Automatic water feed method in lavatory using artificial retina sensor and automatic water feed mechanism in lavatory using artificial retina sensor

A method for providing automatic control of water to a lavatory appliance upon sensing a user, the lavatory appliance including a control valve for controlling the flow of water through the lavatory appliance, the method comprising the steps of:

• acquiring a first image from a sensor in the region of discharge of a lavatory appliance, the first image being composed of the output of pixels;
• processing the first acquired image to determine a first acquired image characteristic, the first acquired image characteristic being composed of the output of the pixels, the output of the pixels being assigned to one of two pixel values based on a binary processing;
• storing the first acquired image characteristic in a first memory unit;
• acquiring a second image from the sensor in the region of discharge of the lavatory appliance, the second image being composed of the output of pixels, the second image being acquired after the first image is acquired;
• processing the second acquired image to determine a second acquired image characteristic, the second acquired image characteristic being composed of the output of the pixels, the output of the pixels being assigned to one of two pixel values based on a binary processing;
• storing the second acquired image characteristic in a second memory unit;
• comparing the first acquired image characteristic in the first memory unit to the second acquired image characteristic in the second memory unit to determine the number of pixel value changes for corresponding pixels of the first and second acquired images indicating movement of the user;
• and
• activating a control valve controlling the flow of water when the number of pixel value changes is within a predetermined range.