Bionic Contact Lens May Lead to Overlay Displays

pfman writes "A University of Washington researcher has developed a contact lens including circuitry and a matrix of LEDs. Although not yet a working prototype, this may be a foundation for terminator/robocop style overlay displays in which computer graphics could be superimposed on your normal vision. 'Building the lenses was a challenge because materials that are safe for use in the body, such as the flexible organic materials used in contact lenses, are delicate. Manufacturing electrical circuits, however, involves inorganic materials, scorching temperatures and toxic chemicals. Researchers built the circuits from layers of metal only a few nanometers thick, about one thousandth the width of a human hair, and constructed light-emitting diodes one third of a millimeter across.'" Kotaku notes that this has some obvious gaming implications.

Comments

Re:Two Questions:

[Angst Badger]

It doesn't really matter since you can't focus on something in direct contact with your eye, anyway.

Focus

[HunterZ]

What about focus? If you're looking at something far away, how will the display be sharp? In fact, how can it ever be sharp enough to read that close up?

My eyes also go crazy if they perceive something moving around in my field of vision closer to me than where I'm focusing; sometimes I have to close one eye in a car when looking at the road when windshield wipers are moving across the front window. I think it's a brain thing though, because sometimes I do the same when watching the speeder bike sequences in SW:RotJ for example :p

focal point issues

[mugnyte]

There's a huge issue with this: When looking at an object at any distance, your eyes adjust alignment and then focus the lens. If you have a HUD in the lens surface, the focal depth is dramatically different between the HUD and the distant object.

  You can experience this now. On a bright white background, it is possible to relax your focus until any object on the surface of your lens become distinct outlines (typically, tiny pieces of debris that are washed away by your tears and blinking). To notice them, you move your eye a light distance and then stop, trying to discern if any shadows/etc are still sliding on the surface liquid. We've all experienced this sensation of trying to "look at" something like that, which causes the cascades of moving one's eyeball, thus the shape, etc.

  With a HUD, I was suspect that only blurry "regions" are actually possible. Much as if you held two pens up to to your eyes and aligned them so there was one (in the same line-of-sight as your original focal point), as a the shape of the "single" pen is hopelessly blurry and useless when trying to see across the room, the HUD wouldn't be the "terminator-style" chart of information.

  Really, what I'd like to see instead is augmentation of a different type: A 360 proximity sensor uses a sensitive area of your skin and various degrees of pressure to let you walk around in the dark, or to "see" behind you. Or perhaps 4 tones for the compass points in relation to your head position, allowing you to use it in a directed manner, like personal sonar or radar.

  But auto-shading your contact lens would be fun. It's a rose-color world.