Head-up displays provide the pilot of an aircraft with a means to view real-world cues simultaneously with on-board flight information. While color and intensity coding is state of the art in modern glass cockpits, head-up displays are still monochrome and limited in brightness. Only contrast and motion are used of the four normal human visual capabilities (contrast, color, motion and stereo). Furthermore the symbols have to be based solely on lines to maintain see-through capability. These limitations together with collimation of the symbology to a certain distance make all indications appear like one object in single depth plane and lead to mutual cluttering. Since separation by design can only be achieved with form and font a high effort in training of the flight crews is mandatory. The introduction of stereoscopic information presentation in the head-up display promises an improved human-machine-interface by providing intuitive separation and combination of indications. A stereoscopic head-up display was developed on the basis of a modern civil head-up display and integrated into a fixed based flight simulator with a collimated visual projection system. First tests indicate improved information perception in head-up displays by adding stereoscopy.
As air traffic is increasing, the probability of encountering 'surveillance' alerts during flight is also increasing. In order to ensure safety, new on board systems need to be developed to provide the crew with a better 'situation awareness' (SA) about its external environment and potential hazards. In addition, the means to manage the data generated by these new systems needs to be build up. Despite the tremendous amount of information, crew workload must not increase. This is where the ISAWARE project comes in with the Integrated Situation Awareness System (ISAS) concept. ISAWARE (Increasing Safety through collision Avoidance WARning intEgration) is a project partly funded by the European Community, executed by a well balanced composition of several European aerospace companies (airframers, a helicopter manufacturer, avionics suppliers, airlines), one research laboratory and one university. The overall objective of the ISAWARE project is to conduct research into the potential improvements to flight safety that can be achieved by providing the pilot with complete predictive situation awareness during all phases of the flight. The Integrated Situational Awareness System (ISAS) merges data from different safety systems concerning terrain, traffic, weather and other. The system ensures the alerts consistency, prioritises alerts and anticipates threats along a predicted trajectory earlier than current systems can provide. The second main axis of the research is the development of synthetic vision displays (PFD, ND and HUD) to enhance the Human-Machine Interface (HMI). The key focus of the project is the development of a ground-based demonstrator rig which is interfaced to a dynamic flight simulator. This rig is used for the evaluation of the ISAWARE concept by a representative range of active airline crews.
Head-up displays provide the pilot of an aircraft with a means to view real-world cues simultaneously with on-board flight information. In combination with a precise navigation, head-up displays allow approaches and landings under degraded visual flight conditions under manual control by the pilots. While color and intensity coding is state of the art in modern glass cockpits, head-up displays are still monochrome and limited in brightness. Only contrast and motion are used of the four normal human visual capabilities (contrast, color, motion and stereo). Furthermore the symbols have to be based solely on lines to maintain see-through capability. These limitations lead to coding of symbology by form and font, resulting in cluttered formats that require a high effort in the training of the flight crews. Since current symbology is monochrome collimated to a certain distance and monoscopic, it appears like one object in a single depth plane. With stereoscopy in the head-up display, several layers of information can be used to declutter the high-loaded 2D symbology. A stereoscopic head-up display was developed on the base of a modern civil head-up display and integrated into a fixed based flight simulator with a collimated visual projection system. First tests indicate improved information perception in head-up displays by adding stereoscopy.
Access to the requested content is limited to institutions that have purchased or subscribe to SPIE eBooks.
You are receiving this notice because your organization may not have SPIE eBooks access.*
*Shibboleth/Open Athens users─please
sign in
to access your institution's subscriptions.
To obtain this item, you may purchase the complete book in print or electronic format on
SPIE.org.
INSTITUTIONAL Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.
PERSONAL Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.