METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR PERFORMING DYNAMIC FOVEATION BASED ON EYE GAZE

1 . A method of forming a foveated image, the method comprising:

(a) setting dimensions of a first region;

(b) receiving an image having a first resolution;

(c) forming the foveated image including a primary quality region having the dimensions of the first region and the first resolution and a secondary quality region having a second resolution less than the first resolution;

(d) outputting the foveated image;

(e) determining an eye gaze location;

(f) determining an eye gaze velocity;

if the eye gaze velocity is less than a threshold velocity, decreasing the dimensions of the primary quality region and repeating (b)-(f); and

if the eye gaze velocity is greater than or equal to the threshold velocity, repeating (a)-(f).

2 . The method of claim 1 wherein the image comprises virtual content.

3 . The method of claim 1 wherein virtual content is received at a first frame rate and the foveated image is displayed at a second frame rate higher than the first frame rate.

4 . The method of claim 1 wherein the primary quality region includes an initial eye gaze location.

5 . The method of claim 1 wherein the primary quality region has a rectangular shape centered at an initial eye gaze location.

6 . The method of claim 5 wherein a height of the rectangular shape equals a sum of a high quality radius (A), a noise radius (B), and an eye saccade radius (C).

7 . The method of claim 1 further comprising:

transmitting the foveated image to a display; and

displaying the foveated image.

8 . The method of claim 7 further comprising performing image processing on the foveated image prior to displaying the foveated image.

9 . A method of displaying a foveated image, the method comprising:

receiving an image having a first resolution;

determining an eye gaze location;

determining an eye gaze velocity;

processing N−1 sections of N sections to produce N−1 secondary quality sections based on the eye gaze location and the eye gaze velocity;

processing one section of the N sections to provide one primary quality section based on the eye gaze location and eye gaze velocity;

storing the N−1 secondary quality sections in memory;

storing the one primary quality section in memory;

combining the N−1 secondary quality sections and the one primary quality section to form a foveated image; and

displaying the foveated image on a display.

10 . The method of claim 9 wherein the one primary quality section includes pixels corresponding to the eye gaze location.

11 . The method of claim 9 wherein processing the N−1 sections of the N sections to produce the N−1 secondary quality sections comprises compressing the N−1 sections using a lossy compression process.

12 . The method of claim 11 wherein the image comprises an M×N image and the N−1 secondary quality sections comprise M×N images.

13 . The method of claim 9 wherein processing the N−1 sections of the N sections to produce the N−1 secondary quality sections comprises subsampling the N−1 sections.

14 . The method of claim 13 wherein the image comprises an M×N image and the N−1 secondary quality sections comprise αM×αN images, where α<1.

15 . The method of claim 9 further comprising warping the foveated image prior to transmitting the foveated image to the display.

16 . The method of claim 9 wherein the image comprises virtual content.

17 . The method of claim 9 wherein virtual content is received at a first frame rate and the foveated image is displayed at a second frame rate higher than the first frame rate.

18 . The method of claim 9 wherein the one primary quality section includes the eye gaze location.

19 . The method of claim 9 wherein the one primary quality section has a rectangular shape centered at the eye gaze location.

20 . The method of claim 19 wherein a height of the rectangular shape equals a sum of a high quality radius (A), a noise radius (B), and an eye saccade radius (C).