Design of a virtual image distance measurement system for augmented reality / virtual reality display

Virtual image distance (VID) is a key parameter in augmented reality (AR) or virtual reality (VR) systems and has a great influence on product performance and user experience. Therefore, it is very necessary to measure the VID accurately and efficiently. In this paper, we develop a VID measurement system which needs no mechanical scanning in the measurement process. The VID can be measured in a short period of time based on one single image generated by the AR/VR system. An image-telecentric lens is designed which is used to capture the virtual image. A diaphragm with two pinholes is placed at the entrance pupil plane of the imaging lens. When the imaging lens is not focused on the virtual image, the captured image contains two copies of the virtual image with a certain interval which is proportional to the VID in units of diopters. By calculating the interval, we can obtain the VID. A simulation is performed in LightTools to verify the effectiveness of the measurement system, and the result indicates that the measurement error is 5 mm when the virtual image is at 3 m.