Portable electronic equipment with automatic control to keep display turned on and method

1. Portable electronic equipment, comprising:

a housing,

a display located in a front portion of the housing,

a first camera located in the front portion of the housing facing a first direction for capturing images of a user viewing the display,

a second camera located in a back portion of the housing facing a second direction opposite the first direction, and

circuitry configured to effect turning on the display in response to recognizing an image of a human face provided by the first camera.

2. The equipment of claim 1 , said circuitry comprising face recognition software adapted to recognize characteristics of a human face as the specified image, and software stored in a machine readable medium and configured to hold on the display in response to recognizing characteristics of a human face.

3. The equipment of claim 2 , the circuitry configured to effect a power saving mode for the display in the absence of a human face being seen by the first camera.

4. The equipment of claim 1 , at least one of the display or circuitry having a screensaver function for the display, and the circuitry configured to override the screensaver function at least while a human face is recognized.

5. The equipment of claim 4 , wherein the screensaver function effects a power saving mode for the display after expiration of a period of time that no input has been provided the equipment, and the circuitry prevents expiration of the time period at least while an image of a human face is recognized, and the circuitry is configured to prevent such expiration of the time period for a duration after an image of a human face has been recognized.

6. The equipment of claim 1 , wherein the first camera is located in the equipment to face in a direction away from the direction that a user of the equipment would view the display, and further comprising at least one of optical elements or a light path to provide to the first camera views looking toward the direction that the user of the equipment would view the display to provide to the first camera a view of the face of the user of the equipment while the user is viewing the display.

7. The equipment of claim 1 further comprising a fish eye lens for the first camera to obtain a wide angle view to facilitate receiving an image of the face of a user of the equipment.

8. The equipment of claim 1 , the equipment comprising a mobile phone, and the first camera and the second camera comprising a standard camera of the mobile phone.

9. The equipment of claim 1 , wherein the circuitry includes memory and program code stored in the memory and configured to recognize a human face from the first camera and to control operation of a power saving feature associated with the display in response to whether or not an the of a human face is recognized.

10. The equipment of claim 9 , wherein the portable electronic equipment is a mobile phone, and further comprising a communications module adapted to wirelessly transmit and receive signals, a speaker, and a microphone.

11. A method of operating portable electronic equipment, comprising

detecting whether an image of a human face is received by a camera of the equipment, and

operating the equipment in response to detecting an image of a human face being received, said operating comprising at least one of turning on a display of the equipment, answering an incoming phone call, initiating a phone call, sending a text message or receiving a text message.

12. The method of claim 11 , said detecting comprising using a fish eye lens to obtain a wide angle view by the camera.

13. The method of claim 11 , said operating comprising controlling operation of a display of the equipment by holding on the display in response to receiving an image of a human face by the camera.

14. The method of claim 11 , wherein the portable electronic equipment is a mobile phone having a display and a screen saver function for the display, said detecting comprising detecting whether an image of a human face is received by a camera of the mobile phone, and said operating comprising effecting control or overriding of a screensaver function for the display of the mobile phone.

15. A non-transitory machine readable storage medium storing a computer program product, comprising

a computer program including face recognition software to recognize whether an input image represents that of a human face, and

a control program to control operation of portable electronic equipment depending on whether or not an input image represents a human face,

said control program, when executed, configured at least one of to turn on a display of the portable electronic equipment and to hold on the display, to answer an incoming phone call received by the portable electronic equipment, to initiate a phone call by the portable electronic equipment, to send a text message by the portable electronic equipment or to receive a text message by the portable electronic equipment.

16. The equipment of claim 1 , said circuitry configured to at least one of answer an incoming phone call, initiate a phone call, send a text message or receive a text message in response to recognizing an image of a human face.