shapard@manta.nosc.mil (Thomas D. Shapard) (02/07/90)
n a previous posting I asked: >> What is the state of art in head mounted visual displays, >> eyephones? ... I got several direct email replys concerning 'Private Eye' by Reflection Technology, Waltham MA. It sounds like an interesting device with a lot of growth potential as well as near term application possibilities. In particular Francis Taylor <narf@media-lab.media.mit.edu> of Reflection Technolgy is sending me an info packet on it via snail-mail, and I suspect would do the same for other interested folks. Michael B. Johnson <wave@media-lab.media.mit.edu> (not connected with Reflection Technology except by knowing someone there) has seen the device and has "only good things to say about it": supplies their address: Reflection Technology 240 Bear Hill Road Waltham, MA 02154 (617) 890-5905 from Jordan B Pollack <pollack@cis.ohio-state.edu> >...Saw this announcement in 11/28/89 PC Mag: >CGA-compatable Private Eye starter kit, $495 >Reflection Technology, 617 890 5905 > >I just hope they are made illegal to drive with >before they become too common..Cellular phones >have really upped the swerve rate... Good point Jordan, on the other hand think of the possibilities for enchanced driving safety by superimposing traffic warning, collision avoidance, dashboard displays, etc. on the driver's vision. Still, you don't want people watching ball games while at the wheel. pkenny@ads.com (Patrick Kenny) posted a reply: > There here! Radio Electrioncs (Feb 1990,P.43) has an article about the >'Display of the future'. [and he posted lot's of data from the article] I got the article and it is very good - thanks Patrick. It mentions two specific companies incorporating P-Eye in a product: Cyberspace of Norcross, ,Y (a pocket video fax!). he continues: > I think we need more than just an eyepiece. There are alot more ways to >display information than a screen. YOU think of the ways, Exercise #1. >I have already thought of them myself. Okay, I'll bite. The essential human interface to v-w, IMHO is sensory input (of all kinds). In the case of vision, the most direct path would be direct stimulation of the optic nerve bundle, and I expect someday we'll know how to do that. Until then we have to go in via the eyes with actual light stimulation. This implies a virtual image, ideally 3D, color, animation. Virtual screens (which is aparently what Private Eye makes you appear to see) are ONE way of presenting information (broadly defined) to the human. But ultimately ANYTHING we can see real-world can be seen virtual-world, plus at lot more that would be physically hard, or impossible, to contrive in real-world. Screen displays are a case of the medium constraining what can be shown. and teir limitations. Virtual screens are one step to reducing those limitations, thus broadening what we can present to the eye. Still the concept of a 'screen' is an artificial constraint -- we don't see the r-world as a series of screens! Ultimately v-world vision should have *fewer* limitations on what we can 'see' than are found in r-world. Tom Shapard shapard@nosc.mil