Continental gives first look at Augmented Reality Head-Up Display

DUBAI- The premium tire manufacturer and International automotive supplier, Continental, has presented its Augmented Reality HUD – the latest evolutionary stage of its head-up display (HUD) system. The AR-HUD system supplements the exterior view of the traffic conditions in front of the vehicle with virtual information for the driver, with production planned for 2017.

In a world that is becoming increasingly complex, the AR-HUD relieves the burden on the driver with a new quality of information. The augmentation connects what the driver’s eyes see with explanatory information, and is an important step in the direction of holistic human machine interfaces in cars for a more comfortable, more economic, and safer driving experience – combating driver distraction and sensory overload.

The AR-HUD system not only supports the driver if the vehicle is in danger of unintentionally drifting out of a lane, but also supports the use Adaptive Cruise Control. In addition, the driver is able to know at which point they should turn, without having to look back and forth between the navigation screen and the road.

With the AR-HUD system, the reflected information appears exactly where the information becomes a part of the driving situation. When navigating, a virtual symbol inserted precisely into the exterior view shows the driver the way of the curve in front of the vehicle. When Adaptive Cruise Control is enabled, a marking in the AR-HUD visualizes which vehicle in front is detected by the assistance system.

The AR-HUD inserts full-colour graphics into the real road view in a section of the driver’s field of vision, approximately 130 cm-wide by 60 cm-high and at a distance of 7.5 meters. The basis for this is provided by camera and radar data from the vehicle sensors – taking into account the vehicle dynamics data, digital map data, and GPS positioning.

With the AR-HUD, Continental is continuing a development path that began in 2003 when the company started the production of the first colour HUD in a passenger car. Continental will bring this projection technology into series production as early as 2016.

Eelco Spoelder, Head of the Continental Instrumentation & Driver HMI Business Unit, commented: “Our many years of experience with HUD technology helped significantly with the development of the AR-HUD. However, generating the augmentation in the AR-Creator was completely new territory.

“The quality of the human machine interface in the vehicle is fundamentally changing with the AR-HUD. The information appears where the driver intuitively looks first – in the direction of travel. Information can hardly be transmitted in a more ergonomic and comprehensible way, and this augmented reality technology places Continental as a leader in HUD development.”

Founded in Hannover, Germany, in 1871, Continental is now one of the world’s leading automotive suppliers and a leader in tire development and technology, backed up by its position in Europe as the leading OEM supplier for tires.