeated until the determination in step 100 or step 102 is positive. If the determination in step 102 is positive because the ignition switch of the vehicle is turned on, the parking process ends.

On the other hand, if the acceleration G represented by the acceleration signal received from the acceleration sensor unit 14 becomes equal to or greater than the acceleration threshold Gth2 while the vehicle is parked, the determination in step 100 is affirmative and the process proceeds to step 104. In step 104, the first control unit 46 causes the camera 28 of the camera unit 26 to capture an image, and starts recording the image captured by the camera 28 in the image recording area 44, for example, as an image that cannot be overwritten.

In the next step 106, the second control unit 48 waits until it receives a door opening/closing signal from the door opening/closing sensor unit 20, and determines whether the door opening/closing signal received from the door opening/closing sensor unit 20 has detected a change from door open to door closed.

If the door opening/closing signal changes from the door open state to the door closed state, the determination in step 106 is affirmative and the process proceeds to step 108. In step 108, the second control unit 48 determines whether the time t from when the video recording is started in step 104 until when it is detected in step 106 that the door opening/closing signal has changed to the door closed state is equal to or shorter than a predetermined time T1 that has been set in advance. Note that the predetermined time T1 can be set, for example, to a time that corresponds to the transmission period of the door opening/closing signal from the door opening/closing sensor unit 20, specifically, a time of about 900 ms.

If the time t is equal to or less than the predetermined time T1, it can be determined that the change in acceleration G that caused the positive judgment in step 100 is due to the door of the vehicle being closed. For this reason, if the judgment in step 108 is positive, the process proceeds to step 112, where the second control unit 48 ends the capture of images by the camera 28 and the recording of the images in the image recording area 44. This makes it possible to prevent unnecessary images from being continuously recorded in the image recording area 44 due to the change in acceleration G (vibration) that accompanies the closing of the door of the vehicle. When the process in step 112 ends, the process returns to step 100.

If the determination in step 106 is negative, or if the determination in step 108 is negative, it can be determined that the change in acceleration G that caused the determination in step 100 to be positive is not due to the vehicle door being closed, and the process proceeds to step 110. In step 110, the second control unit 48 determines whether the time that has elapsed since the start of video recording in step 104 is equal to or greater than a preset predetermined time T2. Note that the predetermined time T2 can be set to, for example, about 60 seconds.

If the determination in step 110 is negative, the process returns to step 106, and steps 106 and 110 are repeated until the determination in step 110 is positive. During this time, the camera 28 continues to capture images and the images continue to be recorded in the image recording area 44.

Also, if the time elapsed since the start of video recording in step 104 reaches or exceeds the predetermined time T2, the determination in step 110 is affirmative and the process proceeds to step 112. Then, as described above, in step 112, the second control unit 48 ends the image capture by the camera 28 and the image recording in the video recording area 44, and the process returns to step 100.

As described above, in this embodiment, the video recording device 30 starts recording video of the interior of the vehicle or the surroundings of the vehicle when the first control unit 46 detects vehicle vibration. Also, when the second control unit 48 detects a vehicle door opening/closing signal within a predetermined time T1 after the vehicle vibration is detected, the video recording is stopped. This makes it possible to prevent unnecessary video from being continuously recorded.

Note that, although the above describes a manner in which vehicle vibration is detected by determining whether the acceleration detected by the acceleration sensor 16 is equal to or greater than the acceleration threshold Gth2, the present disclosure is not limited to this. For example, a dedicated vibration sensor for detecting vehicle vibration may be provided, and the vehicle vibration may be detected by comparing the vibration detected by the vibration sensor with a threshold.

In addition, in the parking process shown in FIG. 3, if the determination in step 108 is positive, video recording is terminated, but the present disclosure is not limited to this. For example, if the determination in step 108 is positive, video recording may be terminated and the video recorded from the start of video recording to the present may be erased. This can prevent the video recording area 44 from being overwhelmed with unnecessary video.

In addition, while the above describes a case where the video recording program 42 is pre-stored (installed) in the storage unit 36, the video recording program 42 can also be provided in a form recorded on a non-temporary recording medium such as an HDD, SSD, or DVD.

10 In-vehicle system 16 Acceleration sensor 22 Door opening/closing sensor 28 Camera 30 Video recording device 46 First control unit 48 Second control unit

Claims (1)

A first control unit that starts recording video of an interior of the vehicle or a periphery of the vehicle when vibration of the vehicle is detected;
a second control unit that stops the video recording when a door opening/closing signal of the vehicle is detected within a predetermined time after vibration of the vehicle is detected;
A video recording device including: