[Wear-Hard] Perhaps a cheaper HMD

[Imagesys33 at aol.com]

In a message dated 9/7/07 3:26:22 PM, tonyh at tekgear.com writes:


>  > Certainly QVGA, on which a simple clock face looks ragged, can only be 
> useful as a speedometer or heart rate monitor. As a video display it is rated 
> "suck". 
>   
>  Oliver, being one of the Grandfathers of HMDs, you should remember a time 
> where QVGA was considered high res.  You were still making good products with 
> what would be considered "low res" today. What's changed other than the 
> availability of better, higher resolution displays?
> 
>           Tony - the adjective "suck-o" was said of QVGA, on day one.   
Private Eye (720X280) looked comparatively good, though only in red.   Looked 
especially attractive at 2.25 oz and $795. It was a beautiful 25-line 
alphanumeric display, but as a graphic display it...sucked. 
Now Microvision has increased the horizontal resolution by 80% -- for only 
ten times the price -- and it is quite good for graphic images.

QVGA was good for getting first-time people excited about the potential for 
HMDs, back when.   And is still good for simple alphanumerics at work and toys 
at home.

I made VGA HMDs and they had to be squeezed in FOV to avoid the jaggies.   
SVGA let me deliver 40° FOV where individual pixels could only be seen if you 
really squinted.

As soon as I get these projects off my plate, I'll be back with the Final 
Solution™.....
A fully integrated wearable office.

> > SVGA gives a good enough image and will likely be the one that Makes It 
> Big... if ever people integrate enough useful functions to make a HMD worth 
> wearing in the mass market. 
>  > Say 40° diagonal FOV:  any less feels like tunnel vision;  any more just 
> can't be eye-scanned without muscle strain... and the optics becomes 
> cost-impractical.  
>  > That's why a million night vision goggles have 40° FOV. 
>  >
>  > Say the eye's resolution  limit at these modest light levels is about 
> half of the ultimate eye resolution... oh, about  2.4 arcsec.  = 1/1000 of 40°. 
>  >
>  >So there is no (zero, nada) value in ever putting better than a 600x800 
> display in a 40° FOV HMD. 
>  >
>  >For anything less than SVGA -- either scale down the FOV to tunnel vision, 
> or learn to love jaggies. 
>   
>  You have it right - consumer acceptability is going to be about the optics 
> and not the resolution of the panel - we've reached the apex of panel 
> resolution.   New and innovative optics will give the industrial designers something 
> to work with to design an appealing product.  The panel really has not much 
> to do with the consumer acceptance of a product.  No panel can compensate for 
> bad optics - yet.
>   
>  -Tony
>   Yeah;   one has to assume that the designer will make   the optics low 
> aberration and distortion free. 
> 
> I still don't know how to make them less ugly than Jordi glasses.   40° FOV 
> on a 1/2" square display is an unavoidable 21 mm back focal length.   
> Something remains to be invented.
> 
> Oliver 



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