Smart Glasses Rival Google

Lumus and eyeSight are giving Google a run for its money. The technology powerhouses recently revealed consumer-grade devices that offer all the prime functions of smart glasses without the bulk.

Lumus, one of the provides of heads-up display flight helmets for military fighter pilots, has brought its innovation to the consumer market. Its true objective is to sell its optical lenses to other manufacturers, but the lens technology is unparalleled.

Lumus offers two lens options: DK-40 single and DK-32 dual lenses. The products are still under development through a joint effort by Lumus and eyeSight, but a pilot was featured at the 2014 Consumer Electronics Show, and there is a lot of excitement involving a potential market release.

The Optical Engine Module, which features a micro-display pod and Light-guide Optical Element lens, is a computer display unit with a 1,280 x 720-pixel format. The lenses (the only ones of their kind made from glass, Lumus says) are only 1.6 mm thick. They look lined but are actually see-through. The lenses also use several thin, transparent beam splitters to enable larger displays and let the user see the real world in real-time. The display covers 40 degrees of the user's field of view and is roughly the size of an 87-inch television screen at a distance of 10 feet.

The smart glasses feature an OMAP4460 dual-core 1.5 GHz Cortex-A9, 2D/3D PowerVR SGX540 graphics accelerator, CMOS camera, USB OTG, LiPO rechargeable battery and charge indicator, Bluetooth BLE, WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, Android OS with full BSP capabilities, audio input/output, and multi-axis gyro and accelerometer.

Aside from the enhanced technology, the smart glasses are designed to be more user friendly than Google Glass. Users can remove items from their line of sight with a simple flick, and they can view further details of an item by dragging it out. The functions work similarly to motion-sensing gaming systems.

The software was made possible through eyeSight, and even though the products are a long way from being available on the market, they show a lot of promise. Some of the anticipated features are similar to those of a smartphone, including maps, calendars, reminders, gaming, and browsing.

The lenses and related software are expected to be sold to manufacturers that wish to customize the technology for their own needs. There's no telling when the products will be available on the market, but we've got our fingers crossed for an early release.

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