Patent ID: 8287136

Claim:
A display apparatus comprising: a light source; a light source drive means to drive the light source; a reflection mirror to reflect an illuminating light from the light source and project it as a projected light onto an object; a mirror drive means to drive the reflection mirror to oscillate it in a non-resonance mode; an address generation means to input to the mirror drive means address information corresponding to coordinates of a position on the object where the projected light is thrown; a control means to control at least the light source drive means, the mirror drive means and the address generation means; a measuring means to output distance information representing a distance to the object, the the measuring means comprising: a start signal generation means to generate a start timing signal specifying a timing at which to start the light source drive means; a light quantity detection means to detect at least a light reflected from the object after having been emitted from the light source; a comparison means to receive a detection signal from the light quantity detection means and generate a reflection timing signal; a clock counting means to count the number of reference clocks from the start timing signal; a repetition counting means to count the number of reflections n of the reflected light by counting the reflection timing signal; a holding means to hold a clock count produced by the clock counting means at a timing of the reflection timing signal; and an arithmetic operation means to calculate a distance based on the number of repetitions n from the repetition counting means and the clock count from the holding means; and a curved surface distortion correction means to output video information corrected according to at least the curved surface distortions, wherein: the curved surface distortion correction means, after having received the address information from the address generation means and the distance information from the measuring means, outputs the corrected video information to the light source drive means so that the illuminating light from the light source driven by the light source drive means is projected onto the object, the light source is driven by the start timing signal and the reflection timing signal, and the arithmetic operation means produces the distance information representing the distance to the object, based on the clock count and the period of the reference clock.