HoloLens at Build 2015

[AFransella]

Open thread to get thoughts and reactions. As a content and UX designer my mind is racing. My primary concern is whether it's useful for text or not, due to screen resolution. All in all they've pulled off a major coup imo. If someone with more posts wants to link to the video feel free.

 

[Giddora]

Open thread to get thoughts and reactions. As a content and UX designer my mind is racing. My primary concern is whether it's useful for text or not, due to screen resolution. All in all they've pulled off a major coup imo. If someone with more posts wants to link to the video feel free.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8t3dNIl0AeU

Unfortunately it is on Y*utube... But it's something.

 

[Motor_Mouth]

I am hugely sceptical of what we see here. What we see on the screen looks to have been composited over the video feed differently to the way it would work through HoloLens. Unless they have some method of blocking incoming light on a pixel-by-pixel basis, nothing you see will ever be darker than what's behind it because HoloLens will simply be adding light to what's in front of you. So where we see solid, full spectrum colour in the video, I think you will see washed-out, translucent objects in reality.

It will always work best in darker environments, which is pretty much what we saw in the journalist demos in January, where both the living room game and light switch demos seemed to have been in pretty dark spaces. I'm sure it will still work outdoors, partly because of the tinted outer lens, but only for some things e.g. I doubt anyone will be walking down the street or sitting on the bus watching Game Of Thrones.

Here's an example. On the left you see a normal composite of a photo of my old car on the starboard side of the dinette. On the right is the same image but using Add mode to sum the values of the pixels of foreground and background, which is how HoloLens will work. It's not terrible in this situation but it's nothing like what they showed at this presentation, either.



Don't get me wrong, none of this dampens my enthusiasm for HoloLens one bit. I'll still be first in line for one, no matter how much they cost, I just think everyone needs to keep their expectations reasonable.

 

[onlysublime]

It cannot be a composite. Compositing only works well with 2D objects (like your car photo example) and even then, it's noticeable. You will notice in the demos that there is movement around the object. So to fake it, you would need someone in some distant place mimicking movement.

Also, the HoloLens is not a typical screen like a monitor display and does not work in the same manner. If you read articles about Magic Leap, they talk about the same things and it's believed that Microsoft and Magic Leap are using similar technologies:

"The solution he and Macnamara and the rest of Magic Leap’s team have come up with is still largely under wraps, and on the record they avoid discussing how the technology works except in vague terms, citing concerns about competition. But it’s safe to say Magic Leap has a tiny projector that shines light onto a transparent lens, which deflects the light onto the retina. That pattern of light blends in so well with the light you’re receiving from the real world that to your visual cortex, artificial objects are nearly indistinguishable from actual objects."

 

[Motor_Mouth]

Whenever you take one image and overlay it over another, like the output of a camera and the output of a HoloLens, what you are doing is creating a composite and you can do it any number of ways you like, even live. Both the images above are composites, they just use different mathematical formulae to create the overlay, and either could very, very easily be done in realtime, just like sports scores and news tickers on TV.

 

[dirtyvu]

All the reports have disproved what you're writing. The images at the show were fully solid and vivid according to numerous reports. And sports scores and tickers are 2D

 

[Motor_Mouth]

It is all 2D, in that it is projected onto a screen. The appearance of 3D is a simple illusion, created by knowing where you are looking and where you are looking from. If you covered up the sensors on the HoloLens, the illusion would be instantly broken. As for the reports, I am yet to read any from using HoloLens in daylight. The environments in which the demos have been shown have all been carefully controlled. i.e. dark(ish) rooms where it will work best.

All that said, I have since had an idea about how they might actually be doing it properly, which is the subject of a separate thread I started the other day.

 

[dirtyvu]

You basically said they faked the demo which was proven to be legit. You said the objects would be translucent. No reports have indicated anything you said.

 

[Motor_Mouth]

Are you serious? I've read report after report saying you can see through ALL the holograms. In fact, I've not read a single article that says you cannot. All that varies is how much or how little they find that a disappointment. If you can find something that says the holograms are 100% opaque, I'd be interested in reading it.