Augmented Reality Future Trends: Hardware
With so many augmented reality devices still in development mode, it can be hard to look forward to future devices. The near future augmented reality devices are often just current generation devices that haven’t been released yet. Let’s take a look at what you can expect to see in the near future for augmented reality devices.
Augmented Reality: Display Screens
It’s worth noting a number of upcoming smart glasses but they may not fall into our strict definition of AR (which is moving more towards mixed reality executions).
Intel’s recently announced Vaunt glasses fall into this category. Vaunt offers an intriguing look at a potential future where augmented reality glasses could look like glasses instead of a bulky headset. Vaunt displays unobtrusive information to the user in a form factor that is nearly indistinguishable from regular glasses. What doesn’t seem to be just an augmented reality headset similar to the HoloLens or the Meta 2.
Vaunt currently offers head-information without the environment-sensing capabilities or high-resolution 3D rendering of current augmented reality headsets. Rather than focusing on photo-realistic projection, Vaunt wants to provide the type of information (such as notifications) that is most useful to you in the simplest form factor possible. Similar to the simple notifications you receive on your phone for an incoming call or text message, these notifications will appear at the edge of your vision inside the glasses. You can then view or dismiss messages with a glance.
This type of implementation is similar to the type of information that appeared on users’ original Google Glass. It will be interesting to see if this is the type of information that is most useful to users, as opposed to the full environment sensing capabilities of augmented reality devices.
Interestingly, Vaunt is currently powered by your mobile device (Android or iPhone) via Bluetooth, pushing heavy computations to your phone. This undoubtedly helps facilitate the device’s small hardware footprint, and may be an indication of things to come for future generations of augmented reality headsets.
Augmented Reality Devices
To see where the augmented reality headsets will be focused next, look at where companies seem to be paying attention. Hong Kong-based Realmax presented a prototype of a device at CES 2018 that closely aligns with the current generation of augmented reality headsets but with a 100-degree field of view. This would exceed the field of view of almost all augmented reality devices currently available.
Technology company Avegant is working on a “planar multifocal approach” to solve one of the current challenges of augmented reality: the replication of human depth perception and how our eyes shift focus between near and far objects. These two companies outline the areas the next generation of AR headsets will focus on: a larger field of view and ways to better replicate depth in AR headsets.
Augmented reality also exists and will only exist outside of the headset. Companies like WayRay have offered their own take on augmented reality experiences in various form factors. The WayRay True AR Navigation System is a 3D windshield augmented reality product designed to be installed directly into your windshield by the manufacturer. In the near future, your new car purchase may include a built-in augmented reality R windshield to provide you with locations, directions, speed and any other information that may be relevant to your trip.
Perhaps the biggest elephant in the AR hardware room of the near future is Apple and its future intentions for AR. Rumors have long been circulating about the company developing an augmented reality headset, and CEO Tim Cook has made no secret of Apple’s interest in augmented reality technology. During the Utah Tech Tour, he praised augmented reality and claimed that using augmented reality would be as popular as “eating three meals a day”.
He also noted that augmented reality has a long way to go: “Augmented reality is going to take a while, because there are some really tough technological challenges out there. But it’s going to happen, and it’s going to happen in a big way, and when it happens, we’ll wonder how we lived without it. We also wonder how we lived without our phone today.” . Apple has also filed several patents in the areas of virtual/augmented reality for items such as the optical system for a head-mounted display. But no one knows for sure except the employees at Apple Apple’s unannounced plans in the virtual/augmented reality space.
Like most things in emerging tech fields, just about everything has to be treated with a pinch of salt to get into the hands of consumers. Companies like Apple often file patents to cover their bases. Many things can happen between product rumors and the actual product release to change the trajectory of hardware development. The best way to deal with the upcoming developments is to stay updated with the news regarding the development cycles of these devices while considering each one with a dose of skepticism until the device reaches the consumers.