Hands-On: Meta Orion Augmented Reality Glasses!
Summary
TLDRMeta's ambitious Orion augmented reality (AR) glasses are hailed as the most advanced personal technology device yet. With a staggering production cost of $10,000 per unit, Orion features groundbreaking technology that combines an optical display capable of projecting holograms across a wide field and an intuitive input system that responds to neural signals. These AR glasses are still at the prototype stage, with only a thousand units made for internal development. Meta's Chief Technology Officer, BOS, expresses excitement over the potential of Orion, indicating that it represents technology that could one day replace the smartphone by merging AR functionality with AI capabilities. The glasses utilize innovative technologies such as micro LEDs, silicon carbide waveguides, and neural interfaces to create an immersive and highly functional AR experience. However, due to current production challenges, Orion remains a developmental concept, with further iterations needed to hit the consumer market.
Takeaways
- 👓 Orion is Meta's latest AR glasses prototype, claimed to be highly advanced technology.
- 💲 Each Orion prototype costs approximately $10,000 to make.
- 🧠 The device features a groundbreaking neural interface for mind-like control.
- 📊 It uses innovative waveguide technology for its display, enhancing AR experiences.
- 🔬 Silicon carbide is used for its high refractive index, aiding in display mechanics.
- 🤖 AI plays a crucial role in enhancing user interaction with the device.
- 📱 Meta sees potential in Orion to eventually replace smartphones.
- 🔍 The glasses are loaded with sensors for precise world perception and interaction.
- 🚫 Orion is not yet available for consumers, aimed at internal development.
- 🔮 The technology in Orion draws parallels with science fiction possibilities.
Timeline
- 00:00:00 - 00:05:00
Orion Meta's augmented reality glasses are dubbed as the most advanced personal technology by Meta, taking years and millions in R&D. Each prototype is costly at about $10,000, made for internal development only. It features an optical display that shows holograms everywhere and an input system reading user intentions, described as a 'time machine'.
- 00:05:00 - 00:10:00
BOS, Meta's CTO, discusses Orion, stating it was intended as a product with a 10% chance of success. Pioneering over ten new technologies, it's now fully functional but not cost-effective for consumer release. The glasses are recognized for having an operating system, being internet-connected, and aiding in software intuition development.
- 00:10:00 - 00:15:00
The glasses have micro-LED projectors and are described as having super high clarity using silicon carbide with a high refractive index for the wave guides, reducing visual artifacts. The custom technology allows for lightweight, rigid structure necessary for optical element precision and future design improvements.
- 00:15:00 - 00:20:00
The Orion system includes a compute puck and relies on custom silicon to minimize power while enhancing battery life. Features include unique radio protocols for power efficiency in thermal management, and world-sensing via sensors and cameras. A fundamental leap towards phone replacement ambition shows in the software experiences enhancing personal technology utility.
- 00:20:00 - 00:25:00
AI integration has accelerated, allowing Orion to offer substantial value as a personal assistant device with contextual awareness beyond typical phone use. Orion was initially conceptualized to prioritize hologram technology, however, AI's advancement now presents new interactive possibilities and contextual utilities.
- 00:25:00 - 00:30:00
With AI and AR capabilities, Orion aims to expand its utility dramatically by enhancing user interaction with the environment. Future prospects include world-locked content sharing, advanced interaction capabilities, and intelligent data retrieval, e.g., remembering where items were left, hinting at its potential role as a memory aid.
- 00:30:00 - 00:35:00
Orion's optical innovations include silicon carbide wave guides for a wider field of view and miniaturization, despite high manufacturing costs. There's a trade-off between current limitations and achieving everyday usability. Future iterations are expected to decrease thickness and increase resolution and immersion.
- 00:35:00 - 00:40:00
The system's EMG wristbands offer innovative input through subtle gestures, complementing the glasses' hand tracking, allowing interaction even when hands are not visible. Orion supports unique experiences with multimodal input, promising an efficient and intuitive user interface without substantial physical effort.
- 00:40:00 - 00:45:00
The demo highlighted Orion's capabilities with seamless interactions, real-time world overlay, potent AI interaction experience, and potential for significant user engagement via social and individual applications. The future improvements are targeted towards a higher resolution, better physical integration, and more affordable consumer configuration.
- 00:45:00 - 00:53:18
Despite the high production cost of silicon carbide elements, Orion aims for ultimate utility beyond current devices. Meta envisions Orion not as another gadget but as a device potentially replacing phones, suggesting a high consumer price point but promising a transformative personal computing experience.
Mind Map
Video Q&A
What is Orion's main feature?
Orion AR glasses feature a holographic display and mind-reading input system.
How much does each Orion prototype cost?
Each Orion prototype costs around $10,000 to produce.
Who developed the Orion AR glasses?
Meta developed the Orion AR glasses.
How many Orion prototypes exist?
There are only around a thousand Orion prototypes.
What makes Orion unique?
Orion's advanced holographic technology and neural input system set it apart.
Can the Orion replace a smartphone?
Meta envisions the Orion as a potential successor to the smartphone.
What technology is used in Orion's display?
The display uses waveguide technology with a high refractive index.
What is the primary use case of Orion?
Orion is primarily focused on augmented reality applications.
Is Orion available for consumer purchase?
No, Orion is not currently available for consumer purchase.
What role does AI play in Orion?
AI aids in world perception and user interaction with the Orion glasses.
View more video summaries
I talked to Ubisoft Devs, it's far worse than we thought
History of the Church (1st-5th Century) - Full-length Documentary | Church History
Gaming/Productive Laptops For Every Budget To Buy During This Flipkart & Amazon Sale
When Antibiotics Don't Work (full documentary) | FRONTLINE
Introduction
What is Risk?
- 00:00:01this is Orion meta's augmented reality
- 00:00:04glasses prototype that they consider the
- 00:00:06most advanced piece of personal
- 00:00:09technology ever created it's taken them
- 00:00:12years and countless millions in R&D to
- 00:00:15get to this point a 98 G pair of glasses
- 00:00:18with an optical display system that can
- 00:00:20put Holograms almost everywhere your
- 00:00:23eyes can look and an input system that
- 00:00:25seemingly reads your mind the catch each
- 00:00:29Orion prototype costs about $10,000 to
- 00:00:32make and meta is only making about a
- 00:00:34thousand of them for internal
- 00:00:35development it's a kind of device that
- 00:00:37they call a time machine and we're one
- 00:00:40of the few people at this year's connect
- 00:00:42conference to go Hands-On with one to
- 00:00:45dive deep into how Orion Works what it's
- 00:00:47like to use them and what this time
- 00:00:50machine reveals about the future of
- 00:00:51augmented reality let's start with a
- 00:00:54conversation I had with BOS meta's Chief
- 00:00:57technology officer okay BOS we're here
- 00:00:59to talk about um Orion or is it project
- 00:01:02Orion Orion Orion we're calling it Orion
- 00:01:05Orion um in conversations with you know
- 00:01:08some of the teams here like displays
- 00:01:09research team I know you guys sometimes
- 00:01:11create products that you think of as
- 00:01:13time machines right where it's like put
- 00:01:15the the best and regardless of cost um
- 00:01:18just to see what it would be like if
- 00:01:21your your team and researchers and
- 00:01:22developers is this representative of
- 00:01:24what you would call like a time machine
- 00:01:25yeah this this is an incredible piece of
- 00:01:27work when we started this Pro program we
- 00:01:29had hoped it would would be a product um
- 00:01:32that we could ship um but we gave
- 00:01:34ourselves only this is even 5 years ago
- 00:01:37uh we gave ourselves only a 10% chance
- 00:01:39of being able to build one we just we
- 00:01:40really had so many uh new technologies
- 00:01:43that we were pioneering at least seven
- 00:01:45probably really I would say 10
- 00:01:46technologies that had never been done
- 00:01:48before yeah so we really weren't sure if
- 00:01:50it could even be built at all and so the
- 00:01:52product was this idea of it being a
- 00:01:53product was our goal we weren't sure if
- 00:01:55we'd get there well we ended up building
- 00:01:56we ended up building not just one we
- 00:01:58ended up building uh you know quite a
- 00:01:59few them uh they work they're
- 00:02:01spectacular we are like Overjoyed with
- 00:02:04with the devices uh ended up not being
- 00:02:06cost effective as a product and so yeah
- 00:02:08it does stand as a time machine but a
- 00:02:10lot of times when when we talk about
- 00:02:11time machines we're talking about um you
- 00:02:13know the version of this it's a time
- 00:02:14machine would be on a bench you know the
- 00:02:16size of of this room plug into all kinds
- 00:02:19of of Power with with lasers is so so
- 00:02:22this is something different this is
- 00:02:23we're going to call this a prototype and
- 00:02:25what's important for us is this is a
- 00:02:26fully working it's got It's got an
- 00:02:27operating system it's it's live uh it's
- 00:02:30Internet connected and we now have a
- 00:02:33device that's allows us to develop
- 00:02:35software um and develop an intuition
- 00:02:38around what software experiences will be
- 00:02:39great for what we believe is the type of
- 00:02:42device that will replace the phone
- 00:02:44someday um and yeah it's it's hard to
- 00:02:47describe the emotion I went through the
- 00:02:49first time I tried it on when the
- 00:02:50software was running it was a few months
- 00:02:52ago and uh the team came in and the team
- 00:02:55is very nervous to show this to me
- 00:02:56because it's been obviously five years
- 00:02:58and who knows how much money in the
- 00:02:59making and we are uh so they're they're
- 00:03:02just apologizing for everything they're
- 00:03:04just oh you know I know that that that
- 00:03:06pixel's a little rough and we'll get the
- 00:03:07color uniformity right meanwhile I'm
- 00:03:09having one of the greatest experiences
- 00:03:11of my professional career what was about
- 00:03:13it that that experience that so
- 00:03:14different than previous you've got a
- 00:03:17it's a full color wide field of view
- 00:03:19display that's responding to neural
- 00:03:22interfaces uh you know that you're
- 00:03:24sending through your wrist yeah um and
- 00:03:26it's it was very responsive and you're
- 00:03:28looking at videos and you're doing video
- 00:03:29calls and it's spectacular it's just
- 00:03:31spectacular just you feel like it's a
- 00:03:34sense of of real Wonder um and so you
- 00:03:37know but of course the team has been in
- 00:03:38it for all this time they just they see
- 00:03:39all the problems it was such an early
- 00:03:41demo that they were they had this the
- 00:03:43compute was they kept replacing a cold
- 00:03:46soda they kept putting new cold sodas on
- 00:03:47the compute because they had they hadn't
- 00:03:49even done the work yet on the thermal so
- 00:03:51they were just trying to cool it down
- 00:03:52with cold sodas but it was just it was a
- 00:03:54glimpse and and even just in the last
- 00:03:56couple of months since I did that demo
- 00:03:58it's now gotten to this point where it's
- 00:04:00it's a fully functioning system you
- 00:04:01could use it you can walk around you can
- 00:04:02spend you know it's got two-hour battery
- 00:04:04life you're walking you can spend time
- 00:04:05in meetings you're able to have a really
- 00:04:07rich um computer available to you
- 00:04:10without taking anything out of your of
- 00:04:11your pocket without losing the context
- 00:04:13of where you are in the world without
- 00:04:15breaking eye contact with someone that
- 00:04:16you're talking to um it's it's
- 00:04:18spectacular and bring new context oh
- 00:04:20absolutely absolutely talk about some of
- 00:04:21those Technologies you said you know
- 00:04:23seven have time to you all of them but
- 00:04:25obviously the display systems a big part
- 00:04:27of it the displays a really really
- 00:04:28important when I have a very fun clear
- 00:04:30demo here and so you've got microed
- 00:04:32projectors which are putting out
- 00:04:34tremendous brightness hugely efficient
- 00:04:37micro LEDs um you know all three colors
- 00:04:39RGB um they're putting out you know
- 00:04:42hundreds of thousands of knits um but of
- 00:04:44course to have a really big eye box so
- 00:04:46you don't have to have this thing where
- 00:04:47you can move the glasses on your face
- 00:04:48and you can still see the image you're
- 00:04:49doing people replication so you're
- 00:04:50shooting those uh photons in lots of
- 00:04:52different places towards the eye um and
- 00:04:55so you're it's a big discount and then
- 00:04:57of course there's inefficiency and
- 00:04:58there's just loss as photons escape the
- 00:05:00substance um and so you've got these
- 00:05:02tiny projector which we completely
- 00:05:04invented ourselves including
- 00:05:06manufacturing the micro LEDs ourselves
- 00:05:08you're shooting it back towards the the
- 00:05:11wave guide the wave guide itself is is
- 00:05:13nano etched into silicon carbide which
- 00:05:15is a a novel material with a super high
- 00:05:17index of refraction which allows us to
- 00:05:19minimize the Lost photons and minimize
- 00:05:21the number of photons we capture from
- 00:05:22the world so it minimizes things like
- 00:05:24ghosting and Haze and rainbow all these
- 00:05:26artifacts while giving you that field of
- 00:05:28view that you want well it's not
- 00:05:29artifact free it's very close to
- 00:05:31artifact free like you you'll get your
- 00:05:32own experience and you you actually it's
- 00:05:33like it's amazing the the optical
- 00:05:36Clarity the see-through Clarity of these
- 00:05:38is really really high um and the image
- 00:05:41is super wide field of view full color
- 00:05:43um and it's it's tremendous so you've
- 00:05:45got these two systems alone working
- 00:05:47together were an immense amount of of
- 00:05:50investment and cost each of them
- 00:05:51requiring two or three different new
- 00:05:54technologies to come to Bear keep in
- 00:05:55mind like red blue and green just
- 00:05:56getting uh red micro EDS is hard because
- 00:05:59it's a very long wavelength to generate
- 00:06:00such a small space right um and then
- 00:06:03silicon carbide manufacturing it and
- 00:06:05growing the crystals large enough and
- 00:06:06and machining it is tremendously
- 00:06:08difficult um and then you have to mount
- 00:06:10this whole thing on on magnesium rigid
- 00:06:12magnesium frame it's lightweight good
- 00:06:14thermal properties because you don't
- 00:06:15have much thermal dissipation space here
- 00:06:16such a small device it looks P um and
- 00:06:19and it's also rigid because right now we
- 00:06:21don't have disparity so you don't want
- 00:06:22to you want to minimize any deflection
- 00:06:23between the optical elements to keep the
- 00:06:25binocular image looking correct in your
- 00:06:27field of view um and these are all
- 00:06:29things that we already have plans to
- 00:06:31improve for the next version so you get
- 00:06:32to this version one and you figure out
- 00:06:34oh we can actually figure out how to do
- 00:06:36disparity correction oh we can actually
- 00:06:37figure out how to put the projector from
- 00:06:38behind we can actually make this thing
- 00:06:40thinner um and so this thing has uh you
- 00:06:43know we have between the system between
- 00:06:45this and the stage that powers it this
- 00:06:47this Puck um you know more than 10
- 00:06:49pieces of custom silicon which have
- 00:06:51miniaturized uh our routines taking them
- 00:06:53from on for example the quest system
- 00:06:56where they might be you know the quest
- 00:06:58has relatively generous envelope
- 00:07:00compared to to these glasses um taking
- 00:07:02them from thousands of mwatts down to
- 00:07:04hundreds of mwatts or in some cases
- 00:07:05dozens of Mills um to have this long
- 00:07:08battery life the the radio protocol
- 00:07:10completely custom radio protocol so that
- 00:07:12you're sending information over in
- 00:07:14bursts to minimize sustained usage of
- 00:07:16the radio again for thermal reasons not
- 00:07:18for power reasons as much as thermal
- 00:07:20reasons which is important for um yeah
- 00:07:22Ai and and continuously perceiving the
- 00:07:24world to give you absolutely cont uh the
- 00:07:27sensors you've got all these tiny
- 00:07:29cameras built in it's actually almost
- 00:07:30easier to see on this one where the
- 00:07:32cameras are you know there seven
- 00:07:33different cameras embedded in the frame
- 00:07:35that are doing the world sensing the the
- 00:07:37the camera sensors are custom sensors um
- 00:07:39you know you need to have super high
- 00:07:41dynamic range you need to have certain
- 00:07:42properties in terms of your ability to
- 00:07:43to pick from the scene what you care
- 00:07:45about and focus on that um so and then
- 00:07:49of course there's quite a few things
- 00:07:50that are shared between this system and
- 00:07:52our Quest systems so the hand tracking
- 00:07:53the eye tracking um spatial audio um and
- 00:07:57those pieces kind of jointly effort but
- 00:07:59of course doing the hand trkking in this
- 00:08:00kind of a form factor is tough and then
- 00:08:02of course at the end of all that you
- 00:08:03still got the novel interface right you
- 00:08:05made an investment in control ABS you're
- 00:08:07not going to walk around in the world
- 00:08:08with controllers um and you can you're
- 00:08:11want to walk around with with your hands
- 00:08:12but you're not going to walk around with
- 00:08:13your hands out here doing this um and so
- 00:08:16and you might even want to be able to
- 00:08:17control the system with your hands in
- 00:08:18your pocket or obscured U and so we've
- 00:08:21got these neural interfaces which are
- 00:08:22just getting started but it's a you know
- 00:08:24this when we started you've seen you've
- 00:08:25seen the control Labs demos this didn't
- 00:08:28used to be this small
- 00:08:30let alone that's attractive um and it's
- 00:08:31so comfortable we've been doing these
- 00:08:32demos a couple weeks now and uh people
- 00:08:34keep walking out of the room not realiz
- 00:08:36they don't even realize they're wearing
- 00:08:37it anymore um and so and then to do so
- 00:08:40you're getting all these these new
- 00:08:41technologies and then you're trying to
- 00:08:42pack it into an under 100 grams you know
- 00:08:45a 98 gram uh device that's comfortable
- 00:08:48enough that you would be willing to wear
- 00:08:49it for its 2-hour battery life um and
- 00:08:51hopefully attractive enough that you
- 00:08:53feel like yeah you could be taken
- 00:08:54seriously wearing these glasses that's
- 00:08:56important um and so you know and so we
- 00:08:59just felt you when you look at that you
- 00:09:01know 5 years AG you can imagine you're
- 00:09:02just thinking man if any one of these
- 00:09:04things is a swing and a miss this whole
- 00:09:06system doesn't come together um and so
- 00:09:08yeah that was the emot you know I have
- 00:09:10all that weight coming into my first
- 00:09:11demo with it and I'm feeling that
- 00:09:13emotion of all that investment and all
- 00:09:14that risk um and the execution that it
- 00:09:16took to get to this point and at this
- 00:09:18point you know and then developers can
- 00:09:19start figuring out what are the best use
- 00:09:20cases but you got this idea that
- 00:09:22eventually you want this to replace the
- 00:09:24phones so the things that people are
- 00:09:25doing on the phone or at least you know
- 00:09:26the media and the type of interactions
- 00:09:29uh but it's also AR can do more than
- 00:09:32what a phone can do so you know what are
- 00:09:34the kind of dream scenarios ideally when
- 00:09:36a consumer version of this hits the
- 00:09:38marketplace why is what's the utility
- 00:09:40that this brings to an average person
- 00:09:42yeah the thing that we didn't anticipate
- 00:09:44five years ago which has changed
- 00:09:46obviously in the last two years is is AI
- 00:09:49so five years ago we certainly imagined
- 00:09:50yep all your 2D phone screen type use
- 00:09:52cases could be useful and then you can
- 00:09:53also have these Holograms in the world
- 00:09:56and they're they're World locked and
- 00:09:57they they're stable and they stay where
- 00:09:59they are
- 00:10:00and if we both had our glasses on we
- 00:10:01could mutually enjoy them explore them
- 00:10:03if it's a chess game we can Summit it
- 00:10:05into existence and we can play it um and
- 00:10:08that's all very cool and it can do those
- 00:10:09things uh in the meantime AI has come up
- 00:10:12and we always thought it would be
- 00:10:13Holograms first and AI would be later um
- 00:10:15and we we have the Holograms but AI is
- 00:10:17coming up fast and so I think a lot of
- 00:10:19the use cases that we'll use with this
- 00:10:20actually will be querying the world
- 00:10:22around you um you know querying uh your
- 00:10:25own day your own past where did I leave
- 00:10:27my keys without having to separately do
- 00:10:29anything to remind it to to remember
- 00:10:32where your keys were it just has you
- 00:10:34know the ability to keep track of these
- 00:10:35things by virtue of of processing what's
- 00:10:38going on as you go about the day um and
- 00:10:40so that probably is for me the phone use
- 00:10:43cases combined with an AI that unlike
- 00:10:46your phone has full context on what
- 00:10:49you've been seeing and hearing yeah
- 00:10:51right and and how much more helpful is
- 00:10:53that going to be as an assistant as you
- 00:10:55go about your life well also doing the
- 00:10:57the basic things that people expect the
- 00:10:58phone to do of course video calls seeing
- 00:11:00messaging video calls are delightful in
- 00:11:02this can I just tell you that it's such
- 00:11:03a funny thing and that's where you see
- 00:11:04some of our other Investments like in
- 00:11:05our investments in codak avatars super
- 00:11:07realistic avatars obviously when you're
- 00:11:09wearing these on your face you're not
- 00:11:10going to have a camera facing you and
- 00:11:13one of the real Delights is not taking a
- 00:11:14phone and holding it way out here this
- 00:11:16the muscles arms get tired you know I'm
- 00:11:18not that strong um and so we animate it
- 00:11:20by using um a codic avatar that you
- 00:11:23already created and then the person
- 00:11:25you're talking to you know it's it's it
- 00:11:27can fool them in the good cases like
- 00:11:28they they they will not necessarily
- 00:11:30immediately realize that they're not
- 00:11:31talking to a camera of you you you talk
- 00:11:34about fatigue and the idea that you know
- 00:11:35you want to make these frictionless is
- 00:11:37possible Right seamless as far as and
- 00:11:39these the the the wristbands here are
- 00:11:41part of that the fact that you can
- 00:11:43control them what are the kind of like
- 00:11:44what's the end state of of that because
- 00:11:47ml has allowed even basic gyro to to in
- 00:11:50infer tap gestures right that's right
- 00:11:52yeah IM usage on on the Apple watch and
- 00:11:55other watches is increasing popularity
- 00:11:57for some use cases I mean we're really
- 00:11:59just getting started with this thing so
- 00:12:00today you're making relatively small
- 00:12:02gestures and those gestures can be
- 00:12:03obscured from the the hand tracking of
- 00:12:06the glasses and you can they still
- 00:12:08registered that's very nice it's just
- 00:12:10the beginning um you know with this
- 00:12:12device for example we have working
- 00:12:13internally um like the ability to do
- 00:12:15handwriting um so you're like you're
- 00:12:16already wearing this on your dominant
- 00:12:18wrist you can do handwriting um as a as
- 00:12:20a as a silent text input and a very like
- 00:12:23um you know a Dem text input if you will
- 00:12:26it's a very so with this device we're
- 00:12:28only just tapping the beginning of it
- 00:12:29you know the ability today to use these
- 00:12:32gestures that are you know very small
- 00:12:35and maybe even out of view of the
- 00:12:37glasses is nice um but that's just the
- 00:12:39beginning you want the ceiling to be
- 00:12:40raised totally in the future you this is
- 00:12:42a device that can do handwrite detection
- 00:12:43so you can just handw write and you can
- 00:12:44do that handwriting very subtly uh and
- 00:12:47have it be text entry for the glasses
- 00:12:49that isn't this big dramatic you know
- 00:12:50you're talking out loud or you're using
- 00:12:52a keyboard in front of your face um and
- 00:12:54so we see a huge ceiling in uh the
- 00:12:57neural interfaces and as you work to
- 00:12:59make this you know smaller andin and
- 00:13:02it's amazing that you said you already
- 00:13:03have plans or ideas to get this to even
- 00:13:05more compact thinner more socially
- 00:13:08acceptable uh which of these
- 00:13:10Technologies make most sense to to
- 00:13:12distribute among the other products you
- 00:13:14know things like metay bands absolutely
- 00:13:16like what what would be the easiest or
- 00:13:18things that make the most sense yeah and
- 00:13:20this is where the the AI bridge I think
- 00:13:22is one of the really critical ones so
- 00:13:24you know when you're when you're
- 00:13:25building a device in a in a very phone
- 00:13:27Centric world the Rayband metag glasses
- 00:13:29are a wonderful device you know of
- 00:13:30course it's it's cameras it's audio it's
- 00:13:33it's really you know good-looking it's
- 00:13:35it's out of the way you don't have to
- 00:13:36take your phone of your pocket to get
- 00:13:37the image to get the video to take the
- 00:13:40call um as soon as you add AI now
- 00:13:42they've transformed into a completely
- 00:13:44different category now you can query the
- 00:13:45world around you with the Rayband metag
- 00:13:47glasses and you can do live translations
- 00:13:49with the Rayband metag glasses
- 00:13:50incredible um and that's just the
- 00:13:52beginning what if you now had a a simple
- 00:13:55small display well when you have a phone
- 00:13:57already a simple small display is an
- 00:13:59obviously my favorite thing to add
- 00:14:00because it's like yeah like you can kind
- 00:14:01of look if you need to but once you're
- 00:14:03asking AI questions and you get so
- 00:14:06annoyed with it reading you the answer
- 00:14:07back even if it's reading the answer
- 00:14:08back to you exactly the question you
- 00:14:10asked it's like just takes time yeah
- 00:14:12just read this read it to me in text
- 00:14:15binary binary yes or no so much faster
- 00:14:17in text um likewise I'm taking an image
- 00:14:19I want to share it is it good like I
- 00:14:21want to see it before I share it so AI
- 00:14:23feels like this bridge use case that
- 00:14:25makes um even smaller displays feel more
- 00:14:28valuable and then those can get richer
- 00:14:30and richer over time adding more and
- 00:14:31more value um and so while we are
- 00:14:34absolutely all you know full steam ahead
- 00:14:36on the next version of these um which
- 00:14:38you know we plan to have be a consumer
- 00:14:41product um we also are taking technology
- 00:14:44from this line and saying hey what what
- 00:14:46is a miniaturized version of this what's
- 00:14:48a version of this that we can take and
- 00:14:49and integrate into um our you know more
- 00:14:53affordable already existing very popular
- 00:14:55line of glasses doesn't somebody doesn't
- 00:14:57need to do everything that's right all
- 00:14:59these the AI glasses have changed our
- 00:15:01outlook on the entire category we were
- 00:15:03worried before that we would have to
- 00:15:04like it would be a big gap between
- 00:15:06things like the rayan metas and the
- 00:15:08Orion and now actually we see an entire
- 00:15:11spectrum of products in the space and
- 00:15:13along the quest ecosystem those are
- 00:15:15parallel tracks that you guys see not
- 00:15:17necessarily converging to a single
- 00:15:18product that's right and and they have a
- 00:15:20lot of relationships so certainly when
- 00:15:21you're doing slam Vio when you're doing
- 00:15:23some of the work on co-processors or
- 00:15:24custom silicon on wireless that work is
- 00:15:27shared between the two teams that's
- 00:15:28wonderful and there's a there's a big
- 00:15:29base of shared work um but there's also
- 00:15:32a lot of work that is very different and
- 00:15:34the thing that I think we always we're
- 00:15:36always very motivated by like who is the
- 00:15:37person whose life is better because this
- 00:15:39technology exists what are they trying
- 00:15:40to do that is now better um and I think
- 00:15:44the use cases for glasses and for um Mr
- 00:15:49headsets is very different even though
- 00:15:50they do things that look very similar if
- 00:15:52you write them down on paper like you
- 00:15:53can use similar words to describe them
- 00:15:54in practice they're very different I
- 00:15:56kind of liken it to the difference
- 00:15:57between like my phone and my laptop top
- 00:15:59M um like I love my phone I have it all
- 00:16:01the time sometimes like you're on your
- 00:16:03phone and you're like I'm writing an
- 00:16:04email you're like no this is a laptop
- 00:16:06email you're just like no like your
- 00:16:07workload like I need to like open
- 00:16:09multiple tabs in a browser I need to
- 00:16:10like be comparing things I need to like
- 00:16:12be doing research like I just need more
- 00:16:14real estate that's like a different job
- 00:16:15and I use a different device for that
- 00:16:17job I do sometimes make that analogy
- 00:16:19between AR and Mr um like they do some
- 00:16:22similar things and that's great we
- 00:16:24should make that as easily kind of
- 00:16:26transferable for the consumer as we can
- 00:16:28in terms of how it feels to do those
- 00:16:30things um but they also do some very
- 00:16:32different things the ability to be
- 00:16:33completely immersed in uh in a VR
- 00:16:35headset is a tremendously valuable asset
- 00:16:37it can be done no other way and you
- 00:16:39should build a device that's really
- 00:16:40really good at that um rather than
- 00:16:42trying to force everything into a
- 00:16:44convergence which I think is a false
- 00:16:45convergence yeah and last question you
- 00:16:46know the VR headsets you guys do a great
- 00:16:47job Connecting People seems to be a big
- 00:16:49mission statement for the company you
- 00:16:50know remotely as they are physically far
- 00:16:52apart imagine if these become more like
- 00:16:56distributed and more mainstream how are
- 00:16:58these connecting people if people are
- 00:17:00sitting across from each other or in a
- 00:17:01collocated space yeah it's for me it's
- 00:17:03two different parts of the story I think
- 00:17:05one of which is Imagine we're distant um
- 00:17:07and certainly these can do video calls
- 00:17:08and that can be very cool um and I can
- 00:17:10share with you what I'm seeing which can
- 00:17:12be kind of a cool thing we can do that
- 00:17:13today with the Rayband metas and you can
- 00:17:15get on a video call and share what
- 00:17:16you're seeing with the person you're
- 00:17:17talking
- 00:17:18to but a lot of this is also when I'm
- 00:17:21with you um am I on my phone because if
- 00:17:24I'm on my phone I am not with you like
- 00:17:26physically I may be here but like
- 00:17:27mentally I am some place I've gone deep
- 00:17:29into the device um whereas if I'm able
- 00:17:32to feel like no no I'm on top of my
- 00:17:34things um it's all here if I need it I
- 00:17:37hopefully am more physically present and
- 00:17:38connected with you um because I have
- 00:17:41this technology versus the the the
- 00:17:42technologies that we use today which are
- 00:17:45kind of famous for being not that like
- 00:17:47they're famous for being things that we
- 00:17:48kind of escape the present moment to get
- 00:17:49into um I'm sure this will be capable of
- 00:17:52both if it's the case that I would
- 00:17:53prefer I'm on a long car ride sure let
- 00:17:56me dive into my videos and get my
- 00:17:58content it's all fun fine um but one of
- 00:18:00the things we do hope is like these are
- 00:18:01technologies that don't just help people
- 00:18:03connect at a distance but also help them
- 00:18:05feel connected when they're together and
- 00:18:07even if they're wearing together there
- 00:18:08are features that will allow them to
- 00:18:10share the same content and see the same
- 00:18:12content I've gotten quite good we have
- 00:18:14we have quite a few fun social games
- 00:18:16that you play which when two players uh
- 00:18:18both have the Orion on you can play
- 00:18:20these kind of games together and uh two
- 00:18:22things are true one of which is um
- 00:18:25people on the outside you look kind of
- 00:18:26ridiculous because you are doing a thing
- 00:18:28that like they can't see the artifacts
- 00:18:31and the second thing which is more
- 00:18:32important is even given the first you
- 00:18:33don't care because you are fully engaged
- 00:18:35in a very cool shared experience um that
- 00:18:38you are experiencing as very much as
- 00:18:40real as anything um so I think there's
- 00:18:42um I think the world gets really fun
- 00:18:44when everyone has access to the
- 00:18:46Holograms can't wait yeah too so much
- 00:18:48cheers thank you so much yeah cheers all
- 00:18:50right let's dive into the nitty-gritty
- 00:18:52details of Ryan and what it was like to
- 00:18:56actually use them and go through that
- 00:18:58whole demo process uh I want to break
- 00:19:00this down into the three discret
- 00:19:03Hardware components that we saw and
- 00:19:05you've seen so far and those are the
- 00:19:07glasses the wireless compute Puck
- 00:19:10Wireless being the operative word there
- 00:19:12and then as well as these neural
- 00:19:14wristbands these EMG electromyography
- 00:19:18wristbands that allow for one of the
- 00:19:20ways you can provide input to Orion
- 00:19:22along side hand tracking eye tracking
- 00:19:25and voice of course uh starting off with
- 00:19:28the glasses it was very clear from
- 00:19:30everyone I talked to that the goal here
- 00:19:32the stated North Star goal was to have
- 00:19:36wide field of view in a socially
- 00:19:38acceptable form factor and previously
- 00:19:41you could have a 70° diagonal field of
- 00:19:44view magic leap to had that but you
- 00:19:46couldn't have that in a small form
- 00:19:48factor or you could have something that
- 00:19:51was more in the glasses form factor like
- 00:19:53these X re but a fundamentally different
- 00:19:56type of augmented reality display system
- 00:19:59this one using bird bath Optics with the
- 00:20:01pros and cons of that so uh Orion uses
- 00:20:05wave guides and if you've been following
- 00:20:07uh augment reality Hardware wave guides
- 00:20:10as opposed to using uh a bird bath
- 00:20:12combiner it's not having like displays
- 00:20:15that bounce through a series of mirrors
- 00:20:18uh to combine the image the rendered
- 00:20:20image with the world image it's using a
- 00:20:22display projector that shoots off AIS an
- 00:20:26angle across a either printed or etched
- 00:20:30guide these pathways on some type of
- 00:20:33Clear Optical material traditionally
- 00:20:36glass and the material that's chosen
- 00:20:38allows has a certain property glass has
- 00:20:41a refractive index I believe of at most
- 00:20:44two um which means that and I'm not an
- 00:20:47optical specialist here but the way I
- 00:20:49understand it is that limits one the
- 00:20:52angle that you have to project the light
- 00:20:55into the wave guide and also the amount
- 00:20:58the degree and the field of view the
- 00:21:00angle which light can exit the wave
- 00:21:02guide into your retina uh and with the
- 00:21:06higher the refractive index index of
- 00:21:09refraction the steeper the angle that
- 00:21:11you're able to get that light in and
- 00:21:13then wider then it bounces around and
- 00:21:16bounces around to a point where you can
- 00:21:17have a wider field of view exiting here
- 00:21:20so combining it combines the benefits of
- 00:21:22a wider field of view as well as a
- 00:21:24smaller form factor the higher that
- 00:21:26refractive index the wave guide material
- 00:21:28they're using here uh that is it's
- 00:21:30silicon carbide you may have seen that
- 00:21:32if you've looked around or watched um
- 00:21:35videos or read stories about Orion
- 00:21:37they're talking about what a novel
- 00:21:38material this is uh and so previously
- 00:21:41silicon carbide as far as they know not
- 00:21:43use uh in Optics it's used in EVS for
- 00:21:48example um and there are a lot of these
- 00:21:50properties they talk about that make it
- 00:21:52ideal for AR so high refractive index
- 00:21:55it's very lightweight lighter than glass
- 00:21:57durable stronger as well and so you
- 00:22:00don't need to have things like flexers
- 00:22:02that around the actual frames to prevent
- 00:22:05it from cracking it's all these benefits
- 00:22:08it's just very expensive to produce so
- 00:22:11when they talk about you know somewhere
- 00:22:13around that $10,000 price point um to
- 00:22:16manufacture one of these 9/10 of that uh
- 00:22:19is actually in manufacturing growing
- 00:22:22layer by layer atom by atom uh these
- 00:22:25silicon car carbide wave guides which
- 00:22:27have very low low yields because you're
- 00:22:30generating them kind of off of a wafer
- 00:22:32it's not like you can bend them and have
- 00:22:35um have some that are not as good that
- 00:22:37you can use in other products they have
- 00:22:39to be perfect and then they also go
- 00:22:41through a physically etched process to
- 00:22:44etch those wave guides at this Nano
- 00:22:46scale versus an imprinting of the wave
- 00:22:49guides in previous AR Technologies uh
- 00:22:52long story short a very complicated and
- 00:22:55expensive way to get this property this
- 00:22:58lens property that's uh allows it to be
- 00:23:01that smallish form factor and I have to
- 00:23:04be up front my Impressions my initial
- 00:23:06Impressions and current Impressions
- 00:23:07still of Orion is I don't think it's
- 00:23:10achieved uh the everyday wear form
- 00:23:13factor yet it yes much Slimmer than it's
- 00:23:16not the headset like uh you know a
- 00:23:18Vision Pro it's not a headset like
- 00:23:20Hollow lens or magic La it does look
- 00:23:23it's closer on that Spectrum to the
- 00:23:26Rayman metas but there's still a little
- 00:23:29bit the rims are still a little bit
- 00:23:30thick and if you look at the the profile
- 00:23:32the side of the Orion the thick there's
- 00:23:34actually some thickness as well to the
- 00:23:36actual frames themselves and that's
- 00:23:37because if you look up close it's not
- 00:23:40just like one piece of glass or one
- 00:23:43piece of optical material there's
- 00:23:45actually an optical stack that's
- 00:23:47sandwiched in those frames um I don't
- 00:23:51know the exact details of what every
- 00:23:53layer uh of that Optical stack does but
- 00:23:56my understanding is the the frontmost
- 00:23:57layer can can be like a polarized layer
- 00:23:59so if you're using this Outdoors you get
- 00:24:01better better visibility for the
- 00:24:03projected images uh there's the display
- 00:24:06projector itself that has a liant layer
- 00:24:09so it's using here U micro leads not
- 00:24:12micro ol Leeds that you might have seen
- 00:24:14on like the big screen Beyond or even
- 00:24:16the the xreal uh glasses these are micro
- 00:24:19Leeds and they're not organic they are
- 00:24:21high efficiency uh displays that provide
- 00:24:24a massive amount of brightness we're
- 00:24:26talking about and the hundreds of
- 00:24:28thousands of knits uh which are required
- 00:24:30because that all gets reduced down as
- 00:24:32the light goes to the wave guide so
- 00:24:34you're talking about a a 300 to 400 nit
- 00:24:37display with the current implementation
- 00:24:40of the prototypes uh that display
- 00:24:42projector lives in front of the silicon
- 00:24:46carbide wave guide and then behind that
- 00:24:48there is a combiner as well that the uh
- 00:24:51aligns and rectifies the uh display
- 00:24:54image with the outside world image so
- 00:24:57make sure that's all matched up and then
- 00:24:59the closest layer also has things that
- 00:25:02support eye tracking uh this is actually
- 00:25:04something really novel the closest layer
- 00:25:06if you look up close to Orion um I
- 00:25:10noticed like these little squiggly lines
- 00:25:11almost look like dust or hairlines what
- 00:25:14they actually what's embedded on this
- 00:25:17frontmost layer uh of the of the optical
- 00:25:20stack closest to your eyes are tiny IR
- 00:25:24light emitters used for of course ey
- 00:25:27tracking cuz you have have cameras in
- 00:25:30the arms of the glasses looking at the
- 00:25:34uh looking at the lens and so those tiny
- 00:25:37squiggly lines are actually uh the way
- 00:25:39those light emitters IR light emitters
- 00:25:41are powered and they're squiggly because
- 00:25:43they have to be this randomized pattern
- 00:25:45so that when you're wearing the glasses
- 00:25:48your eyes don't see the squiggly lines
- 00:25:50you actually you can't see them because
- 00:25:52they are a random pattern it's really
- 00:25:54interesting idea of getting uh instead
- 00:25:56of having a ring of IR lights that shoot
- 00:25:59into your IE beams they're actually on
- 00:26:01the Optics themselves but invisible at
- 00:26:04that distance to the naked eye I did ask
- 00:26:07about you know corrective lensing as
- 00:26:09well um if people right now are using
- 00:26:12contacts um to to use Orion but uh they
- 00:26:16did say their plan and a lot of their
- 00:26:18team do need corrective lensing so it's
- 00:26:20going to that's something they want to
- 00:26:21solve it's going to be built in um it's
- 00:26:23like a thing where you'll want to submit
- 00:26:25a prescription and when it's in the
- 00:26:27assembly state
- 00:26:28the lens element that's closest to your
- 00:26:31eye will support some range of um some
- 00:26:34range of RX correction they don't want
- 00:26:38uh something you're going to snap on
- 00:26:40they don't want an additional layer that
- 00:26:42was really important to them again with
- 00:26:44trying to achieve this goal of having a
- 00:26:47display profile a a physical profile as
- 00:26:50close to glasses as possible uh they
- 00:26:53want that distance between your eyeball
- 00:26:55and the lens to be know 1.5 cm 15 mm
- 00:26:59which they're really proud of now in
- 00:27:02terms of what this display looks like uh
- 00:27:0670° diagonal fovs translate to 60°
- 00:27:10horizontal and 40° vertical in using the
- 00:27:13demo it seemed expansive and it wasn't I
- 00:27:17couldn't see the edges of uh the limits
- 00:27:20of where can render if I move my head
- 00:27:22side to side uh the images I could force
- 00:27:25a rendered window or an avatar I was
- 00:27:27looking at to be clipped off at the
- 00:27:29edges but I don't need 90° field of view
- 00:27:33for augmented reality as I might want
- 00:27:35you know more than that for virtual
- 00:27:37reality I'm also wearing the glasses
- 00:27:40themselves the frames themselves you're
- 00:27:41also seeing the outside world the
- 00:27:43benefit of having the real photons from
- 00:27:46the world come to your eyes uh means
- 00:27:48that as long as the rendered image kind
- 00:27:50of fits in that 60x 40° field of view uh
- 00:27:55it's wide enough to support multiple
- 00:27:57windows so play a game to not feel
- 00:28:00constrain not looking like you're
- 00:28:01looking at a postage stamp version of a
- 00:28:04a rendered image as we've seen before in
- 00:28:06earlier Optical AR headsets it was also
- 00:28:10one of the best AR systems I've used in
- 00:28:12terms of not having a ton of visual
- 00:28:15artifacts now there it wasn't zero
- 00:28:18visual artifacts I did notice some
- 00:28:20ghosting on the inner periphery if I
- 00:28:23looked my eyes are there like a ghosting
- 00:28:25of the image uh but there weren't stray
- 00:28:28lights casting in it was like rainbow
- 00:28:30effects so even though in some of the
- 00:28:32images that you may have seen looking
- 00:28:34into the glasses of like this kind of um
- 00:28:37chromatic prism um it's not actually
- 00:28:40what I see as I was looking through the
- 00:28:43glasses looking out into the real world
- 00:28:45uh the actual Holograms themselves were
- 00:28:49bright um and not fully opaque but it
- 00:28:53had like a glowy look to them uh one of
- 00:28:56the things I noticed was the the
- 00:28:58resolution wasn't that high either
- 00:29:00they're saying with the current microed
- 00:29:02displays they're getting about a 13
- 00:29:04pixels per uh pixels per degree density
- 00:29:07uh so you could read some text you could
- 00:29:10browse a web page but it's not sharp uh
- 00:29:13it's comparable to like early VR
- 00:29:15headsets like the valve index is right
- 00:29:18around 13 14 pixels per degree uh they
- 00:29:22are working on different types of
- 00:29:25display projectors in the future so I
- 00:29:26did get to try a 26 pixel per degree
- 00:29:30version of the Orion prototype and that
- 00:29:31one was much sharper although less
- 00:29:33bright and images also less opaque so
- 00:29:37they're finding where those trade-offs
- 00:29:39live uh when they want to ship this as a
- 00:29:41product they're saying that they know
- 00:29:43the road map and there is a path to
- 00:29:45getting above 30 pixels per degree they
- 00:29:48wouldn't want to ship something without
- 00:29:49that they know that's a really important
- 00:29:51part uh but the objects they they look
- 00:29:54there they look present but they're
- 00:29:56they're bright and glowy it's not
- 00:29:58looking like you wouldn't confuse one of
- 00:30:00those Holograms with a real object in
- 00:30:02the real world it's very clearly that
- 00:30:04holographic look of s that's very
- 00:30:06colorful and bright the display system
- 00:30:09is also fix Focus so it's not that holdy
- 00:30:12Grail of having some type of light field
- 00:30:15display where you can have version
- 00:30:18accommodation across any focal distance
- 00:30:21uh the fix Focus here is 1.5 M so
- 00:30:23similar to VR systems and they know
- 00:30:26there's a buffer range in which they can
- 00:30:29display content combined with you know
- 00:30:31stereo Imaging that gives you uh
- 00:30:34comfortable 3D looking images without
- 00:30:35straining our eyes without straining the
- 00:30:37accommodation it is a I think a
- 00:30:40limitation or parameter of the type of
- 00:30:43wave guide Optics they're going towards
- 00:30:45so these are not you light field Optics
- 00:30:47I don't think we're going to get those
- 00:30:49in a glasses form factor uh but it
- 00:30:52really was also emphasized how important
- 00:30:54it was that the display images not only
- 00:30:57between left and right eye but also with
- 00:31:00the camera systems the outward World
- 00:31:02facing camera systems are perfectly
- 00:31:05aligned there's kept on stressing it is
- 00:31:07aligned the Precision of less than a
- 00:31:09tenth of the thickness of a human hair
- 00:31:12uh because any disparity like vertical
- 00:31:14disparity between left and right eye or
- 00:31:17disparity between the images and the
- 00:31:19world calibration which can be affected
- 00:31:22by things like thermals expansion of the
- 00:31:25hardware on a hot day that would be be
- 00:31:28uncomfortable because you also have the
- 00:31:30real world as a reference and so the
- 00:31:32rendered images have to look perfect
- 00:31:34relative to each other as well as the
- 00:31:37real world that's really important for
- 00:31:38AR they could not stress heavily enough
- 00:31:41how important it was for that uh for
- 00:31:44that alignment to me in place that's
- 00:31:45reinforced by the Magnesium that they're
- 00:31:47using for the frames as well as even
- 00:31:50some real time adjustment and a digital
- 00:31:54um calibration um based on the sensing
- 00:31:56of how the glasses are being being worn
- 00:31:59and this glasses form factor which I
- 00:32:01think is probably the biggest this type
- 00:32:03of glass will ever be hopefully as they
- 00:32:06turn this into a real product they did
- 00:32:08say that they had ways to make it
- 00:32:10thinner you know BOS talked about like
- 00:32:12not only they had ways to condense the
- 00:32:14thickness of the frames by maybe moving
- 00:32:18the projector instead of in front of the
- 00:32:21wave gu to behind the wave guide um but
- 00:32:24you need more uh calibration or real
- 00:32:27time adjustment but that that actually
- 00:32:29gets you half the thickness uh they also
- 00:32:32think the rims themselves can be less
- 00:32:34thick as well as well as a more
- 00:32:36ergonomically designed uh arms so much
- 00:32:40of the the physical ID is also
- 00:32:42constrained by how many how much
- 00:32:44Electronics they need to pack in the ear
- 00:32:46and the the power envelope of this and
- 00:32:48so they've developed a bunch of custom
- 00:32:51silicon Hardware to run things at very
- 00:32:53low power so display itself that micr
- 00:32:57Leed that that's consuming most of the
- 00:32:59power but you also have onboard
- 00:33:01processing for slam World tracking for
- 00:33:04hand tracking for ey tracking that's all
- 00:33:06running locally uh spread across weight
- 00:33:10distributed on these glasses and then
- 00:33:12you also need battery as well so things
- 00:33:15that traditionally would be consuming a
- 00:33:17lot of power on a phone they're trying
- 00:33:20to get to you know a third A fifth or a
- 00:33:22tenth of power required so the dozens of
- 00:33:26milliamps aggregated to you know a
- 00:33:28couple hundred milliamps versus a couple
- 00:33:31hundred milliamps aggregated to you know
- 00:33:33like a l of power being used because
- 00:33:35then you wouldn't be able to use this
- 00:33:36for the know 2 and a half to three hours
- 00:33:38of use time that they say those glasses
- 00:33:40currently have so battery chemistry
- 00:33:43there's just real physics limitations
- 00:33:45you know the shape of the batteries they
- 00:33:46can kind of mix around but it's the
- 00:33:48classic you know every cubic millimeter
- 00:33:51space need to be occupied and Balan in
- 00:33:54some way and every Dimension that you
- 00:33:57change affects some other Factor so
- 00:34:01that's the that's the I think the real
- 00:34:02breakthrough and innovation in the
- 00:34:05glasses part of a Rion it's not that it
- 00:34:07has you know the widest perfect field of
- 00:34:10view or you know it has the longest
- 00:34:13battery life for the most powerful and
- 00:34:15smooth compute it's getting all of those
- 00:34:18separate ingredients together in the
- 00:34:20physical limitation of that form factor
- 00:34:23that they've been able to achieve and
- 00:34:24then they can say okay now that they got
- 00:34:2670° diagonal field of view in this 98 G
- 00:34:29package where the place is they can
- 00:34:32tweak to make it more affordable as a
- 00:34:35real consumer product um and a lot of
- 00:34:38that has to do with the second device
- 00:34:40the compute Puck as well so while there
- 00:34:42is local processing on the glasses for
- 00:34:45things like slam uh app logic so what
- 00:34:47actually runs applications uh things
- 00:34:50that don't need immediate low latency
- 00:34:52that would make it uncomfortable to use
- 00:34:54in AR glasses that can run on a wireless
- 00:34:57computer Ute device and it being
- 00:34:59Wireless such a big deal uh they talked
- 00:35:01about how they've created unique
- 00:35:04protocol that works on top of Wi-Fi 6
- 00:35:06where they're pulsing the data not
- 00:35:08streaming data non-stop which gives them
- 00:35:11a lot of power savings and then of
- 00:35:13course tuning the applications to work
- 00:35:15with that um the compute Puck is
- 00:35:18something because it's wireless it
- 00:35:20doesn't even need to be in your pocket
- 00:35:22it can be in a bag they talked about it
- 00:35:24being in a backpack or a purse with a
- 00:35:26range of about 10 to 12 ft so uh that
- 00:35:30can last all day while the glasses can
- 00:35:32last a couple hours and something that
- 00:35:34as long as it's close to you you're
- 00:35:35going to get that full functionality of
- 00:35:38the glasses uh an interesting side note
- 00:35:41with the compute Puck you'll see in some
- 00:35:43of the video that we shot of it that it
- 00:35:45looks like there are cameras on the
- 00:35:47front of it as well as on the side on
- 00:35:50this bevel and those aren't actually
- 00:35:52cameras in use those are actually
- 00:35:53artifacts uh left over from earlier
- 00:35:56implementations of explorations of how
- 00:35:58they could use this compute Puck and if
- 00:36:00you're thinking it as a controller they
- 00:36:03also thought of it as a controller uh
- 00:36:05the cameras on the front and maybe the
- 00:36:08the little uh divot on the top of the
- 00:36:10compute Puck uh inv verions uh previous
- 00:36:13versions allowed to work as a six degree
- 00:36:15Freedom tracking Precision controller
- 00:36:17kind of like a you know touch Pro
- 00:36:19Controller that you got on the the quest
- 00:36:20Pro Inside Out tracking on the device
- 00:36:23itself they decided they didn't want to
- 00:36:25focus on that that was maybe too much
- 00:36:27spreading too thin so they have hand
- 00:36:29tracking instead uh the cameras on the
- 00:36:32bevel in front of it were to maybe place
- 00:36:35it on a table so it can look back at you
- 00:36:37and do some kind of skeletal modeling so
- 00:36:40that when you are on a video call your
- 00:36:43avatar could be fully tracked uh but
- 00:36:45they also didn't want you to have to
- 00:36:47require you know they wanted this to be
- 00:36:48a device that you can be using while
- 00:36:50walking around and not have to require
- 00:36:52taking the compute P out of your pocket
- 00:36:54putting on a bench or a table just to do
- 00:36:56a video call so making those very uh
- 00:36:59deliberate decisions that will then rely
- 00:37:01on the camera systems B on the headset
- 00:37:04itself uh inferences that they can then
- 00:37:06use extrapolate over machine learning
- 00:37:08for things like body tracking face
- 00:37:10tracking for their codic avatars but
- 00:37:13really cool to see some of those uh
- 00:37:16design decisions that they explored
- 00:37:18still on the Prototype Hardware itself
- 00:37:21uh so the compute P doesn't do the input
- 00:37:24and while there is it tracking input
- 00:37:25that we talked about there is hand
- 00:37:26tracking input put uh you can combine
- 00:37:29those very much in like a apple Vision
- 00:37:30Pro Way gaze and tap and pinch or moving
- 00:37:33things around uh there's also this
- 00:37:36wristband so it's also the first time
- 00:37:38we're seeing in a product the investment
- 00:37:40they made when they acquired control
- 00:37:43labs and they've published papers since
- 00:37:45then about EMG wristbands so this is a a
- 00:37:50wristband that uses a non-invasive
- 00:37:52sensing of the electrical signals that
- 00:37:55go to your muscles in your wrists so the
- 00:37:57complex sense of array of muscles that
- 00:38:00are moved um as you move your fingers or
- 00:38:03the orientation of your hand that can
- 00:38:05get translated and processed through
- 00:38:07their ml processor on board The
- 00:38:09Wristband itself and then turn into
- 00:38:12gestures and poses that the system can
- 00:38:15recognize um I was really curious you
- 00:38:17know because they invested in this uh
- 00:38:20EMG system many many years ago I'm sure
- 00:38:23theyve spent a lot of money developing
- 00:38:25it but machine learning is also gotten a
- 00:38:28lot more advanced in the past couple
- 00:38:29years and something as basic as an IMU a
- 00:38:32gyroscope an IMU inside you know like a
- 00:38:35watchband uh we've seen uh with demos at
- 00:38:38atic World Expo even in accessibility
- 00:38:40options on the Apple watch you can get
- 00:38:43tap uh you know pretty reliable tap
- 00:38:46gestures without needing to tap into EMG
- 00:38:50the IMU can actually be trained uh that
- 00:38:52data can be trained to get you a pretty
- 00:38:55good success rate what boss and the
- 00:38:58Orion team told me is that the potential
- 00:39:02of what the wristbands can deliver over
- 00:39:04time that ceiling is so has so much
- 00:39:07prise so much potential the very basic
- 00:39:10gestures that I was used with no system
- 00:39:13training no calibration training uh it
- 00:39:15was just tapping so I could use a thumb
- 00:39:18to index finger to tap and this doesn't
- 00:39:21need to be in front of me it can
- 00:39:22literally be in my hand in my pocket
- 00:39:24imagine I'm walking down the street
- 00:39:26hands in my jacket pocket and I can be
- 00:39:28controlling the interface with Taps I
- 00:39:31can be turning my wrists and tapping my
- 00:39:33thumb to my middle finger and bringing
- 00:39:35up a menu uh I can be scrolling so one
- 00:39:38of the most uh impressive gestures was
- 00:39:41just putting my thumb on my inex finger
- 00:39:44and swiping up and down and scrolling
- 00:39:47through like an Instagram video feed I
- 00:39:49really tried to see like how much
- 00:39:51pressure how much intentionality did I
- 00:39:53need to put into that gesture and it
- 00:39:55turned out not much at all just that
- 00:39:57gentle small micro gesture as they would
- 00:40:00call it was enough to get scrolling and
- 00:40:03that's where it seems to be very a very
- 00:40:05powerful um very powerful form of input
- 00:40:09using your hand versus the uh computer
- 00:40:12vision based input you know CV based
- 00:40:14input of the hand tracking on Apple
- 00:40:16Vision Pro I've loveed the vision proos
- 00:40:19combination of gaze and pinch and
- 00:40:21gesture tracking it's been really
- 00:40:23intuitive and really powerful to use but
- 00:40:25over this past year of using that I've
- 00:40:26also realize that uh a lot of big
- 00:40:29movements in my hands are are still
- 00:40:31pretty straining so you know grabbing
- 00:40:34something pinching something and moving
- 00:40:35it with my elbow or moving with my wrist
- 00:40:38which I do more than I probably should
- 00:40:41that's not comfortable over time it's
- 00:40:44really that our hands are built for the
- 00:40:46dexterity of our finger joints and our
- 00:40:48finger movements so that's why you know
- 00:40:50holding a stylus holding a pencil it's
- 00:40:52about moving you know your finger
- 00:40:54Knuckles not about moving your wrist
- 00:40:56when you're typing on the keyboard
- 00:40:57you're not you don't want carpal tunnel
- 00:40:59you don't want to be moving your wrist
- 00:41:00so the micro gestures the smaller the
- 00:41:02gesture that you can make that the
- 00:41:04system can still interpret as these
- 00:41:07separate discrete input types uh the
- 00:41:10more powerful and the more comfortable
- 00:41:12and more long-term use that you can get
- 00:41:15out of this which you'll need for
- 00:41:16augmented reality and that's why they're
- 00:41:19committing to this EMG wristband I did
- 00:41:22ask about you know multiple wristbands
- 00:41:24right now there's one and it's a very
- 00:41:25you know spelt form factor
- 00:41:28uh but they've showed demos of people
- 00:41:29using two resp spans they talk about in
- 00:41:31the future being able to recognize you
- 00:41:33know Handwriting Without actually
- 00:41:35physically writing on on on a piece of
- 00:41:38paper uh and they even uh have trained
- 00:41:41versions of this where someone can be
- 00:41:42typing on a keyboard that isn't there
- 00:41:45didn't get to try any of those yet but
- 00:41:47for the basic gestures of you know
- 00:41:49tapping of opening up a menu of swiping
- 00:41:53of double tapping for tapping into meta
- 00:41:55AI all of those work with
- 00:41:58one or two false positives you know even
- 00:42:00like kind of the small ticks I had my
- 00:42:01arms folded and you know just moving my
- 00:42:03hands rubbing my hands together I was
- 00:42:05activating their meta AI accidentally so
- 00:42:07something I'll probably have to train
- 00:42:09myself to use for the system as well as
- 00:42:11the system learning my own proclivities
- 00:42:13for how I move my hands lots of
- 00:42:16interesting uh tech there and then the
- 00:42:19demo experience itself there was an
- 00:42:21onboarding process so a whole fitment
- 00:42:24process where they got the glasses to
- 00:42:26work with with my face the arms are
- 00:42:29bendable so they do Bend outward and
- 00:42:31they Bend not at the traditional point
- 00:42:34of uh where a hinge would be it's lower
- 00:42:36and that's probably for the added
- 00:42:38rigidity again for the the two dis uh
- 00:42:42display systems be calibrated and the
- 00:42:44camera recalibrated uh but they did give
- 00:42:46me a nose Bridge so it would stick to my
- 00:42:48nose as well as these rubber grips to
- 00:42:50make sure that the class's AR arms
- 00:42:52weren't moving because uh the way their
- 00:42:54eye tracking works I got a sense that if
- 00:42:56I was pushing the glasses against my
- 00:42:58face from time to time I would lose eye
- 00:43:01track and calibration and have to do
- 00:43:02that process again it was a very on
- 00:43:05Rails demo lots of guard rails they
- 00:43:07walked me through this very evenly
- 00:43:09diffused lit room so no Bright Lights
- 00:43:12lots of Hard angles probably help with
- 00:43:15the slam World tracking they walk me
- 00:43:17through you know from a couch to uh a
- 00:43:20little display area that set up uh I did
- 00:43:22very basic things there was uh a video
- 00:43:24call so chat it with someone uh when in
- 00:43:27which they would have seen a codak
- 00:43:29avatar interestingly enough the seven
- 00:43:32camera systems they there is no camera
- 00:43:34system pointed down your face uh there's
- 00:43:37no face tracking camera like the quest
- 00:43:39Pro or the Apple Vision Pro has so
- 00:43:41that's probably using your voice and
- 00:43:44then using machine learning to convert
- 00:43:46that into mouth movement of your Kodak
- 00:43:48Avatar which probably is rendered in the
- 00:43:50cloud and stream down as video so it's
- 00:43:53not like a spatial persona for say it's
- 00:43:56still in a windy in the video but you
- 00:43:58know you had um asymmetrical experiences
- 00:44:01where I was doing video calls with
- 00:44:02someone just holding up on the phone uh
- 00:44:05a video call with someone in a codec
- 00:44:06Avatar again a flat codec Avatar and
- 00:44:09then things like web browsing video
- 00:44:11watching all of which looked and worked
- 00:44:14as kind of I would imagine so you know
- 00:44:18I'm speaking about it very plainly and
- 00:44:19almost like unremarkably and the the
- 00:44:22amazing part was how kind of natural and
- 00:44:24unremarkable how how it the experience
- 00:44:28match in my brain what I hoped it would
- 00:44:30be uh performance was a little bit laggy
- 00:44:34I could tell not that there was the
- 00:44:35latency between the glasses and the
- 00:44:37wireless compute Puck but maybe they're
- 00:44:40pushing the limits of how many windows
- 00:44:42they could display and uh I didn't get a
- 00:44:45sense of the frame rate uh of you know
- 00:44:47the images it wasn't like dragging
- 00:44:49window things were lagging behind but it
- 00:44:52was only the three panes they were
- 00:44:54locked in line to each other uh kind of
- 00:44:57like your quest dashboard um and even
- 00:45:00though I could put that alignment of
- 00:45:03three Windows anywhere it wasn't locking
- 00:45:05those windows to the room mapping for
- 00:45:08example I get to use uh one instance of
- 00:45:11men AI where you know like the Rayband
- 00:45:14metas I asked it a prompt to look at the
- 00:45:16scene in front of me in this guided demo
- 00:45:19it was a scene of ingredients to make a
- 00:45:20smoothie and then it did the thing where
- 00:45:23it you could hear it take a picture a
- 00:45:25shutter snap it would process it and
- 00:45:28after a couple seconds I would get these
- 00:45:31U indications on top of the actual
- 00:45:35objects themselves labeling so uh the
- 00:45:37cool thing here was as opposed to
- 00:45:39getting audio feedback which you can do
- 00:45:41right now with the meta AI on Rayband
- 00:45:43metas uh it was actually World locked
- 00:45:46visual feedback identifying each of
- 00:45:49these products on the table with a label
- 00:45:52that was attached to them and then a
- 00:45:54floating list of like smoothie making
- 00:45:57instructions uh that type of world
- 00:45:59loocking is what I what we want from AR
- 00:46:01and we want more of that scene
- 00:46:03recognition scene understanding you know
- 00:46:06persistence and uh my sense is that
- 00:46:08persistence isn't there yet you know
- 00:46:10it's for the duration of that
- 00:46:11interaction with Med AI uh but it
- 00:46:15doesn't have the capabilities to know
- 00:46:17that I want this XYZ recognize and have
- 00:46:20it you know persistent as I'm walking
- 00:46:22between rooms or walking the outside
- 00:46:24world uh continuously track continuous
- 00:46:27updating that might be more for you know
- 00:46:28as you get more compute or they figuring
- 00:46:30that out later I did a demo where I was
- 00:46:33sitting at a kind of a high bench coffee
- 00:46:36table and and then you know scrolling
- 00:46:39through social media so scrolling
- 00:46:41through Instagram again here using the
- 00:46:44very small micro gestures just swiping
- 00:46:47up and down that was one of the
- 00:46:49Breakthrough moments for me how easy
- 00:46:52intuitive and not laborious unstrained
- 00:46:56it my hand was was just moving doing
- 00:46:57these micro gestures it was really
- 00:47:00amazing um and then there were some
- 00:47:03games so they had this kind of 3D game
- 00:47:06you kind of place anywhere and it's an
- 00:47:09ey track and and then tap based gesture
- 00:47:12based uh activation where you're looking
- 00:47:14at you know where you want the enemy
- 00:47:16your spaceship to shoot very simple kind
- 00:47:18of asteroid style shooter not super
- 00:47:22impressed with that but the final demo
- 00:47:25this pong demo that one blew my mind
- 00:47:28that one was done in two ways one with
- 00:47:30collocation so with uh the project Le
- 00:47:34Orion giving me the demo looking at him
- 00:47:37he's wearing Orion glasses I'm wearing
- 00:47:39Orion glasses and between us are two
- 00:47:43glowing grids that are locked in place
- 00:47:47for both of us and with stereo There's
- 00:47:49real like sense of depth there and this
- 00:47:52you know glowing pong ball that's going
- 00:47:54between these two uh squares glowing
- 00:47:58blue and glowing orange squares and then
- 00:48:01using my hand to kind of move a gesture
- 00:48:03and try to spin that pong ball as it
- 00:48:05moves through 3D space that seemed so
- 00:48:10futuristic so science fiction it was
- 00:48:13amazing and then looking around the room
- 00:48:15and of course everyone looking at us and
- 00:48:17they just see two people holding their
- 00:48:19hands out playing you know waving in the
- 00:48:21air looking like they W were waving each
- 00:48:23other but we're playing a multiplayer
- 00:48:25game of holog graphic pong that was so
- 00:48:28cool I did another version of pong where
- 00:48:31instead of playing with someone in the
- 00:48:33space I was playing against a stylized
- 00:48:35full body Avatar and that Avatar was
- 00:48:38maybe standing you know 7 8 ft away from
- 00:48:42me and here with the 40° vertical field
- 00:48:45of view I could see the Avatar in its
- 00:48:47entirety you know it was there and I
- 00:48:49didn't need to look up and down and have
- 00:48:52their head or feet cropped off uh and
- 00:48:54had them you know fully animated with
- 00:48:57their hand tracked as well and talking
- 00:48:59to them with spatial audio um it was
- 00:49:02like a holographic presence it wasn't
- 00:49:05the photorealistic codic Avatar this one
- 00:49:07was way more stylized and glowy um but
- 00:49:11give that sense of if you again over
- 00:49:13time with more compute having more of
- 00:49:16those walking around in your space that
- 00:49:18feels really like the Hol like science
- 00:49:22fiction throughout my entire demo
- 00:49:25session it was continually reinforced to
- 00:49:27me that as impressive and as proud of of
- 00:49:31this prototype that they spent so many
- 00:49:33years on uh they know they can do better
- 00:49:36they know the paths forward to make it
- 00:49:38more of a consumer device and I think
- 00:49:40it's a really good decision that even
- 00:49:42though they intentionally originally
- 00:49:44intended to make Orion something they
- 00:49:46could sell that they're not selling this
- 00:49:48right now uh if I was to imagine what a
- 00:49:51consumer version of Orion may look like
- 00:49:55uh I don't think it's going to end up
- 00:49:56using that silicon carbide I think that
- 00:49:58they're realizing that the benefits of
- 00:50:00it that wi fov like the costs are too
- 00:50:03high they're not going to be able to
- 00:50:04scale that and make it affordable so you
- 00:50:06might have a little bit of a lower fov
- 00:50:08or the find the trade-offs that they
- 00:50:10have to figure out uh they know they
- 00:50:12need a higher density display they need
- 00:50:14they want to ship something with you
- 00:50:15know at least 30 pixels per degree so it
- 00:50:18might not be as bright or opaque as the
- 00:50:21Holograms I saw in this demo but they
- 00:50:24also know they're going to get a smaller
- 00:50:25form factor with a thinner um thinner
- 00:50:29Optical stack with thinner bezels and
- 00:50:32more ergonomic arms um and it seems like
- 00:50:36they're Welling their way to figure out
- 00:50:38that what that means as a product
- 00:50:39because they really want this to replace
- 00:50:42the phone and that also means they want
- 00:50:44to charge a lot of money for it it's not
- 00:50:47going to be an accessory that you buy
- 00:50:49just to use on airplanes or in the car
- 00:50:52uh they want people to buy these as you
- 00:50:55know maybe their second most important
- 00:50:56Computing device and they talked about
- 00:50:59maybe pricing being in the range of a
- 00:51:00high-end phone or laptop so in my mind
- 00:51:03maybe like 1,500 probably $2,000 is
- 00:51:06where I can see this ending up um and I
- 00:51:09would rather that they charge more and
- 00:51:12make sure they include as much of that
- 00:51:14technology as possible then try to get
- 00:51:16something that's more mass Market appeal
- 00:51:18and not have the experience be as good
- 00:51:21but I'm also super excited about where
- 00:51:23the technologies that they've built into
- 00:51:25Orion are going to make their way into
- 00:51:28Quest products or Rayband meta products
- 00:51:30you know specifically those EMG
- 00:51:32wristbands I would love to have Micro
- 00:51:35gestures I could use uh while using
- 00:51:38glasses to peruse you know some type of
- 00:51:41social media feed or scroll have another
- 00:51:43way of doing input as opposed to just
- 00:51:45tapping the sides of the glasses or just
- 00:51:47using uh voice control for their AI
- 00:51:50system so it'll be a ways away I think
- 00:51:52before we'll see the consumer product
- 00:51:55that Orion and up being uh and this
- 00:51:59prototype they've made the Thousand or
- 00:52:00so that they've made are not for
- 00:52:02developers unlike you know the snap
- 00:52:04spectacles that were announced a couple
- 00:52:06weeks ago uh developers can't get this
- 00:52:09right now it's not about building an app
- 00:52:11library or an app store you know when we
- 00:52:14think of the iPhone you know that killer
- 00:52:16app on the iPhone yes it's the App Store
- 00:52:18it's the thing that's made it so
- 00:52:19powerful but when the iPhone was
- 00:52:21announced Steve Jobs walked on stage and
- 00:52:23he sold it as a IP OD a phone and a
- 00:52:28breakthrough internet communicator and
- 00:52:31it was about getting the fundamentals
- 00:52:33right having real value and utility in
- 00:52:36the vice out of box so people will keep
- 00:52:38on using it rather than trying to put it
- 00:52:40out there and figure out and let
- 00:52:42developers figure out that will come
- 00:52:43later so you know meta Orion team take
- 00:52:47your time get those Tech into things
- 00:52:49like The rayan Meta into Quest and I
- 00:52:52think they're well on their way um to
- 00:52:55bring us the future
- 00:52:57hope you enjoy that deep dive into Orion
- 00:53:00uh if you have questions about my
- 00:53:01experience please post them in the
- 00:53:03comments below I'll try to reach out to
- 00:53:05the folks that met to answer those as
- 00:53:07best as possible um and thank you so
- 00:53:10much for watching as always I'm norm and
- 00:53:13we'll see you next time
- Meta
- Orion
- Augmented Reality
- Holographic Display
- Neural Interface
- Prototype
- AI
- Smartphone Replacement
- Wearable Technology
- Innovative Materials