Magna’s driver and occupant monitoring mirror, developed in partnership with Seeing Machines, is set for a big announcement next month. Having made its debut in the VW Tiguan L Pro in China last year, it has since been seen in various Volkswagen and Cupra models for sale in Europe, and most recently the refreshed Audi Q3.
Demonstrated on the Magna stand at the Munich IAA Mobility show in September was a transparent version of the mirror, as shown below.
Source: Colin Barnden
Clearly visible in the pictures is the CMOS image sensor in the center of the module, and on the right hand side a horizontal set of IR illuminators and two vertically mounted pairs of illuminators.
The orientation and position of the illuminators creates a highly distinctive flash pattern, making the Magna mirror easily recognizable from YouTube videos posted by influencers doing test drives of new model releases.
940nm IR light is invisible to the human eye, but is detected by the CMOS image sensor of most modern digital cameras and smartphones, creating the now distinctive purple hue seen in still images and full motion video.
Also revealed for the first time at Munich IAA was the second generation of the Magna occupant mirror, as shown below. Let’s unpack that in more detail.