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Analysis of Magic Leap 2 at SPIE AR/VR/Mr 2022

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Re: Analysis of Magic Leap 2 at SPIE AR/VR/Mr 2022

#41

Post by valine »

hyperhopper wrote: post #34
valine wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one wants to wear a headset if it makes them look stupid. If AR glasses are a dead end then mass adoption of AR outside of gaming/enterprise is likely DOA.

Bluetooth headphones were "stupid looking" and endlessly mocked. Now airpods are in vogue. Social perceptions easily change, especially when there are billions of dollars invested in making them change.

Airpods were one of the first truely wireless earbuds from a well known company. They were successful because of their looks, not in spite of them.

Before airpods wireless earbuds looked like this: https://www.lg.com/us/bluetooth-headsets-headphones/lg-HBS-7...

Re: Analysis of Magic Leap 2 at SPIE AR/VR/Mr 2022

#42

Post by smoldesu »

wpietri wrote: post #23

Back in October, when Facebook made a lot of "metaverse" noise, I wrote a thread looking at the history of stereoscopic 3D from the 1850s to the present as a way of explaining why I think facehugger VR is going nowhere. Somebody turned up to complain that going back to the Civil War era wasn't sufficiently big picture for him: "You need a long view. All the serious players are still in the Mercury phase. The Gemini a…

> Which is a roundabout way of saying I think kguttag is right when he says, "ML2 looks like a product designed for the consumer market, but it was seen that it would be far too expensive for that market, it was recast as an 'enterprise' device." To me it's a not-great solution desperately looking for a problem.

Microsoft did the same thing with Hololens. First it was supposed to be an entertainment device for the home, where you could enjoy interactive experiences and mess with little Minecraft models on your coffee table. Well, that didn't pan out. Next they made a bid for the creative professional market, who might get a kick out of being able to manipulate 3D models in realtime through a headset. Oops, you can do this with a $300 Oculus Quest and a free Blender plugin. Okay, how about the enterprise market? They've got much deeper pockets, and we can just toss together a few productivity apps to make it seem attrac... what do you mean they don't want it?

Fine, we'll take it to the one place that will burn money on a nothingburger no matter the cost. We could bring these people a gilded pile of scrap metal and they'd pay 10x market price. There's only one customer that meets this criteria: the United States military!

Re: Analysis of Magic Leap 2 at SPIE AR/VR/Mr 2022

#43

Post by ryandrake »

Wow, talk about a tech news blind spot: I honestly though Magic Leap wasn't even around anymore. Last news I heard about them was they burned through $billions, their product woefully (almost fraudulently) failed to meet any of the hype they set out, they sold a handful of units, and then the company folded. How on earth are they still in business?

Re: Analysis of Magic Leap 2 at SPIE AR/VR/Mr 2022

#44

Post by moralestapia »

kguttag wrote: post #25
moralestapia wrote: post #17

Very nice in-depth analysis, thanks kguttag. My personal bet on this space is that kura.tech's product is going to be the real deal; but it is exciting to see that the AR field in general is starting to enter its own plateau of productivity and we may start seeing great products soon.

I think we need to see Kura actually demonstrate that their technology works. You might want to see this video (queued to his discussion of Kura at CES 2022: https://youtu.be/S0heZVN5NCs?t=1328

>I think we need to see Kura actually demonstrate that their technology works.

Indeed.

Re: Analysis of Magic Leap 2 at SPIE AR/VR/Mr 2022

#46

Post by hindsightbias »

valine wrote: post #32
bajook wrote: post #29

Optical AR is a dead end. Passthrough AR with VR goggles and 8K cameras on the outside will be the way that wins.

No one wants to wear a headset if it makes them look stupid. If AR glasses are a dead end then mass adoption of AR outside of gaming/enterprise is likely DOA.

Apple is great at many things, but exceptional at fashion.

Re: Analysis of Magic Leap 2 at SPIE AR/VR/Mr 2022

#47

Post by Miraste »

bajook wrote: post #29

Optical AR is a dead end. Passthrough AR with VR goggles and 8K cameras on the outside will be the way that wins.

This seems like a tech-community-only opinion to me, the same thinking that is currently killing Magic Leap. If you want to build a mass-market AR headset, you should have one priority: make it look like glasses. People like eye contact. People don’t like looking like alien telemetry pods are eating their eyeballs. Once you have that, then you can worry about things like resolution, fov, and color reproduction. The only companies I’ve seen understand this are Snap and Amazon, with the caveat that they forgot to make the glasses do anything useful.

I suspect this is why Apple is having such a hard time with their headsets. Above all else, Apple doesn’t release products that are dorky.

Re: Analysis of Magic Leap 2 at SPIE AR/VR/Mr 2022

#48

Post by ramesh31 »

ryandrake wrote: post #43

Wow, talk about a tech news blind spot: I honestly though Magic Leap wasn't even around anymore. Last news I heard about them was they burned through $billions, their product woefully (almost fraudulently) failed to meet any of the hype they set out, they sold a handful of units, and then the company folded. How on earth are they still in business?

>I honestly though Magic Leap wasn't even around anymore. Last news I heard about them was they burned through $billions, their product woefully (almost fraudulently) failed to meet any of the hype they set out, they sold a handful of units, and then the company folded. How on earth are they still in business?

AR/VR in general has hit the "slope of enlightenment" portion of the hype cycle [0]. Talented people are still diligently working on this stuff behind the scenes and advancing the state of the art, even though mainstream adoption has a ways to go.

[0] https://hobi.com/gartner-hype-cycle-emerging-tech-potential/...

Re: Analysis of Magic Leap 2 at SPIE AR/VR/Mr 2022

#49

Post by numpad0 »

bajook wrote: post #29

Optical AR is a dead end. Passthrough AR with VR goggles and 8K cameras on the outside will be the way that wins.

Why not just put up a head tracking 3DTV at that point? Only caveat is it'll look like a window to VR rather than an overlay to real world, but from psychological standpoint it might favorably communicates that the local and remote is physically separate with a substance inbetween.

Re: Analysis of Magic Leap 2 at SPIE AR/VR/Mr 2022

#50

Post by Miraste »

kguttag wrote: post #12
echelon wrote: post #2

I've barely cracked the surface of this and it's already one of the best analytical breakdowns of new tech I've seen. Thank you, kguttag! This is obviously a very hot market. Where do you see AR vs VR in 2 years? Five years? Do you think these companies will have supply chain issues? Do you think AR will face adoption issues? It seems like the lack of light, "glowing eyes", eye tracking cutouts, and other issues will…

While the market is "hot" in terms of awareness, it is still a very small market facing major technical challenges. I think AR while useful in enterprise markets (measured in the 100's of thousands a year) is a long way from being ready for the mass consumer market. I am seeing a lot of progress in some areas and will be publishing an article later this week on them. In particular both Dispelix and Digilens have made…

Did you get to try the Avegant prototype? It sounds quite promising.
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