Face Unlock in a darkened room?

N4Newbie

Trusted Member
Nov 15, 2012
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I'm not sure if this has been addressed yet - will Face Unlock work in a darkened room?
 
It'll work in complete darkness. The system uses two wide set IR flood emitters to illuminate your face.
 
Good to know. Thanks for the replies.

Out of curiosity, does this apply to current iPhones as well?
 
Good to know. Thanks for the replies.

Out of curiosity, does this apply to current iPhones as well?
Yes. Apple uses the same type of tech. The main difference is that they only use a single IR emitter where the Pixel uses two, wide set on both sides of the phone. I can only assume that this leads to better accuracy and fewer mistakes.

I'm curious if Google plans to augment these with the Soli chip. The chip does have the ability to determine not just that there is something there, it also can tell what type of material it is seeing... If it's woid, metal...skin...

They just need to turn on the eyes closed thing to shut up the cranky pants complaining about it.

Oh... Being greedy, I'd love it if they could expand that to include not unlocking if you aren't looking at the screen... Maybe in time.
 
Works at an angle too. Must be an AI element in there too. Didn't want to unlock at an angle laying down, but it has learned.
 
Works at an angle too. Must be an AI element in there too. Didn't want to unlock at an angle laying down, but it has learned.
Just good software. It's mapping everything it sees in three dimensions.. And I'm assuming that they added a second IR emitter to improve accuracy.

So it breaks your face down into a series of reference points that form a kind of wireframe shell. Then when it kicks on, it plays a 3D version of Where's Waldo... Looking for any surface in view that matches the reference.
 
face unlock works in the dark and with sun glasses on. when I set up face unlock, I had a beard, but I shaved a few days later, and it still works great. The only time it had issues unlocking was when I had a hood on, it just wouldn't unlock.
 
Depends on the sunglasses. My RayBans are dark and it does not work. Non-polarized too in case people wonder.
 
Depends on the sunglasses. My RayBans are dark and it does not work. Non-polarized too in case people wonder.

Ok, just after posting this comment. I did a quick test. and it turns out it's my hat that's really throwing things off. If I'm wearing a hat with sunglasses it does not work and works as soon as I take off my sunglasses because I'm assuming it's seeing more of my face. With my Sunglasses on and the hat off it still works. so it looks like it's mainly the hat not the sunglasses. Makes sense though now that I understand what's happening.
 
Ok, just after posting this comment. I did a quick test. and it turns out it's my hat that's really throwing things off. If I'm wearing a hat with sunglasses it does not work and works as soon as I take off my sunglasses because I'm assuming it's seeing more of my face. With my Sunglasses on and the hat off it still works. so it looks like it's mainly the hat not the sunglasses. Makes sense though now that I understand what's happening.

Mine does the same thing. I was wearing my hoodie today and it was pretty chilly, with the hood up, an glasses on it wouldn't work. Once I dropped the hood, it was fine again.