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These smart glasses became my erratic personal trainer
Fitness wearables don't have to go on your wrist -- although it makes sense that most of them are designed that way. We've been wearing wristwatches for generations, so it's a place where we're used to tethering something. But how about the original wearable: eyewear? JINS Meme is a pair of unassuming smartglasses that have highly sensitive three-axis gyroscopes and accelerometers inside. And because they're situated on your head, the Japanese eyewear company says it can offer insight into your posture and balance and pinpoint weaknesses. To help you with all of the above, JINS recently launched a core-training application ("taikan") to complement its existing running-coach app. It tests your core strength (think: abs, back, abductors, butt, etc.) and offers a live critique on how you're doing. Here's how training went.
Volkswagen is issuing AR glasses as standard factory equipment
Following a successful 3-month pilot program at its Wolfsburg plant, Volkswagen announced on Tuesday that it will begin issuing 3D smart glasses to its plant logistics personnel. These glasses, which display information like bin locations and part numbers directly in the user's line of sight, should help speed up order picking. That is, they'll tell plant employees if the parts they're holding are the parts they actually need. And to keep the process as hands-free as possible, a camera embedded in the specs will double as a barcode scanner.
JINS' fatigue-tracking smart glasses hit Japan next month
Okay, so you've been able to order JINS' non-smart (dumb?), app-customizable glasses for awhile if you live in Japan. That much is pretty well established. But the eyewear outfit's recently announced that its line of Meme smart glasses will be available in the company's home-region stores starting next month on November 5th. Maybe they'll eventually make their way stateside considering JINS' store in San Francisco. How much is that doggy in the window? According to our Japanese Engadget colleagues, ¥19,000 or about $160. We tried them out at CES this year and came away pretty impressed, especially with the purported 16-hour battery life.
Recon Jet smart glasses get the GoPro controller app they deserve
Recon Instruments makes tech-friendly snow and cyclist headwear with built-in GPS, displays and more. Recon's Jet glasses even have a camera on board -- but it's limited to a one-minute max for videos. Riders, runners and powder-fiends who own either the Snow2 or Jet can now eke out a little extra functionality, thanks to an app that'll let you control a GoPro, right from the headset's touch controls. Called "MyGoproRemote2," the app functions just like GoPro's own mobile offering, with all the same options -- preview, record, change settings and so on. Your Snow or Jet connects to the camera over WiFi, so it's likely a burden on the battery for both devices, but that's the price of not having to carry a phone or GoPro remote we guess. The app's confirmed to work with Hero3 and Hero4 cameras, and can be snapped up (for free) from Recon's Engage app store.
Epson's smart glasses are for tech-loving mechanics
For the mall-pounding public, smart glasses are a hard sell. The combo of dorky looks and, well, lack of actual need has strangled the few attempts to commercialize them. Epson (of printer fame) thinks trade and industry is where the market/money is, and is adding another smart headset to its professional-friendly range. The Moverio Pro BT-2000 (yah, really) is based on Epson's existing BT-200 model, with a more rugged design and a juicier specification. This time around, Epson is tempting engineers with a 5-megapixel stereo/3D camera with depth sensing, head tracking and support for augmented reality, like if Dickies made HoloLens.
Sony's head-mounted display will turn spectacles into smart glasses
It's no secret that Sony's been working on a sort of Google Glass analog, but the fact that the company's also got a bolt-on display that can (ideally) turn any pair of glasses into a savvy wearable is nothing short of impressive. After Sony wrapped up this year's CES press conference, we got the chance to yank a pair out of some poor spokesperson's hands and strap them on for ourselves. Long story short: Sony just might have a winner on its hands.
Toshiba prototype is a simpler, lighter Google Glass rival... with a catch
Nearly every tech company wants in on the wearables game, but they can't all be Google Glass or Apple Watches -- not that they have to be. But hey, here's Toshiba -- and it's got a Toshiba Glass prototype to show off. We'll say this right at the start: this remains a reference product that the company's showing off at CEATEC in Japan this week. And yes, technical specifics (let alone a price) aren't being discussed yet, but the vision for Toshiba's eye-based wearable prototype is a gentle, predictable one. The hardware is the combination of a tiny projector, attached to admittedly normal-looking frames. However, there's actually a special kind of one-sided reflective glass to catch the projection. The projection module itself is kind of bulky, but actually lightweight... which is great, until you realize that this prototype requires a constant wired connection to work.
Not quite Google Glass: a week with Epson's awkward smart glasses
I had the full attention of Engadget's San Francisco office as I unpacked Epson's latest augmented reality headset, the Moverio BT-200. The glasses make for one heavy, awkward wearable: Coke-bottle thick lenses with inlaid transparent displays hovering in front of each eye. My coworkers and I passed them from desk to desk anyway, snapping goofy images for Instagram and musing over what to do with them. The glasses aren't Engadget's typical review fare -- it's not a product intended for consumers, and I wonder out loud how I'm going to explain the lenses to my readers. Without missing a beat, my editor Christopher Trout looks me square in the eye and gives me an answer. "Wear them," he says. "For a week. That's an assignment. You're doing it." Hoo boy.
Vuzix's smart glasses now talk to your iPhone
Vuzix's M100 Smart Glasses may be Android-powered, but that doesn't mean you have to use its hands-free features with other Android devices. The company has rolled out an OS 2.0 update that lets you use the wearable with most iOS gear. So long as you have the companion app (due very shortly), you can take full advantage of the M100's augmented reality apps, hands-free calling and other features that keep your hands free. If you've been looking for a head-mounted computer that will play nicely with your iPhone (and isn't as pricey as Google Glass), your search might be over.
Vuzix brings offline Nuance voice control to its smart glasses
If the only news you're waiting to hear from Vuzix is the smart sunglasses the company announced in January, well, this story isn't for you. But if you have one of the company's M100 smart glasses, then read on, because Vuzix has just released a big software update (version 2.0) with significant changes to the Android-based platform. Most significant, perhaps, is OS 2.0's offline Nuance integration for voice control -- and yes, that means it doesn't need the internet, at all, to work. The upgraded platform also promises longer battery life and faster performance, comes with redesigned user interface and desktop launcher, and supports Bluetooth Low Energy for music streaming and phone calls. As a nice plus, you can now download future updates over the air, while devs get a new SDK. All M100s from here on out will come preloaded with OS 2.0, but if you already dropped a grand to get one long ago, you can download the updated software from the Vuzix website.
Now you only have to barely move your hand to control your smart glasses
One main obstacle to making smart glasses mainstream is their awkward control methods, but that may change courtesy of Thalmic Labs, the maker of the $149 Myo muscle-sensing armband due in this fall. With the help of several enterprise partners, the startup has managed to integrate its futuristic wearable with Google Glass, Epson Moverio and Recon Jet, thus allowing users to quickly flick through documents, contacts and apps with subtle hand plus finger gestures, as opposed to fiddling with a tiny trackpad. In the videos after the break, it seems that there's great potential for the Myo in the medical space, heavy industries plus outdoor sports, albeit at the risk of making the users look a little silly.
Oxford University's smart glasses help people with partial vision see more detail
When we hear the term "smart glasses" these days, we tend to focus more on the smart and less on the glasses. Researchers at Oxford University see things the other way around: putting the emphasis on glasses suggests a device that helps the visually impaired see the world, not augment it. This is the project Dr. Stephen Hicks of the Nullfield Department of Clinical Neurosciences at the University of Oxford has been working on: a wearable designed to give folks with partial vision a clearer view of their surroundings. It's not as flashy as Google Glass, but it has the potential to change lives. It's also being tested in the wild.
Meta's augmented reality glasses are almost ready for developers
With all the attention Meta has been giving its $3,000 smart glasses prototype, you'd be forgiven if you thought the company and let its original Kickstarter design fall to the wayside. Forgiven, but wrong. Last May, the firm asked developers to help it build the world's most advanced augmented reality solution, promising developer kits for roughly half the price of Google's glass. Now that unit is almost ready to ship out -- we dropped by the company's booth at Augmented Reality Expo to see how it's shaped up.
Cleveland Indians want to put ads where fans can see them
Advertisers and sponsors are extremely valuable to all professional sports teams, and thus it is very important to keep them engaged with the fans. In an effort to make this happen, the Cleveland Indians recently partnered with Tobii, a maker of eye-tracking glasses, to conduct a study that could determine what exactly folks look at throughout their time at Progressive Field. The MLB team says it gave 47 fans a pair of Tobii Glasses to use during the span of three days, which were worn as they watched games from various seating areas at its ballpark. Essentially, using the Tobii Insight research program as the basis, the goal was to see how much time participants spent looking at the main scoreboard and other dynamic signage. In theory, this would detect just how valuable certain locations are inside the stadium -- so, the easier it is for you spot it, the more it could potentially cost for a company to put an ad there.
Firefighter developing Google Glass apps to help with response and rescue
For all the potential of Google's face-based hardware, we haven't seen many uses beyond the cool and novel that are any more than noble ideas. Not for firefighter Patrick Jackson, though, who's combined his talents for programming and winning wearables to create apps that help him and others out on the job. At this point, his software can push emergency calls to Glass and direct responders to locations and nearby hydrants with Google Maps. Currently, he's working on being able to pull up floor plans and other relevant information about buildings before entry, as well as vehicle diagrams and instructions for aiding in-car rescues. Jackson's #ifihadglass application also outlines the many benefits of streaming live video from an incident, so all he appears to have overlooked thus far is a warning system for Kurt Russell's worst enemy.
Atheer Labs wants to make its augmented reality glasses a reality on Indiegogo
Atheer Labs isn't the only company chasing Tony Stark, but it is the very latest to offer a set of smart glasses to developers -- enabling them to build out 3D touchless gesture controlled apps. Like its competitor, Meta, Atheer wants to do away with restrictive conventional computing and replace it with augmented reality. The idea is to, eventually, combine your real and digital worlds seamlessly through the power of smart glasses and wearable computers. Unlike Meta, however, Atheer's using Android underpinnings, and will let users run regular Android applications on their faces while they wait for the 3D apps to arrive. As have many others, Atheer's chosen Indiegogo as the means to connect with code monkeys and get them building applications for its platform. And, with the launch of the funding campaign comes the revelation of both a dev kit and the company's first set of consumer specs, dubbed Atheer One. Folks willing to spend $850 for a developer kit now will get their hardware in March 2014. Early adopters wanting the One headset need only pay $350, but won't receive it until the end of next year. What you see above (dev kit on the right, Atheer One on the left) is close to what will make its way into backers' hands, but the hardware's not yet final.
Meta Pro promises Tony Stark-style computing with a $3,000 pair of sunglasses
As opposed to the rudimentary capabilities of the current king of wearables, Google Glass, a company called Meta is building a full-fledged augmented reality computing platform into a pair of aviator shades and a pocket computer. The platform aims to provide the kind of user experience heretofore seen only in Hollywood films -- think Tony Stark using J.A.R.V.I.S. in Iron Man. It's been about four months since we last touched base with Meta, and at the time, we saw a prototype headset and got a demo of the company's technology -- it was a good start to be sure, but the UI was far from ready for consumer use. Since then, Meta's been working hard to get its $667 Meta.01 developer kits ready, while also designing its first consumer set of specs set to ship in June: the $3,000 Meta Pro. The Pro is the first pair of smart glasses that stuffs the technology needed to enable Stark-esqe computing into the form factor Meta's founder, Meron Gribetz envisioned when he started the company -- something akin to a pair of Ray Bans. And, not only do these new glasses sport more fashionable frames than the dev hardware, but Gribetz promises us that they'll also have greater computing capabilities, too. So, when the company offered up the opportunity to learn more about the Pro and use a prototype headset in person at Meta's headquarters in Silicon Valley, we jumped at the chance.
Vuzix's Android-powered M100 Smart Glasses now available to pre-order for $1,000
If you want Android-powered eyewear that's readily available, you won't have to wait for Glass' commercial launch next year; Vuzix has already beaten Google to the punch. The company's M100 Smart Glasses have started shipping to developers, and the general public can now pre-order the eyepiece ahead of its expected December release date. Do be prepared to pay for the privilege of seeing your Android and iOS apps on a heads-up display, however. The M100 will officially sell for $1,000 -- about twice as much as Vuzix predicted in January.
Spanish researchers use AR glasses and smartphones to aid student-teacher classroom communications
Gunners. They are a unique subset of students found in most any university lecture hall who steer classroom conversations with constant comments and questions directed at the professor. But what if you want a more inclusive environment that lets even timid students ask questions? One where they can communicate with their professor privately, during class, without interrupting. Well, researchers from la Universidad Carlos III of Madrid (UC3M) have built a system that lets professors receive feedback from students and know which ones have questions by using augmented reality technology. It works by leveraging the smartphones in students' pockets and giving the professor a set of AR smart glasses. Using an app connected to the system's server, students can indicate when they do or don't understand a concept, that the professor should go more slowly, or that they know the answer to the question. Then, an icon indicating which action the student has taken will be displayed over that student's head on the smart glasses' displays. Using the system, the professor can also push predefined questions to students' phones and control presentation slides using hand gestures and a Kinect. Intrigued? Speak Spanish? A demo video of the system in español awaits you after the break.
Hands-on with Meta 1, a 3D augmented reality headset with a natural UI (video)
Augmented reality is the future, or at least the proliferation of AR apps and hardware seems to indicate that'll be the case. Meta revealed its own augmented reality device, called Meta 1, in January and is currently in the midst of a Kickstarter campaign to ramp up manufacturing and get it to the people. If the headset looks familiar, that's because its hardware is: it's comprised, in no small part, of Epson and SoftKinetic gear. It utilizes the 960 x 540 binocular 3D displays from Epson's Moverio glasses and the depth sensor sitting atop them comes from SoftKinetic. Of course the glasses you see are but a first generation and are wired to a battery pack worn around the waist -- the company's currently working on slimming things down with customized eyewear that'll be revealed later this year, however. For now, the dev kit and the still-in-development Unity-based SDK are slated to ship in September, but we got to see some of what Meta 1 can do a bit early.
