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Zeiss Cinemizer OLED with head-tracking hands-on (video)
The Carl Zeiss Cinemizer OLED has been a long time in the making -- we first heard about the video glasses at Macworld in 2008 -- but the company has yet to push the head-mounted display past the prototype phase. We stumbled upon Zeiss' booth here at CeBIT, where we found a version of the glasses that look mighty similar to the mock-up we saw in marketing materials from 2010, but are now equipped with a pair of head-tracking modules to expand the yet-to-be released marvel's practicality. With head-tracking now on board, the Cinemizer can theoretically appeal to gamers, architects, even educators, who can use the glasses in the classroom.We took a look at an Inreal CAD app demo that lets the wearer navigate a yet-unbuilt house, walking through virtual rooms (a joystick is used for forward motion, so you won't be accidentally walking into physical walls) as you judge paint colors, furniture placement and try to convince your significant other that there really is room for a 65-inch HDTV. The tracking modules are located behind the ear rests on each side of the OLED glasses, which have seen a slight boost in resolution since we last heard about them, jumping from VGA to 870 x 500 pixels in each OLED panel. Tracking was responsive and accurate -- the experience of walking around a room felt almost lifelike. What's even more exciting than the device's performance is that we may finally see these hit stores in 2012, with a tentative summer ship date. And, while still a pricey addition to your display collection, the Cinemizer lands on the inexpensive end of the Zeiss product scale, ringing up at €649 (about $850), plus another €100 for the tracking hardware. Jump past the break to see it in action.%Gallery-149741%
NYT: Google to sell Android-based heads-up display glasses this year
It's not the first time that rumors have surfaced of Google working on some heads-up display glasses (9 to 5 Google first raised the possibility late last year), but The New York Times is now reporting that the company is not only working on them, but that it's set to release them by the end of this year. Citing "several Google employees familiar with the project," the paper's Nick Bilton reports that the glasses will be based on Android, pack 3G or 4G connectivity, plus GPS and a range of sensors, and cost "around the price of current smartphones," or somewhere between $250 and $600. They're also said to include a low-resolution camera that can monitor your surroundings in real time and overlay relevant information, although Google is said to be paying attention to potential privacy concerns, and "wants to ensure that people know if they are being recorded by someone wearing a pair of glasses with a built-in camera."What's more, the Times says that none other than Sergey Brin is a "key leader" on the project, with another being Google engineer Steve Lee, the creator of Latitude. Notably, Bilton also says that Google sees the project as an "experiment that anyone will be able to join," and that the company is not currently thinking about potential business models for the glasses, which could suggest that they may be more of a small-scale hobby than part of a major push into consumer hardware.
Canonical bringing HUD to Ubuntu 12.04, company's assault on menus continues
Canonical -- shepherd of the popular Linux distribution Ubuntu -- generally doesn't rock the boat with its LTS releases, but things are going to be different this time around. With 12.04LTS the company is taking its assault on contextual menus to the next level by launching HUD. Mark Shuttleworth's obsession with simplifying user interactions began with the controversial Unity UI in Ubuntu 10.10, and will continue with the Head-Up Display. "Menus require you to read a lot when you probably already know what you want," the distro's founder wrote, "HUD solves many of these issues." Those that have used the search feature in Apple's "Help" menus, or launcher apps like Quicksilver and Alfred, will immediately recognize the goal -- to keep a user's fingers on the keyboard, remove clutter and facilitate quick access to available actions. Listening to music and in the mood for The King? Invoke HUD, type the artist's name and you're presented with your Elvis catalog. It also uses "fuzzy matching" and will remember the actions you most commonly perform to further refine your experience. If you're having a hard time envisioning how HUD works, fear not; there is a three minute video demo awaiting your inspection after the break. Death to menus!
Wind River and Clarion pair up to bring Android to your imported street racer
Wind River, Intel's embedded systems arm has been the subject of some misty-eyed advances from car stereo makers Clarion. Ol' Windy (as we're trying to get it called) will be providing a custom version of its Android implementation to power the forthcoming "Clarion Malaysia IVI" in-vehicle-info-tainment kit. The device will be powered by a Freescale i.MX processor (a heavy duty ARM implementation that can utilize multiple cores) and pack Clarion's usual range of high-end multimedia, GPS and reversing camera functionality. We're excited to see this bad boy roll off the production line, but remember that, at least in Illinois, it's illegal to enjoy the "tainment" part whilst driving.
Vuzix Tac-Eye LT offers a clip on HUD for rugged, wannabe cyborgs
Does a pair of screens placed over your eyes seem like overkill? Well, AR enthusiasts, Vuzix has heard your calls and has introduced the Tac-Eye LT -- a transparent monocular AMOLED display that only puts info in front of one of your peepers. Unlike some of the company's other head-mounted displays, the Tac-Eye isn't aimed at personal entertainment. Instead, Vuzix envisions it being used as a HUD in rugged environments, offering alerts, data and video feeds. The unit comes mounted on a pair of Oakley specs (of course) but it can easily be clipped to a pair of standard safety glasses. The 800 x 600 see-through display comes in three different configurations: VGA-in, video-in or both. The Tac-Eye LT is available throughout Europe now... at least according to the PR. We couldn't find them for sale anywhere, nor could we track down pricing info. Head on after the break for the full release and a few more technical details.
Reader UI of the Week: A distraction-free hunter UI
Each week, WoW Insider and Mathew McCurley bring you a fresh look at reader-submitted UIs as well as Addon Spotlight, which spotlights the latest user interface addons. Have a screenshot of your own UI that you'd like to submit? Send your screenshots along with info on what mods you're using to readerui@wowinsider.com, and follow Mathew on Twitter. Welcome back to Reader UI of the Week, where your awesome UI creations go out for the world to see and learn from. I must stress again that this is a learning experience, people. Learn. Adapt. Thrive. Evolve into user interface greatness. Our submission this week is one of those examples of coolness and tidiness that many people could get some cool ideas from. Sigkill is a hunter with a distraction-free UI. His email subject started to pick at my mind: distraction-free. Are there really distractions out there that are part of a user interface? Why would a game distract you from, say, playing the game? Are there addons that are distracting you during serious raid play or just flashing when things shouldn't be flashing? Am I being too nitpicky? Well, I might have figured it out, and with your help, I think we'll be on the road to distraction-free UIs for all of us.
BMW 3 Series gets 'full-color' heads-up display
If you've been hankering for some HUD action in your next auto, you'll have one more choice come next spring: the all-new 2012 BMW 3 Series. The launch will mark the first time a heads-up display has made it into Bavaria's volume seller, after debuting as an optional extra eons ago on its 5 Series. Since then, HUDs of limited hues have permeated München's high-end, splaying speed and navigation directions in the line of sight of road-going elites everywhere. However, this iteration is "full-color," which besides pleasing ROY G. BIV fans, makes it "more intuitive," as the company reasons it'll aid drivers in recognizing crucial alerts faster. That, or we're really just a generation away from über cool AR wizardry and movies on our windscreens. Of course, no word on when the 3's brethren will get the technicolor treatment, but we're betting it won't be long, given that's the dash of a 6 Series you see above. PR, per usual, is after the break.
Hands-on with Toyota's Prius plug-in hybrid (video)
Yesterday we attended Toyota's Green Drive Expo where we were given the opportunity to take the production version of the Prius plug-in hybrid (PHV) -- and its smorgasbord of technology -- for a spin. We spent a couple hours driving interfacing with the computers aboard the Advanced model, which besides being outlet-friendly, includes some unique features within the Prius lineup. Explore our gallery below, and hit the break for our impressions and hands-on videos with the latest incarnation of Toyota's iconic vehicle.%Gallery-134091%
Wings Over Atreia: Let's get personal, personal...
Come on let's get personaaaaaaaal. Let me hear your... OK, maybe that song is a bit beyond some of you folks, but for others, you simply won't be able to get it out of your head all day! I cannot help it if 98% of my thoughts are all in music: old, new, classical, show tunes, or Disney ballads. Even MMO theme music and scores. It doesn't matter -- they all swirl around my head. So you will just have to suffer along with me once in a while. But I digress -- let's get back to the topic at hand. What? I haven't shared the topic yet? Sure I have! This week, Wings Over Atreia is all about getting personal. Or rather, making it personal. Even though our favorite MMOs host a multitude of players and have to lay out a general canvas for all, who doesn't long for a more personalized experience? We express it through names, character customization, fashion, and even roleplay. We buy cash shop items to achieve it. Another way is by customizing our UI. After all, even moreso than your characters, the UI is the one piece of Aion that you have to look at constantly (unless you play with the UI off, which must be an interesting feat!). Mods pepper the net for many games, giving a more unique touch to the games we love to play. So why not for Atreia? Load on past the cut to explore this aspect of personalizing your Aion experience. Or more accurately, the way you can't.
Eye-tracking microdisplay delivers Terminator vision, distracts joggers
The folks at Fraunhofer IPMS have done it! After years of tireless research and promises of Borg-like eyewear, the group has delivered a prototype of the world's first bidirectional, eye-tracking OLED microdisplay (got all that?) at SID 2011. The rig is much like a monocle, except with a transparent OLED display inside, which overlays digital information on top of the reflected light that usually hits your eyeballs. What's more, there are integrated photodetectors inside and special software to monitor the direction of your gaze, allowing you to interact with your newfound augmented reality using only the flick of an eyeball. Fraunhofer foresees joggers taking in movies while out for a run, which sounds more than just a little dangerous. We, on the other hand, envision a world in which the first thing anyone does upon meeting someone new is discreetly check their relationship status on Facebook -- finally fulfilling the social network's full creep potential. One more pic and the poorly translated PR after the break.
Brazilian police live out Robocop fantasies, test glasses that scan for criminals
In advance of the 2016 Olympics 2014 World Cup (and the thousands of visitors it'll draw), military police in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro are testing glasses topped with cameras capable of scanning crowds for criminals. The camera analyzes 46,000 biometric points on up to 400 faces per second -- data that then gets compared with a database of up to 13 million people. If a mug happens to match a wanted person or known troublemaker, a red light will appear on a small screen connected to the glasses. And, in a twist particularly befitting Robocop, the glasses can purportedly be calibrated to zoom in from 12 miles away, though they'll typically be used to manage crowds at a much more personal 50 meters (164 feet). For now, local cops will use them to tame crowds (and likely brawls) at soccer matches and even concerts, but hope to eventually monitor those crowded World Cup stands. As for us, we're all kinds of curious. Where do those tens of millions of faces come from -- Santa's naughty and nice list? What if people wear masks? Or sunglasses at night?
DARPA's next-gen wearable display: augmented-reality, holographic sunglasses
The US military seems to adore the idea of wearable displays, hence its continued efforts to make them a reality. We know it seems like just yesterday that DARPA tapped Lockheed Martin to build low-power, lightweight augmented-reality eyewear, and it was actually four full years ago when the wild and wonderous dream was to craft HMDs as small and light as "high-fashion sunglasses." Well, that dream lives on, this time with holograms: the lenscrafters at Vuzix just received a cool million to develop goggles that holographically overlay battlefield data on the wearer's vision. It all sounds very Dead Space (or, you know, like a Top Secret version of Recon-Zeal's Transcend goggles), promising realtime analysis of anything within sight. The company believes the finished product will be no more than 3mm thick and completely transparent when turned off. If all goes well, expect this to trickle down to consumers in short order; soon you'll have full "situational awareness" -- including relationship status -- of that mysterious stranger you've been eyeballing from across the room.
MegaReader brings true multitasking to the iPhone, lets you walk and read at the same time (video)
Galaxy S owners will already be familiar with the awesome power of overlaying text on a live view of their phone's camera feed, but now their iPhone counterparts get to join in the fun as well. MegaReader, an e-reading app that's survived the cutthroat App Store waters long enough to reach version 2.1, has just added a "Heads Up Display" feature to its list of attributes. Its function is to make your iPhone appear transparent, which is achieved by relaying camera images of what's behind the phone to its front. A real life saver, a mere gimmick, or a golden opportunity for a hilarious promo video? Why not all three?
Pioneer prototype laser-based heads-up display with Android hands-on (video)
Looking down at gauges? Officially passe. Check out Pioneer's vision of the future, a prototype that uses an embedded laser projector (a Microvision, as it were). They showed it a little earlier in Japan but this is the first time we've seen it in the US, and we got a chance to try it out. Right now it's just running a static demo, but the idea is that a virtual concierge (represented by our favorite mascot) pops up to give you information, and you could also get streaming video from traffic cameras, all without you having to look down. The information is supposed to come via a smartphone, we learned later an Android one at that, though things are a little vague. A release date is a little vague too, sometime in 2012, though we're told the company is working with car companies. But could we get this by next year? We'll see. %Gallery-113481%
Elbit wins $68 million defense contract to supply OLED-equipped HUDs
We still haven't heard about any takers for the company's "hunter-killer' robot, but Elbit Systems has just scored a big contract for some of its other military gear. It's just announced that it's received a five-year $68 million contract from the U.S. Department of Defense, which will see it provide the Army, Navy, Marines Corps and Coast Guard with its AN/AVS-7 heads-up display system components. While complete details are obviously a bit light, the HUDs apparently incorporate an eMagin OLED microdisplay, and are said to "increase situational awareness and safety by allowing pilots to fly 'head out of the cockpit' during day and night operations." Head on past the break for the full press release.
Pioneer's prototype laser HUD could help you drive home, connected to an Android smartphone (video)
Another year, another attempt to project light onto transparent screens, but Pioneer's Network Vision HUD is one of the cooler prototype heads-up displays we've seen. First off, it uses lasers to generate its ethereal navigation images -- lasers make everything better -- and second, it's presently sourcing that data from a Android smartphone, making it a fantastic potential addition to infotainment ideas like Nokia's Terminal Mode. Pioneer told Network World that it's planning to actually sell a version of the technology by 2012, but that it might be an aftermarket product rather than an integral part of your car's windshield. They are, of course, entertaining deep-pocketed auto manufacturers as well.
Recon-Zeal Transcend goggles now shipping, GPS and head-mounted display included
Don't you just love it when a plan comes together? If you'll recall, we heard that Recon Instruments was fixing to up-end the winter sports goggle market in February of this year, with an optimistic-at-the-time ship date of October 2010. Lo and behold, the outfit has managed to nail its estimate, and the planet's first GPS-enabled goggles are now available to highfalutin' skiers and snowboarders. At least initially, the company will be rolling out a limited set, with two models to choose from: the $499 Transcend SPPX is fitted with an SPPX polarized and photochromic lens, while the $399 Transcend SPX features an SPX polarized lens. Aside from the fact that these probably cost less than those ho hum Oakleys in the ski shop, they're equipped with a Zeal Optics' frame design with a micro LCD display, which appears to hang approximately six feet in front of the user. That head-mounted display provides real-time feedback to the wearer, including speed, latitude / longitude, altitude, vertical distance traveled, total distance traveled, a chrono / stopwatch mode, a run-counter, temperature and time. Yeah, wow. You can bet we'll be trying to snag a set for review when we do our best impression of "hitting the slopes" post-CES. %Gallery-104018%
The Road to Mordor: Pippin's top five plugins
This past week in LotRO's been a bit like riding river rapids: There's been a lot of rapid ups-and-downs, violent lurches to avoid dangerous objects, and a whole lot of noise that's drowning out the calmer waters ahead. For every piece of good news and positive word-of-mouth, there's been a lot of unfortunate bumps, such as server queues, dynamic layers, mouthy trolls and Codemaster's launch delay. However, I believe it's all going to settle down in a couple more weeks, and LotRO will emerge the better for it. So if this is your first week in Lord of the Rings Online, welcome! Find a great kinship, take time to smell the flowers, and hunt some orc for me. Today I'd like to take a look at one of the unsung heroes of the recent content patch -- the ability to create and use plugins (also called mods and addons) to enhance your user interface. While the system is still in beta and has a rough-around-the-edges feel to it, it's already shown great potential, particularly though the creativity that mod designers are pouring into it. While there are only a small number of plugins available as of right now and Turbine has yet to expand the scope of these Lua scripts beyond constrained limits, it's not too early to beef up your UI with these spiffy additions. Read on, free peoples of Middle-internet!
iPhone app enables augmented driving, at your own risk
Let me preface this post by saying that I'm an old fuddy duddy. imaGinyze (US$2.99) is an iPhone app that provides an augmented reality Heads Up Display (HUD) for drivers on the road. When mounted to a windshield, it monitors incoming video information and produces overlays for roads, traffic, signs and more. An electronic voice announces lane changes, your proximity to other vehicles and other such distracting information. I've been using alternative car- and lane-detection hardware units for decades, but they're called my eyes. Perhaps there's an obvious application for this app that I'm missing (smarter cars, enhanced night driving or what have you), and if so, please fill me in. But for now, I can't help but think it'd be a distraction while driving, and a dangerous one at that. Even Luke understands -- sometimes you just have to put the hardware away and use the Force. [Via Gizmag]
Turbine expands on LotRO's Lua scripting
Ever since hearing the news that Turbine will allow players to create mods for Lord of the Rings Online using the Lua programming language, the community's been abuzz about what this means for LotRO -- good and bad. Would this allow for the creation of game unbalancing add-ons, or perhaps the rise of a LotRO edition of WoW's controversial GearScore? Or does Turbine have a specific vision in mind for the scope of mods? Yesterday on the LotRO forums, Narrel, Turbine's Games Systems Engineer, posted a clarifying note about why the company chose to implement this and where it plans to go with it. The devs' main priority with Lua scripting was to empower players to tweak and modify the user interface more to their liking, as the default UI cannot be all things for all folks. While it is going to prohibit mods from botting or macros, Turbine will open the field for players to work with the inventory layout, information that the HUD displays, quickslot bars, target info, fellowship info and raid vitals. "We are very excited about this feature," Narrel said, "and look forward to the day when it goes live allowing players to have a much more customizable experience with our graphical interface."