We’ve all see video glasses before – those clunky, Geordi La Forge-looking things that promise to display a 10 foot screen in front of your face. The drawbacks, generally, are size and transparency. Lumus, however, has solved those problems and is working on bringing a pair of see-through, HD video glasses to market that look more Minority Report than 1990s Star Trek.
I talked to these guys in September 2010 and the technology has improved immensely since then. They’re basically offering a pair of light, wearable glasses that will show HD video in front of your eyes and even allow you to interact with the world via augmented reality.
Basically, Lumus has embedded a pair of light pumps into the earpieces that send and refract light down the lens. This moves the electronics away from the eyes, offering a lighter and more stream-lined experience. The lenses are completely transparent (and can be tuned for folks with vision problems) and when enabled the glasses display a crystal clear, 87-inch screen about ten feet away from you. The displays themselves are 1280 x 720 pixels and Lumus has created iPhone-compatible adapters that can display HD video right through the pumps and into the lenses.
The display is stunning. Because each eye display works independently, you can view 3D video in 720p (1080p is on its way) and the clarity is amazing. When you turn them off, the picture disappears completely, leaving perfectly clear lenses. Unlike the Moto ROKR MP3 sunglasses that they used to sell back in the day, the styling and size makes you look less like Dog the Bounty Hunter and more like a Bond villain.
Although these guys will be showing their gear at CES, they’re going the OEM route and are currently looking for partners to use the technology in AR displays, video games, and media players. There won’t be any Lumus-branded “They Live” style super glasses any time soon, although they do have some major players interested in the technology.
Generally, the future of this sort of display is a “Not If But When” problem. At some point wearable displays like this will replace hand-held screens. However, it will take a few years of trial and error to hit the right device at the right time. Lumus is hard at work at military and commercial systems for logistics and battlefield feedback but I’m most excited about the prospect of wearing these on a plane instead of staring at an iPad or laptop.
Well, it appears that Three’s call center agents in Denmark won’t be able to wear pajamas into work anymore. Following the introduction of 3LiveShop in Sweden, the mobile carrier’s other Scandinavian group is introducing this rather novel way of shopping for new phones to Danes. Properly situated consumers may now elect to participate in live video chats with Three employees, who manipulate product photos and information on a heads-up display for customer convenience. (We’d like to imagine this nice lady has placed the Galaxy S II and iPhone 4 into the “maybe” pile.) Thankfully, shoppers won’t have to look presentable at all, as participating in two-way video conferences is entirely optional — along with more traditional voice and chat methods. If you’re curious to see a demo of the system in action, just check the video after the break.
[Thanks, Jonas]
Continue reading Three brings 3LiveShop to Denmark, offers webcam chat and heads-up product display (video)
Three brings 3LiveShop to Denmark, offers webcam chat and heads-up product display (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 25 Nov 2011 14:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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If you’ve been hankering for some HUD action in your next auto, you’ll have one more choice come next spring: the all-new 2012 BMW 3 Series. The launch will mark the first time a heads-up display has made it into Bavaria’s volume seller, after debuting as an optional extra eons ago on its 5 Series. Since then, HUDs of limited hues have permeated München’s high-end, splaying speed and navigation directions in the line of sight of road-going elites everywhere. However, this iteration is “full-color,” which besides pleasing ROY G. BIV fans, makes it “more intuitive,” as the company reasons it’ll aid drivers in recognizing crucial alerts faster. That, or we’re really just a generation away from über cool AR wizardry and movies on our windscreens. Of course, no word on when the 3′s brethren will get the technicolor treatment, but we’re betting it won’t be long, given that’s the dash of a 6 Series you see above. PR, per usual, is after the break.
Continue reading BMW 3 Series gets ‘full-color’ heads-up display
BMW 3 Series gets ‘full-color’ heads-up display originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 01 Nov 2011 02:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Looking down at gauges? Officially passe. Check out Pioneer’s vision of the future, a prototype that uses an embedded laser projector (a Microvision, as it were). They showed it a little earlier in Japan but this is the first time we’ve seen it in the US, and we got a chance to try it out. Right now it’s just running a static demo, but the idea is that a virtual concierge (represented by our favorite mascot pops up to give you information, and you could also get streaming video from traffic cameras, all without you having to look down. The information is supposed to come via a smartphone, we learned later an Android one at that, though things are a little vague. A release date is a little vague too, sometime in 2012, though we’re told the company is working with car companies. But could we get this by next year? We’ll see.
Gallery: Pioneer laser HUD hands-on
Continue reading Pioneer prototype laser-based heads-up display with Android hands-on (video)
Pioneer prototype laser-based heads-up display with Android hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 09 Jan 2011 23:07:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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This is a good idea. We’ve all seen bike computers, heart-rate monitors, and so on, the sort of things athletes or just data-loving runners and cyclists track during their activities. The trouble is that they’re rarely easy to consult: you have to take your eyes off the road to check your speed, or interrupt your run cadence to check your heart rate.
The 4iiii Sport-iiii system (pronounced sport eyes, apparently) solves this problem by suspending a little bar in your peripheral vision and indicating key metrics with LEDs.
So you program it ahead of time to tap into your various monitoring devices — speedometer, heart rate monitor, watch — and it displays that information to you not as actual numbers, but in a simplified way. I’m not sure exactly how each one would work, but you can imagine if your target heart rate is 100, the amber lights would light as your approach it, green turn on when you’re hitting it, and perhaps blink fast if you exceed it. The only controls are a tap or double tap, prompting an update or changing data type respectively.
Sure, in a few years we’ll all have transparent AMOLED displays in our sunglasses, but until then this is a cool little system, if you can get used to the non-standard readout.
[via Pink Bike]
Off the shelf 3D HDTVs may still be a bit expensive from a consumer’s point of view, but they’re a downright bargain compared to the usual high-end virtual reality gear. This gave some researchers at UC San Diego a bright idea: they’ve paired a $2,300 Samsung 3D TV with a half-silvered mirror and a touch-feedback controller for a haptic-enabled heads-up virtual reality system (or HUVR) that costs just $7,000 (without head tracking). What’s more, they say their system actually outperforms the PARIS HUVR system developed twelve years ago (and still in use), which cost a full $100,000. Head on past the break for a quick video of the rig in action.
[Thanks, Chase]
Continue reading UC San Diego researchers repurpose 3D HDTV for heads-up VR system
UC San Diego researchers repurpose 3D HDTV for heads-up VR system originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 26 Jul 2010 06:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Related Posts:Tom “Durrrr” Dwan and John Duthie star in the second show of the PKR Heads-Up Grand Slam, on Sky Sports 2 and HD2 at 10pm on Tuesday 12 January – here’s a taste of the action.
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