DRIVING EMULATION APPARATUS

An emulation apparatus (1) for driving a vehicle (5) driven by a driver and having control device (50), the emulation apparatus (1) including shooting device (20) to film the vehicle driver's view (5) and generate a shooting output, sensor device (21) to check the instantaneous vehicle's conditions (5) and generate a condition output, a control apparatus (22) having transmission device (23) to receive the shooting output and the condition output, at least one emulation device (3) to connect to the control apparatus (22) and including: display device (30) of the shooting output, control device (31) to emulate the vehicle control device (50) to allow a practitioner to emulate the vehicle driving (5), the control device (31) generating a practicing command output, the control apparatus (22) comparing the vehicle condition output (5) with the practicing command output and displaying on the display device (30) a comparison between said outputs.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to an emulation apparatus for driving, for example for driving aircraft, cars and similar, of the type specified in the preamble of the first claim.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

It is currently known the emulation and simulation systems for driving.

For example, the simulators make it possible to learn or improve the driving of aircraft and cars, without entailing the associated risks, in particular for the people driving and for the people around them.

Said simulators are more and more precise and therefore simulate real driving in an ever more realistic way.

For example, the so-called “Full Flight Simulators” (FFS) are known, which allow to replicate an operational scenario, in a civil or military context, in a complete manner, thus allowing crews to train.

The known art described includes some important drawbacks.

In particular, the simulators, however precise, will never be able to perfectly emulate the real exercises and practices.

Furthermore, said simulators are very expensive and complex.

In some cases, the problem was solved with emulations. During the emulations, practitioners are asked to imitate the gestures of more experienced drivers.

However, even the latter have important limitations.

In this situation, the technical task underlying the present invention is to devise a driving emulation apparatus capable of substantially obviating at least part of the aforementioned drawbacks.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Within the scope of said technical task, it is an important object of the invention to obtain a driving emulation apparatus that allows practitioners to interface as much as possible with the reality.

Another important object of the invention is to realize an emulation apparatus for driving that is simple and cheap.

The technical task and the specified aims are achieved by an emulation apparatus for driving as claimed.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

FIG.1shows an emulation apparatus for driving according to the invention.

In the present document, the measurements, values, shapes and geometric references (such as perpendicularity and parallelism), when associated with words like “about” or other similar terms such as “approximately” or “substantially”, are to be considered as except for measurement errors or inaccuracies due to production and/or manufacturing errors, and, above all, except for a slight divergence from the value, measurements, shape, or geometric reference with which it is associated. For instance, these terms, if associated with a value, preferably indicate a divergence of not more than 10% of the value.

Moreover, when used, terms such as “first”, “second”, “higher”, “lower”, “main” and “secondary” do not necessarily identify an order, a priority of relationship or a relative position, but can simply be used to clearly distinguish between their different components.

Unless otherwise specified, as results in the following discussions, terms such as “treatment”, “computing”, “determination”, “calculation”, or similar, refer to the action and/or processes of a computer or similar electronic calculation device that manipulates and/or transforms data represented as physical, such as electronic quantities of registers of a computer system and/or memories in, other data similarly represented as physical quantities within computer systems, registers or other storage, transmission or information displaying devices.

The measurements and data reported in this text are to be considered, unless otherwise indicated, as performed in the International Standard Atmosphere ICAO (ISO 2533:1975).

With reference to the Figures, the emulation apparatus according to the invention is globally indicated with the number 1.

It is capable of allowing a practitioner to emulate the driving of an experienced driver.

Said driver therefore preferably drives a vehicle5, such as an aircraft, military or civilian, or an automobile or even more. Vehicle5can also be a sports vehicle, such as a formula 1 car or similar.

The vehicle5comprises control device50, known per se, such as joystick, steering wheel, pedals, levers and switches and even more.

The apparatus1preferably comprises shooting device20configured to capture the view of the driver of the vehicle5and generate a shooting output. They are preferably one or more cameras showing, for example, the view or part of the view given by the main window on the vehicle5, the driver's helmet or other (FIG.1).

The apparatus1also preferably comprises sensor device21configured to check the instantaneous conditions of the vehicle5and generate a condition output of the vehicle5.

The sensor device21preferably comprise accelerometers, and/or one or more of gyroscopes, telemetry, inertial platforms, and similar, connected to the vehicle5and able to determine its condition.

Alternatively, or in addition, the sensor device21are directly connected to the control device50of the vehicle5, and therefore directly detect the movement of the steering wheel and similar.

Alternatively, or in addition, the sensor device21obtain information indirectly through the images of the recording device.

The apparatus1also preferably comprises a control apparatus22. The control apparatus22is a heterogeneous system and generally comprises a server computer, per se known, and preferably connected devices suitable for controlling the process described.

The control apparatus22preferably comprising transmission device23, configured to receive the shooting output and the condition output, respectively from the shooting device20and the sensor device21. Said transmission device23are preferably antennas or cards and/or cables, or wireless connections, bluetooth and radio for internet connection. Logically also the sensor device21and the shooting device20are preferably connected to the Internet via suitable connection device.

The emulation apparatus1further comprises at least one emulation device3, used by the practitioner. There may also be more emulation devices3used simultaneously by a plurality of practitioners.

The emulation device3comprises connection device with the control apparatus22, such as web connections known per se.

The emulation device3preferably comprises display device30, such as a screen or similar, suitable for displaying the output of said shooting device20. The practitioner can therefore see what the driver sees, or something very similar.

The emulation device3also preferably comprises control device31configured to emulate the control device50of the vehicle5, so as to allow the practitioner to emulate the driving of the vehicle5, the control device31therefore generate a practicing control output.

The control device31can be constituted by joysticks and steering wheels, for example similar to those used for video games and similar to the control device50of the vehicle5or even more. The device3can also comprise, or be, a simple smartphone or tablet, which therefore already comprises the display device30and the connection device. In this case the control device31can be given by the inclination of the smartphone and the accelerometers connected.

Advantageously, the control apparatus22compares the condition output of the vehicle5with the operating control output and displays on the display device30a comparison between said outputs (FIG.1). Basically, the practitioner visualizes, for example, the degrees of turn of an aircraft and the video of the turn, preferably substantially live, and at the same time visualizes the difference with his own turn, for example with a second visual signal25, given by the reactions on the commands that realized.

Preferably, the transmission device23transmit the shooting output and the condition output substantially in real time, or live, and display the comparison between the outputs substantially in real time.

Alternatively, especially if there are several practitioners who can also directly compare each other, the control apparatus22is configured to determine a delay in the transmission of the output to allow the simultaneous transmission of the outputs. In such a way as to allow even the slowest connections or devices to connect and act with simulation.

The operation of the emulation apparatus1previously described in structural terms is as follows.

It also defines a new emulation procedure for driving of a vehicle5preferably made with the emulation apparatus1described above.

The emulation process preferably comprises:the driving of the vehicle5by a driver,the shooting of the view of the driver of the vehicle5, preferably by means of the shooting device and the described methods, and the generation of a shooting output,the verifying, by means of sensor device21, preferably of the type described above, of the instantaneous conditions of the vehicle5and the generation of an output condition,the transmission of shooting output and condition output of a control apparatus22, preferably of the type described and preferably by means of the transmission device described,the connection of at least one emulation device3, or of more emulation devices3, preferably of the type described, to the control apparatus22,the display of the shooting output on the emulation device3,the generation of a practising control output by means of command device31activated by the practitioner,the comparison of the condition output of the vehicle5with the practicing control output and the display on the display device30of the comparison between the outputs. This comparison and display preferably takes place in real time or with a predetermined delay as previously described.

The emulation apparatus1according to the invention achieves important advantages.

Indeed, it allows a practitioner to emulate an experienced driver in real time and with precision.

The practitioner, therefore, is not in front of a simulator, but in real conditions, and can accurately verify the differences between his driving and the guide of the expert driver, without however taking any risks, including physical ones for the driver and the surrounding people, and in the problems that would have a real guide.

Moreover, the said emulator is simple and inexpensive.

The invention is susceptible of variants falling within the scope of the inventive concept defined by the claims.

For example, a concrete embodiment of this procedure can be an application or software for smartTV or similar, which is operationally similar to a broadcasting channel with an emulation filter of the film shown. The control (joystick, steering wheel, joystick, or smartphone) could therefore be connected either via cable or wireless.

For example, the procedure can be extended to the use of other objects, not only driving vehicles or even the movement of an expert without objects or means.