An illumination apparatus that illuminates an illumination zone having a first direction and a second direction crossing the first direction is provided with a light source to emit a coherent light beam, and a diffraction optical device to diffract the coherent light beam incident from the light source. The diffraction optical device diffracts the incident coherent light beam so that a width of the illumination zone in the second direction gradually becomes wider along the first direction of the illumination zone from a nearer side to the diffraction optical device.

An optical axis control apparatus includes an optical axis controlling unit for calculating a pitch angle using output values from an acceleration sensor provided in a vehicle and controlling, using the pitch angle, optical axis angles of headlights provided in the vehicle, during stop of the vehicle; and a rolling motion determination unit for determining, when the vehicle has started traveling, whether there has been a rolling motion during the stop of the vehicle. When the pitch angle has been changed during the stop of the vehicle due to loading or unloading of baggage or a change of passengers, etc., and the rolling motion determination unit determines that the rolling motion exists, the optical axis controlling unit corrects, when the vehicle has started traveling and the rolling motion has been terminated, the changed pitch angle, i.e., the amount of change in pitch angle, using the amounts of correction set for each roll angle, and controls the optical axis angles using the corrected pitch angle, the each roll angle being obtained during stop of the vehicle.

An illumination apparatus that illuminates an illumination zone having a first direction and a second direction crossing the first direction is provided with a light source to emit a coherent light beam, and a diffraction optical device to diffract the coherent light beam incident from the light source. The diffraction optical device diffracts the incident coherent light beam so that a width of the illumination zone in the second direction gradually becomes wider along the first direction of the illumination zone from a nearer side to the diffraction optical device.

A system to enhance vehicle safety is disclosed comprising a vehicle having a front end and a rear end; at least one visual signal light apparatus positioned in the proximity to the front end of the vehicle; the visual signal light apparatus illuminates when the vehicle's is decelerating via its braking system; wherein the visual light apparatus is comprised of at least a main component and a mount component; wherein the mount component is suitable to mount the main component to a surface of the front of the vehicle; wherein the main component is comprised of a housing, an LED array, and a solar array; wherein the housing is comprised of a recessed portion housing the LED array; wherein the LED array faces the front end of the vehicle; and wherein the solar array is embodied to a top surface of the housing.

A luminous device for a motor vehicle, said device including a pixelized light source and an optical system that is arranged to project a pixelized light beam emitted by the pixelized light source, the optical system comprising a first mirror arranged to collect and reflect rays of the pixelized light beam emitted by the pixelized light source, a second mirror arranged to reflect the rays reflected by the first mirror, and a third mirror arranged to receive the rays reflected by the second mirror and to reflect these received rays so as to correct field aberrations. The invention enables improved projection of a pixelized light beam by a luminous motor-vehicle device.

A vehicular lighting assembly for compensating for the change in light emission angle due to load on a vehicle. The assembly included at least one lighting element, an actuator associated with the or each lighting element for adjusting a light emission angle of light emitted therefrom relative to the vehicle with which the vehicular lighting assembly is associated, and an actuator housing in which the actuator is housed. A vehicular-pitch-determining sensor is then arranged to indirectly determine a pitch of the vehicle, and associated with a controller for controlling an actuation of the actuator in response to a vehicular pitch as determined by the vehicular-pitch-determining sensor. A vehicular lighting system, pitch-compensation actuation unit, motor vehicle and method of altering the angle of light emission from the headlamps of a motor vehicle are also provided.

A vehicle lighting device includes at least one headlight, a position and/or acceleration sensor, and a control unit for adjusting a light/dark boundary of the headlight. Pitch movements of the vehicle can be detected by the position and/or acceleration sensor, and a change in the light/dark boundary due to the respective pitch movement can be compensated for by the control unit. The position and/or acceleration sensor and the control unit are arranged in the headlight or directly on the headlight.

A vehicle-lamp control device includes a control unit that adjusts an optical axis with respect to a change in a total angle that includes a road surface angle and a vehicle attitude angle while the vehicle is at rest, and maintains the optical axis with respect to a change in the total angle while the vehicle is traveling. The control unit fixes the optical axis angle when a fault state of the control device is detected. Upon the control device having recovered from a fault state, the control unit generates an adjustment signal either upon estimating a current vehicle attitude angle on the basis of an output value from the tilt sensor obtained while the vehicle is traveling, or upon receiving a signal indicating a current vehicle attitude angle from an external device.

To provide a technique capable of accurately obtaining the attitude of a vehicle in the pitch direction. A control device for a vehicular lamp which controls the optical axis of a vehicular lamp in accordance with an attitude change in pitch direction of the vehicle is disclosed. The device includes an angle calculation part which obtains a first and a second acceleration by eliminating the gravitational acceleration component from each acceleration in the vertical and the longitudinal direction of the vehicle, calculates a vehicle traveling direction acceleration based on the accelerations, and obtains a vehicle attitude angle based on the correlation between the vehicle traveling direction acceleration and the first and the second accelerations. The angle calculation part obtains the attitude angle of the vehicle when it determines that the vehicle is accelerating or decelerating based on the determination on the basis of each acceleration difference at the predetermined time.

To obtain correction information for automatic leveling control without a special environment. A device controlling the vehicular lamp axis in accordance with attitude change in the pitch direction of a vehicle including: a detection part detecting a first and a second acceleration; a correction part obtaining variation of the vehicle angle at a stop based on the two accelerations of a first and a second timing, obtaining vehicle angle while traveling based on the two accelerations while traveling, and obtaining and retaining a correction angle based on the difference between the two; an angle calculation part obtaining the vehicle angle while traveling based on the two accelerations, and obtaining an actual vehicle angle by subtracting the correction angle from the vehicle angle while traveling; and an optical axis control part generating a control signal based on the actual vehicle angle, and providing the control signal to the vehicular lamp.