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Demo of Prototype Virtual Retinal Head Mounted Display
muterobert writes with an article about a new head mounted virtual retinal display (technology last covered ages ago). The folks over at Road to VR took a look at an engineering prototype; from the article: "The Avegant HMD uses a virtual retinal projection display consisting of a single LED light source and an array of micro-mirrors. This differs from normal screens in that with a VRD there is no actual screen to look at. Instead, a virtual image (in the optical sense) is drawn directly onto your retina. . ... 'At one point I was looking at a sea turtle in shallow coral waters. Sunlight was beaming down from the surface and illuminating the turtle's shell in a spectacular way — it was one of the most vivid and natural things I've ever seen on any display. The scene before me looked incredibly real, even though the field of view is not at immersive levels.'"
i think this might completely overwhelm the occulus rift. the fact that it can be adjusted to your eyesight is pretty awesome as well.
I've avoided "monitors on eyeglasses" for a while, feeling the technology still a bit weak, but damn am I ready to just turn on my direct-to-eye virtual system.
We're turning the corner, kids. I can't wait to see what's down the block.
Less deeply cool if the mirror control software locks up and you burn a line/spot into your retina.
Trying, plasma TV style, to run noise/wipes material through it to reduce retina burn-in would not be fun.
On the other hand, nice to see another step towards the Snow Crash universe. Just need a depleted uranium hypervelocity railgun and people will finally start listening to Reason.
biopowered.co.uk - catalytically cracking triglycerides for home automotive use since 2008. Just say no to big oil!
Images are drawn onto your retina every waking second of your life.
It's the micromirror device. Duh. There is no fundamental optical difference between this, Google Glass, and Oculus Rift. The only differences are the size of the physical component that is the screen (very small in the case of Glass, medium in this case, much larger in the case of Oculus Rift) and the optics used for the light path (from trivial in the Rift to more complex in this case and in Glass) and thus also the apparent size of the screen to the wearer.
Retinal "projection" is just a fancy term for "making it look to your eye like there's a screen in front of it". There's no magic. Even with a scanning laser-based retinal projection system, where there is no physical screen (but a scanned laser creates a virtual plane that acts like one) you still need to cover the eye in a big lens and make the light seem to come from the same places it would come if there were a big screen in front of it. It's impossible to "project into your retina" from an angle and make the image appear to cover other parts of your vision that do not intersect with the projection system, because your eye's lens (like any other lens) is designed to not allow this to happen.
It's cool that we have different approaches to VR competing with each other, but let's not let the marketing folks get away with hand-wavey BS claims.
It was on some show. It was distributed as a game involving getting pink Frisbee-like objects into purple articulating horns which emanated from holes in plane which extended off into the distance. Seems like it might be quite addictive.
Basically, they are shining three LEDs at you and moving where the light from those LEDs land. Ostensibly, laser is supposed to be usable safely in this sort of application as well, but this company steered away from even that.
So this isn't pointing something that is even particularly high powered or coherent at your retina, mostly just sidestepping the screendoor effect because the light path is being manipulated in a manner that isn't as discrete as an array of OLEDs accomplishing the same thing (the latter being easier since the LED state doesn't need to change nearly as fast with OLED or LCD as it would in a system scanning the retina with similar light source.
Still, not my cup of tea yet as the FOV isn't ambitious, and I think FOV is more key than eliminating the inter-pixel gaps (and in fact if mobile device industry continues their one-upmanship, a 7-inch 4k display might be viable and not matter much anyway).
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
It sounds to me like you're worried that the developers understand the technology as little as you do.
No, images arrive at our retina through means the human body has been using for thousands of years.
Having a piece of technology draw it directly onto your retina is different. And anybody who has ever seen screen burn-in on a monitor will know why it's different.
It's no different at all though. In everyday natural means, light passes through the eyeball to arrive at the retina. In this display, it also passes through the eyeball to arrive at the retina. Naturally, our pupils adjust to allow a comfortable amount of light through. That doesn't change here, either - the pupil can still adjust to suit the viewer's preference.
If too much natural light gets through the pupil, we instinctively blink or squint to avoid burning. That only fails when the viewer intentionally keeps their eyes open (such as kids staring at the sun), when too much energy gets through in the time it takes to execute the blink (such as powerful lasers), or when the energy being absorbed is outside the range of human perception (IR or UV damage).
Fortunately, we actually have a pretty good idea of how much energy is required to burn the retina, and we can easily make LEDs that stay under that threshold. Since the wavelength of an LED is uniform, there's very little risk of any IR or UV damage, as well.
The biggest hazard to this thing is that some idiot might try to wear it while walking, and be hit by a car. That proves that walking is horribly dangerous compared to safer alternatives like being inside the car, even though feet are the locomotive means the human body has been using for thousands of years.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
They'll do it with lasers so you can't unsee it.
Don't worry. You have already lost much more eyesight due to the small-factor car headlights you cross every night.
Fashion says headlights should be smaller, because this is nicer. So, the same amount of light gets out from a twice or four times smaller area.
Mind you, this same energy also lands on a four times smaller area on your retina.
You are already burnt, just because nobody thought about headlight size (there are laws on the total power, but not on the surface).
See, you don't need ultramodern retina head mounts...
Herve S.
Hey, like I said ... you want it, run wild.
I don't want it, and I don't as yet see any reason to take on faith the claims that, in theory, it's perfectly safe.
My eyes, however, will not be the ones to prove that assertion. What you do with your eyes is your problem.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
...because this doesn't look at all like the laser retinal scanners from 10-15 years ago. And that's a good thing.
I got to try one of the laser retinal scanners at SIGGRAPH ages ago. I was pretty excited, because they promised to dodge the corrective-lenses issue -- in effect, it's as though you're stopping the eye down to a microscopic aperture, which means focus and aberration issues become arbitrarily small. The problem, though, was diffraction artifacts, and they were overwhelming -- there were big, heavily-fringed blobs at fixed positions in the image, and you couldn't make them go away.
Laser technology has come a long way since then, but it doesn't matter. As far as I know, there's nothing that technology can do to overcome this fundamental flaw.
Surely you don't want any *artificial* light that those other HMDs offer.
(My BS meter was pegging out while watching that video.)
most of the computer devices you look at do not have 'screens' but DIRECT light sources, no different in concept from this Avegant HMD.
The difference is that on regular screens, each pixel is an individual, diffuse light source, with that light coming from a LED belonging to that pixel. This thing steers a number of beams reflected from a single light source directly into your eye, forming the image on your retina instead of on something in front of your eye. The end result ought to be similar to what other head mounted displays do, but the optics involved are very different. One advantage is that as far as I can see there's no need for large lenses or (worse) Fresnell lenses, which often cause visible distortions to the image.
They do still have to solve some of the other issues you mention (brightness is hardly an issue in modern kits). But there's more to this tech than buzzwords; doing things this way could make for a decidedly smaller headset and produce higher quality images.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
It's not made clear in the article, but this looks identical in principle to a conventional digital projector (i.e. powerpoint and home cinema). It's a rather daft article in places; e.g. of course the device has pixels. They're just not RGB triplets. The micro-mirrors must surely be these sorts of things: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_micromirror_device which are a standard DLP part: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Light_Processing Instead of a white screen, they're projecting onto the retina directly. It's a nice idea but I'm not clear on the benefits and the article doesn't seem to say anything concrete in this regard. There may be downsides: For one thing, the RGB cycling of the LED can lead to rainbow effects when you sacade across the display. The DLPs I'm familiar with have this, at any rate. Perhaps an RGB LED is fast enough to avoid this, though.
soylentnews.org
This thing doesn't use a single beam; this is not at all like building an image with a laser at very high intensity to compensate for scanning over a large area. This is like a DLP projector, using many beams that are either on or off. So: the light source will be of relatively low intensity, and it's not like a malfunction (or even a hack) is going to steer all beams onto the same spot in your eye, burning a hole.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
> bright enough to feel pain on your retina
Technically you don't. Your brain reacts to overwhelming brightness data, but if I take a laser outside of the visual range, I can burn penises on your retina without you even feeling it.
No, images arrive at our retina through means the human body has been using for thousands of years.
No, the poster you're responding to was correct. As far as your eye is concerned this is optically identical to normal visual conditions. If it wasn't, you wouldn't be able to see an image with this device.
"Images" do not "arrive" at your retina as you say. Instead, mostly parallel light rays from a surface/object arrives at the lens and, if the conditions are correct, an image is formed onto the retina. All this device is doing is projecting a micro-mirror array onto your retina. So long as the light levels aren't dangerous, there's no problem. In fact, the whole experience is just like using a telescope or a microscope.
soylentnews.org
That's nothing. Try being behind modern sedans while driving in a high-seat vehicle like an SUV. Those curved rear windows at 45 degree or shallower angles are able to reflect the summer sun (and there's a lot of it in Texas in the summer), mostly when going southbound or toward the sun. Sure, it's not quite as bright as looking directly into the sun, but it's still a real pain.
Even someone leaving his brights on at night isn't that bad, because he's coming from the other direction and will pass you very soon, while you could be stuck behind that beige shitbox for miles, and there's usually another right in front of it even if you pass.
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Stop trying to speak sense to the technophobe. Them thar LAZER BEAMS FROM TEH SCARRRY MACHINE IS GOWNA BLOW MY EYEBALLS UP! He is probably out telling someone to get off his lawn anyway.
I absolutely get and share your distrust of big pharma, but I think this case is different. Notice I'm not saying the display is safe because the manufacturer said so. In fact, I didn't notice anything regarding safety in the article (although I didn't read the whole thing). I'm not taking anything on faith from the manufacturer, I'm saying it's safe based on first principles and basic optics.
Optically this is essentially the same as normal vision or using a telescope or a microscope. The device likely uses a couple of lenses to illuminate the mirror array with the LED, then one more lens that, in concert with your eye's lens, projects the mirror array onto your retina. In other words, that last lens does exactly what the eyepiece of a telescope or microscope does. It's literally the same thing. It's really simple optics with no weird tricks. Nothing is being "beamed" or weird "cool" stuff being done. So since I'm happy to use a microscope and telescope, I'm happy to use this. I have to be, because they're the same thing. Like I say, the only possible acute danger is if the lighting levels are dangerously high. But that's not possible in this case because it doesn't use a laser and light source is illuminating a mirror array, not being focused onto your retina.
soylentnews.org
Let's see if we can clear up a few things. Imagine looking at your monitor.
The pixel in the upper left corner is emitting a hemisphere of light. Or rather, it's emitting a bunch of rays of light that spread out in a hemisphere. Under ideal circumstances, it's the same color and intensity for any of those rays, though we know from experience that it tapers off and sometimes changes color as you see it from greater angles. But for most of the "straight on" angles, they're about the same.
A subset of that hemisphere of rays is entering one of your pupils. If you consider the shape of that subset, it forms a cone, with the base at that pixel on the monitor, and the extent formed by the circle of the pupil. All those rays of light will (assuming your eye is focused on the monitor) focus to a point on the associated retina.
The individual rays in that cone are close to, but not quite, parallel to each other. The farther away your monitor is, the more parallel they are, and the closer the monitor is to you, the more the rays are spreading out. Each eye's lens takes care of focusing the parallel or spreading out rays back to a point on its retina. Note that if the rays are spreading out too much (ie, the monitor is too close to your face), you cannot refocus the rays back to a point. You'd need additional optics to help achieve this. (This is why Oculus needs a big fat lens in front of each screen.)
For the purposes of this explanation, we'll simplify a bit and consider a bundle of rays that are parallel. Given this simplification, the only distinction between the pixels on the monitor (aside from their color and intensity) is that they arrive at your pupil from different directions.
In fact, you can replace the monitor with physical objects that are reflecting light, and the same principles apply. Going a step further, you can see that it doesn't really matter how those bundles of rays are generated; the only thing that matters is how they enter the pupil. The direction (ie, angle) that they enter from determines the location, and the color and intensity determine what you see there.
So let's take away the monitor, and instead imagine other ways that you can generate different parallel ray bundles directed at your pupil. The original "virtual retinal display" from the University of Washington was based on the following principle:
1) Generate a single collimated beam of light rays. Collimated means that all the rays within the beam are parallel (or close to it). Beam, in this case, does not mean a tiny dot, but rather a beam with some girth to it (on the order of a centimeter).
2) Use one or more tiltable mirrors to shine this beam at different angles at your pupil. By redirecting the beam in a raster-scan fashion, you can trace out a complete image.
3) For each different direction scanned (ie, each pixel), you also need to change the color and intensity of the beam appropriately (to correspond to the pixel you see from that direction).
Note that the beam has to be spread out significantly from a single point, such that when redirecting it from one extreme to other that it will still hit your pupil. Light that doesn't enter your pupil is wasted.
This is just one method. The subject of today's article appears to use a DMD array instead of one or two scanning mirrors. Assuming that the DMD mirrors can scan in a 2D fashion, then it's really the exact sample principle.
Note that there are many other ways to achieve the same ends. If you have a point light source, you could use a parabolic mirror to generate a large collimated beam. Provide some way to scan that beam, and voila. You might also note that spherical mirrors approximate a parabola, except for arbitrary directions. Provide a way to scan the light source, and voila.
As you can see, the trick is mainly in the scanning, since all the rest is "easy".
What it's doing is essentially allowing you to look at a DLP chip through a series of special lenses, by making the DLP chip look like it's much larger than it really is and much further away via the optics. It's not beaming anything directly into the eye any more than the sun is "beaming" the light you see right now into your eye. It is, as another poster pointed out, much like looking into a microscope, or even looking at the world through corrective lenses.
Don't even get me started on aspirin. Herr Bayer wouldn't even have a starter on his hands there.
If it bugs you that much you should invest in a pair of polarized sunglasses. They are perfect for reducing the glare you describe. They also reduce the glare from water quite well.
Man, you really need that seminar!
...I don't as yet see any reason to take on faith the claims that, in theory, it's perfectly safe.
Science: It works, bitches.
We drive cars with explosive-level gasoline stored just waiting for some idiot to decide that NOW is the perfect time to cause a 20+ car pile-up. Statistically around 100% more people killed by car accidents than murders every year. I guess light levels don't look so dangerous.
Indeed. And in fact, most people are using a technology right now that if it were to be introduced for the first time in today's safety climate would be rejected due to bad design and safety issues. That technology being the common light bulb socket. Think about it. Bare metal contacts that can be easily touched. If the bulb breaks, removal of the base being a hazardous activity (even more so if the power is left on). And in fact, the polarized two prong plugs and outlets you now find were developed as a means of attempting to render the light socket safer (when properly wired, the polarized plugs and sockets will arrange for the screw to be at ground instead of being 'hot'.)
A system much like this has been in use in military applications since the mid-1990s - see Micro Vision Systems. I don't recall if they use micromirrors but I think not.
It's easier to be a result of the past, but more fun to be a cause of the future! http://www.spacefinancegroup.com/
Not to mention those ubiquitous four-wheeled vehicles that burn extremely flammable and poisonous petrochemicals, and move at speeds several times as fast as the fastest animal alive - and are built using materials refined in mile-long fiery furnaces or cooked out of more petrochemicals! Did you know that the of intelligence to momentum of that vehicle plus its herder is lower than almost any animal?
When these vehicles were first introduced, laws in some places required they be preceded by a person carrying a flag, to warn oncoming horse and buggy traffic of the fire-snorting beast. Perhaps we should have kept that law in place!
It's easier to be a result of the past, but more fun to be a cause of the future! http://www.spacefinancegroup.com/
The Phrase "shut up and take my money" was made for this technology.
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I'm going to guess that you don't wear glasses, or you would unserstand that for those of us who do, it's either crappy clip-ons or expensive prescription sunglasses.
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I do wear glasses. I'm a cheap bastard so I generally buy from a place that sells an eye exam, regular glasses, and sunglasses for $99 if you can live with the frames they offer. If you pick nicer frames the price goes up, I usually get out of there for $150. I bought a pair of prescription polarized sunglasses years ago for $200 and I still use them, I treat them tenderly always keeping them in a hard case when I'm not wearing them. When I'm staring into bright water or road having an out of date prescription isn't very noticeable.
For swimming, I buy "off the shelf" prescription goggles for $20. They don't match my eyes perfectly, but at least I can walk around without banging into anything and I don't crash into stuff in the water. My eyes require different strength lenses, so I buy 2 pair and cannibalize them to make 2 custom pair that sorta fit my eyes.
If you have a current prescription you can shop online, there are some good deals out there.
If bright glare bothers you, do yourself a favor and invest in the polarized lenses. I've got pretty sensitive eyes and it's been totally worth it for me.
Man, you really need that seminar!