The late Steve Jobs believed in developing products holistically. When developing Vision Pro, Apple didn't copy Meta's Quest, they went far beyond that lowly device and brought new concepts to market with hand gesture, with presenting users with a massive display for watching movies and multiple windows to work with a Mac.

Apple has been taking a holistic view of future smartglasses as well. There are many patents on various aspects of future smartglasses already in our archives and today, the U.S. Patent Office published a patent application of Apple's that relates to an advanced smartglasses case for storing the glasses. The case can  include optical charts, physical fiducials, and/or reflective calibration spheres for calibrating inward-facing cameras on the head-mounted device such as gaze tracking image sensors. The case may include cameras for capturing images of displayed images on the head-mounted device to determine if a waveguide and display in the head-mounted device are misaligned. No one at present has anything like this on the market.

In Apple's patent background they note that electronic devices have components such as displays and other optical components. During operation, there is a risk that components may become misaligned with respect to each other due to drop events and other undesired high-stress events. This poses challenges for ensuring satisfactory component performance. Apple's patent addresses this issue.

Storage Systems with Calibration Capabilities

Apple's patent application covers a system may include a head-mounted device such as a pair of glasses and a storage case for storing and calibrating the head-mounted device.

The head-mounted device may include displays such as projector displays and may include associated optical components. The optical components may include waveguides that are used in providing images received from the displays to corresponding eye boxes for viewing by a user.

The storage case may include a recess for receiving the head-mounted device. The case may include optically detectable features for calibrating cameras in the head-mounted device.

For example, the case may include optical charts, physical fiducials, and/or reflective calibration spheres for calibrating inward-facing cameras on the head-mounted device such as gaze tracking image sensors.

For calibrating outward-facing cameras on the head-mounted device that have larger focal distances, the case may include a light source and a diffractive optical element to create a light pattern that virtually originates from infinity. The case may include cameras for capturing images of displayed images on the head-mounted device to determine if a waveguide and display in the head-mounted device are misaligned.

The case may also include other features for calibrating the head-mounted device. For example, a lid on the case may apply an expected amount of pressure to a force sensor on the head-mounted device when the head-mounted device is stored in the case. Control circuitry in the system may compare the measured force value from the force sensor with the expected force value to determine if the force sensor needs calibration. A motion sensor in the case may be used to calibrate motion sensors in the head-mounted device.

For full details, review Apple's patent application 20250086834.

Apple Inventors

• Chris Patton: Mechanical Design Engineer focused on structural systems.
• Dominic Cincione: Product Design