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Orion, our first true augmented reality glasses

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Re: Orion, our first true augmented reality glasses

#471

Post by cubefox »

drewrv wrote: post #164
wilsonnb3 wrote: post #32

Decent hands on article from the verge with more info https://www.theverge.com/24253908/meta-orion-ar-glasses-demo... Wireless compute puck. 70 degree FOV. Resolution high enough to read text. Wrist band detects hand gestures and will be used in another product.

From using various VR systems, a hololens, and reading reviews of the vision pro I really feel like hand gestures are a bad way to interact with AR systems. They might work in a pinch (heh) but some sort of small controller that can act as a pointer and has a button or two is superior in every way. It's interesting that meta went through the effort of bundling an accessory but stuck with hand gestures anyway.

Except that AR glasses that require a controller are totally impractical when using them in everyday life.

Re: Orion, our first true augmented reality glasses

#472

Post by mk_stjames »

I just want two to four text lines of 80-characters wide, literally in monochrome if you have to I don't care, and the ability to use it to scroll thru help with speaking in a foreign language / subtitling what I am hearing around me, in a glasses form factor that people don't notice aren't my normal reading glasses.

That is it. I have wanted just this, for decades.

I have lived a lot of my life in places where I don't speak the local language. I have Auditory Processing Disorder and a speech impediment that, if I don't have a good 'script' to go along with, makes it very difficult for me to get by in public often. I currently live in a country where my anxiety is amplified by the fact that any mis-spoken words by me often results in straight up being berated at a faster speed than I can understand, instead of being helped. I feel like am absolute idiot every time I have to just go get something at the pharmacy or ask for something new at the bakery. I've tried for years, taking courses, to learn to listen closer and work on my grammar and vocab, but I'm aging and have just gotten worse and worse.

Most interactions would go smooth if I could just have a few key moments translated for me. I feel like this is a no brainer of tech now that we have super reliable speech-to-text in multiple languages and pretty damn good audio filtering to pickout the main converstation from background noise. I'd even let the model run on a laptop in my backpack to keep the glasses down in size to something that, again, doesn't make me look like some VR dweeb. And no cameras in the glasses staring at people making them question my motives or draining the battery. Just the essentials.

Please. I've been seeing promises of this for literally 20 years. I just need those few lines of text in ~640x200 pixels in front of me to help me get by. Fuck it, give me a 9600 bps serial-over-bluetooth to the display and make it 'dumb' and I'll write the software myself..

Re: Orion, our first true augmented reality glasses

#473

Post by zmmmmm »

siquick wrote: post #150
SirFatty wrote: post #118

A solution looking for a problem.

I don’t know a single person who is interested in anything like this, including massive gadgets nerds. Who’s the target market? The Verge reporters?

And yet people who try it instantly want it. The Meta Ray Bans are a hit, they couldn't make enough for a long time.

Sometimes upfront demand isn't the only indicator that matters.

Re: Orion, our first true augmented reality glasses

#474

Post by cubefox »

zmmmmm wrote: post #466
Twirrim wrote: post #12

I know it's a prototype, but yikes those are large and goofy looking. Reminds me of the old 80's NHS glasses in the UK (which you could get for free if you couldn't afford otherwise). Or for those of you old enough, Brains from the old Supermarionation versions of the Thunderbird show ( https://i2-prod.walesonline.co.uk/incoming/article8451975.ec... )

I was an early adopter of the Galaxy Note which looked outlandishly large and goofy, back when people still spoke in awe of how Jobs made the 3.5" iPhone to fit the human hand naturally and no other form factor could possibly be right. Fast forward today and nearly every phone looks like a galaxy note. Turns out when the utility is there, people will adapt.

Or the Dell Streak with its "huge" 5 inch screen in 2010. A "phablet". Today it would be considered on the smaller side.

Re: Orion, our first true augmented reality glasses

#475

Post by throwitaway1123 »

doctorhandshake wrote: post #269
wilsonnb3 wrote: post #32

Decent hands on article from the verge with more info https://www.theverge.com/24253908/meta-orion-ar-glasses-demo... Wireless compute puck. 70 degree FOV. Resolution high enough to read text. Wrist band detects hand gestures and will be used in another product.

The EMG wrist band is the most exciting part of this release, IMO. That strikes me as a great solve that pushes into software a lot of hard problems that were solved with hardware previously.

That was the part that stood out to me as well after watching The Verge's video: https://youtu.be/mpKKcqWnTus?t=98

The Vision Pro uses optical sensors for hand tracking, so if your hands aren't visible to the device it obviously can't track them. Electromyography solves that problem, and I could imagine Apple integrating some variant of this in a future Apple Watch, and just falling back to optical sensors if you don't own one.

Re: Orion, our first true augmented reality glasses

#476

Post by quotemstr »

xtracto wrote: post #262
Twirrim wrote: post #12

I know it's a prototype, but yikes those are large and goofy looking. Reminds me of the old 80's NHS glasses in the UK (which you could get for free if you couldn't afford otherwise). Or for those of you old enough, Brains from the old Supermarionation versions of the Thunderbird show ( https://i2-prod.walesonline.co.uk/incoming/article8451975.ec... )

The problem is that these companies keep wanting to put processing in the glasses. The glasses should only have the minimum circuitry to send, receive and render very high definition video. All the processing should be done in another device (like the arm band) that is carried nearby (like the wireless microphones they use in TV or concerts: https://www.amazon.com.mx/UHF-Wireless-Microphone-System-Kit... ). That way…

I understand your position. It's the architecture that a lot of players in the space (e.g. Qualcomm) are doubling down on --- and it seems intuitively obvious that we should tether smart glasses to ubiquitous phones.

The problem is that by doing so we make glasses secondary, auxiliary devices. You wouldn't leave your house without your phone, but if you forget your tethered glasses, well, no big deal.

The only way we move past phone as personal computing form factor is making alternatives standalone devices. If you could do everything you do on your phone, but on glasses, you might drop the phone habit. If you can't drop the phone habit, and there are only so many things you can take with you when you leave your house, AR glasses will always be an afterthought.

Re: Orion, our first true augmented reality glasses

#477

Post by zmmmmm »

LarsDu88 wrote: post #143

Just remember, these are $10000 prototypes. Two more silicon nodes (36 months 2027) and these will be the same size as regular sunglasses

The $10k figure is interesting because if they wanted to I'm sure they could sell these to tech elites and celebrities for that much (essentially, the Tesla approach). Presumably the software isn't there yet, but it seems like a missed opportunity to me - imagine getting all the A and B list celebs wearing them. Perhaps it's just not realistic until another iteration but it seems tantalisingly close.

Re: Orion, our first true augmented reality glasses

#478

Post by zmmmmm »

regularfry wrote: post #102
rvz wrote: post #7

Say what you want about Zuckerberg. But once again you have witnessed the heavy investment in reality labs to create a new XR glasses platform that potentially ticks all the boxes that will take consumer XR glasses mainstream: * Looks very cool and more natural. (In comparison, look at Snap XR Glasses) * No wires sticking out. * Not a huge VR headset. * Can see what you see through the lenses for XR capabilities. * C…

The "doesn't look too dorky" benchmark for me is the XReal Air line. They're a few years old now, and they aren't exactly AR glasses in the same way, but you'd expect the headline of this iteration of tech to be better looking. Not worse. I wonder what's actually in the frames. You wouldn't put bulk there if you had any other choice.

XReals have no battery or standalone function and top out at 50 degrees or so field of view. So the fact Orion is doing all of those function at 70 degrees, self powered and wireless is stunning.

Re: Orion, our first true augmented reality glasses

#479

Post by kQq9oHeAz6wLLS »

_DeadFred_ wrote: post #416
Animats wrote: post #399

Nice hardware. They're down to swim goggle size. Then you see what Facebook wants you to do with it - see screens in front of you all the time. One with Facebook's "Recommended" page, and a video of some talking neckbeard. There's a feeling of "we were promised virtual reality, and all we got was talking heads of influencers." The hardware apparently has GPS, but that's turned off. So, no Pokemon Go yet. Not even Hyp…

I think the preferred term is contentpreneur now, not influencer.

I'm never gonna remember that

Re: Orion, our first true augmented reality glasses

#480

Post by underlipton »

jazzyjackson wrote: post #217
drewrv wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From using various VR systems, a hololens, and reading reviews of the vision pro I really feel like hand gestures are a bad way to interact with AR systems. They might work in a pinch (heh) but some sort of small controller that can act as a pointer and has a button or two is superior in every way. It's interesting that meta went through the effort of bundling an accessory but stuck with hand gestures anyway.

I agree, and I also think that walking around to items positioned statically in space is a really dumb way to do embodied computing. I mean if an app is associated with your kitchen fridge or whatever fine, pin it to your kitchen fridge, but if I'm going to be enveloped in an omnidirectional high def display, I want a way to bring the windows to me , not have to move my body to different windows. Anyway, Logitech mad…

I disagree. Physical activity enhances mental well-being and the quality of cognition. A system that allows one to design their workspace with regular movement in mind is going to be a boon for people who are usually chained to a desk for purely virtual work, forced to navigate cramped UI with their finger. Say I'm editing a video; you're telling me my media bin could be a literal bin a few steps away, allowing me to physically separate my "media selection" task from my "cutting and moving clips" task? Knowing that this kind of encapsulation helps to improve focus, and the movement would help with circulation and stress? Sign me up.
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