A color-simulating apparatus is provided, which can be applied to change the color of an article to various colors. The color-simulating device first analyzes a color to be simulated and then produces a light having the color according to the analysis result. Lastly, the color light is used to provide the color of an article.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to a color-simulating apparatus.

2. Description of the Related Art

Human beings living in the world are sensitive to the variation of colors. Various colors might affect the feeling of people. Therefore, sometimes people have to change the color of an article in order to arrange various colors in pairs. There are some prior arts focusing their research on colors and how to arrange various colors in groups. Conventionally, in order to change the color of an article, pigment or dye in various colors has to be coated on the article. This conventional method is troublesome and can not change the color of an article in real time.

Besides the conventional method described above, some prior-art articles are made of the material which can change its color under various temperatures or while illuminated by various intensities of lights. However, such an article can only change its color from deep to light or between two different colors. The color variation of the prior-art article is monotonous.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Accordingly, in order to overcome the drawbacks of the prior arts, an object of the present invention is to provide a color-simulating apparatus, which can be applied to change the color of an article to various colors.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a color-simulating apparatus, which can change the color of an article in real time.

According to this invention, the color-simulating apparatus first analyzes a color to be simulated and then produces a light having the color according to the analysis result. Lastly, the color light is used to provide the color of an article.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

Referring toFIG. 1, according to the first embodiment of the present invention, the color-simulating apparatus comprises: a light source device10, a demodulation device14and a light-emitting device16.

Referring toFIG. 4, the light source device10includes three-primary-colored light sources10a˜10cfor providing lights of three primary colors, and modulators10x˜10zfor modulating the lights of three primary colors, respectively.

The modulated lights of three primary colors produced by the light source device10is reflected by the article12and is then received by the demodulation device14. Referring toFIG. 5, the demodulation device14includes an optical sensor140and demodulators14x˜14z.

Corresponding to the modulation way of the modulators10x˜10z, the demodulation device14demodulates the modulated signals. For instance, if the modulators10x˜10zmodulate the lights of three primary colors with three different frequencies f1, f2and f3, then the demodulation device14has to demodulate the modulated signals corresponding to the three frequencies f1, f2and f3.

The reflectivity of the article's surface is different for different colored lights. Therefore the lights of three primary colors has different light intensities after being reflected by the article. The intensity signals of the three-primary-colored lights can be obtained by using the demodulation device14to demodulate the signals of the reflected light.

The light-emitting device16includes light-emitting elements of three colors, such as light-emitting diode or laser diode. The driving circuit of the light-emitting device receives the intensity signals output from the demodulation device14and then drives the light-emitting elements of three colors to emit a colored light to simulate the color of the article12.

Referring toFIG. 2, according to the second embodiment of the present invention, the color-simulating apparatus comprises: a light source device20, a filtering device24, a demodulation device26and a light-emitting device28.

The light source device20includes a white light source for emitting a white light and a modulator for modulating the white light.

The modulated white light produced by the light source device20is projected to and is then reflected by the surface of the article22.

The reflected white light is directed toward the filtering device24, which includes filters of three primary colors for filtering out the lights of three primary colors from the white light.

The lights of three primary colors obtained through the filtering device24are received by the demodulation device26.

Referring toFIG. 6, the demodulation device26includes optical sensors26a˜26cand demodulators26x˜26z. The optical sensors26a˜26crespectively receive the lights of three primary colors and convert the optical signals of the lights to electrical signals. The demodulators26x˜26zrespectively demodulate the electrical signals to obtain the intensity signals of the three-primary-colored lights.

In this embodiment, the modulation/demodulation of the lights is adopted to prevent the signals from the interference of noise signals. Regarding the modulation/demodulation way, for instance, the white light can be modulated with a certain frequency f. The demodulation device26demodulates the modulated lights corresponding to the frequency f.

Referring toFIG. 3, according to the third embodiment of this invention, the color-simulating apparatus comprises: a light source device30, a filtering device34, a demodulation device36and a light-emitting device38.

The light source device30is the same as the light source device10of the first embodiment. The modulated lights of three primary colors produced by the light source device30are projected to and then reflected by the surface of the article32.

The reflected three-primary-colored lights are directed toward the filtering device34, which includes filters of three primary colors for respectively passing the lights of three primary colors.

Referring toFIG. 7, the demodulation device36includes optical sensors36a˜36c, filters36p˜36rand demodulators36x˜36z. The filters36p˜36rare used to further purify the lights of three primary colors obtained through the filtering device34, respectively. The optical sensors36a˜36crespectively receive the lights of three primary colors and then convert the optical signals of the lights to electrical signals. After filtering out some noise signals by the filters36p˜36r, the demodulators36x˜36zrespectively demodulate the electrical signals to obtain the intensity signals of the three-primary-colored lights.

The filters36p˜36rcan be band-pass filters for passing the signals having a certain frequency range. Since the light source device30modulates the lights of three primary colors with different frequencies, the filters36p˜36rcan be used to pass different colored lights of three primary colors, respectively.

The color-simulating apparatus of the above embodiments can emit a colored light corresponding to the color of the article. In practice, a light guiding apparatus can be used to direct the colored light toward a certain position. For example, the color-simulating apparatus can be applied to a cup. A light-guiding layer is formed on the outer surface of the cup. Light diffuser is doped into the light-guiding layer. Thus, when the cup is placed on a table, the color-simulating apparatus can emit a colored light corresponding to the color of the table. The colored light is transmitted to the whole surface of the cup through the light-guiding layer, and is uniformly emitted from the surface of the cup due to the affect of the light diffuser. This method can be applied to various articles to change the color of an article.

Besides, the colored light emitted by the color-simulating device can directly illuminate the surface of an article. The article can present various colors when the color-simulating apparatus is placed on an environment having various colors.