Ambient Light Detection by Camera

Authors: Mr Brouk.Wedajo, brouk.wedajo.ext@valeo.com, Ms Caroline Robert, caroline.robert@valeo.com

Company: VALEO, Driving Assistance Research Center, 34 rue Saint André, 93012 Bobigny, FRANCE

Keywords: Low beam Automation, Luxmeter by camera, Multifunctional camera

Abstract:

Cameras are used today in driving assistance domain for advanced applications like High beam-Low beam Automation or Traffic Sign Recognition.

In another hand, another sensor is used for basic applications like rains sensing, ambient light intensity estimation and low beam automation.

Multi-functional sensors are today the challenge of the Driving Assistance research. Until today, to give a realistic approximation of quantity of light in Lux received by the camera was difficult due to the specific camera response which is different from the driver’s perception of incoming light.

This paper presents a solution for the illumination estimation by a camera.

Real measurements are made on different cameras after their calibration and compared with a luxmeter with the same field of view. Then, accurate numerical results, and application examples are finally presented in this paper.

The procedure used is simple, takes a short processing time and can be finally a useful tool in driving assistance applications. Moreover, this solution can be applied for many  kinds  of cameras after calibration.