Interactive object systems and methods
AssigneeUniversal City Studios LLC
InventorsEric To Chan, Howard Bruce Mall
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A system is provided to activate on-board special effects of a handheld or other interactive object that carries no, or relatively low-power, internal power supplies and that is directly enabled or passively powered by acoustic energy of acoustic waves from an external source. The interactive object may include a resonate chamber to receive the acoustic waves and convert the acoustic energy therein to mechanical and/or electrical energy. The interactive object may additionally include a power harvesting system configured to store and/or supply the electrical energy to an on-board special effect system. As such, the interactive object may be configured to create a variety of special effects with no, or relatively low-power, internal power supplies.
Claims20
An interactive object, comprising:
- a special effect system;
- and
- an acoustic power harvesting system, the acoustic power harvesting system comprising:
- a resonant chamber comprising an open end and a flexible end, wherein the resonant chamber is configured to receive acoustic waves through the open end and reflect the acoustic waves within the resonant chamber, and wherein the flexible end is configured to move in response to receiving the acoustic waves;
- an electro-mechanical transducer coupled to the flexible end, wherein a magnet and a coil of the electro-mechanical transducer are configured to move relative to each other in response to a movement of the flexible end to cause a change in an electromagnetic field of the electro-mechanical transducer to harvest power;
- and
- a power storage device storing the harvested power and configured to supply the harvested power to the special effect system.
An interactive object method, comprising:
- receiving, at an interactive object, acoustic waves within a resonant chamber, wherein the resonant chamber comprises an open end and a flexible end, and wherein the flexible end is configured to move and cause a change in an electromagnetic field of an electro-mechanical transducer to harvest power in response to receiving the acoustic waves;
- storing the harvested power using a power storage device;
- and
- providing the harvested power to a special effect system to power a special effect.
An interactive object, comprising:
- a resonant chamber comprising an open end and at least one flexible end, wherein the resonant chamber is configured to receive acoustic waves through the open end and reflect the acoustic waves within the resonant chamber, and wherein the at least one flexible end is configured to vibrate in response to receiving the acoustic waves.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.