Patent ID: 8121787

Claim:
A video mirror system for a vehicle, said video mirror system comprising: an interior rearview mirror assembly mountable at an interior portion of a vehicle, said interior rearview mirror assembly comprising an electrochromic reflective element, said reflective element having a front portion that faces generally towards a driver of the vehicle when said interior rearview mirror assembly is mounted in the vehicle, and having a rear portion that is generally opposite said front portion; wherein said reflective element comprises a third-surface transflective reflective element; said reflective element comprising a transflective mirror reflector; a video display screen disposed to the rear of said rear portion of said reflective element, said video display screen emitting light when actuated that passes through said transflective mirror reflector of said reflective element to be visible to a driver of the vehicle viewing said front portion of said reflective element; wherein said video display screen comprises a thin film transistor liquid crystal display element; said reflective element being at least about 15 percent transmitting to visible light incident at said rear portion of said reflective element at where said video display screen is disposed; wherein a camera having a field of view rearward of the vehicle is mounted to the rear of the vehicle and wherein, during a reversing maneuver of the vehicle, a video output of said camera is displayed by said video screen so as to assist the driver in reversing the vehicle; wherein said liquid crystal display element is back lit by a plurality of light emitting light emitting diodes; wherein the presence of said video display screen is only principally visible to the driver of the vehicle, who is viewing said interior rearview mirror assembly when it is mounted at the interior portion of the vehicle, when said liquid crystal display element is back lit; wherein said video mirror system comprises a user input disposed at said interior rearview mirror assembly; wherein said user input comprises at least one of (a) a manual input device and (b) a voice input device; and wherein said video display screen is operable to display at least one of (i) an instruction, (ii) an icon, (iii) a character, (iv) a symbol and (v) an indicia.