While AR technology has been developed to help to promote road safety, it could be causing the opposite result.
According to the results of preliminary studies on the use of augmented reality head up displays (HUDs) that show images on windshields that are meant to help to make driving safer and easier for motorists, the use of this technology could actually be making driving less safe.
The problem with AR technology while driving primarily involves distraction due to divided attention.
According to Ian Spence, a professor of psychology at the University of Toronto, “Drivers need to divide their attention to deal with this added visual information.” He also pointed out that “Not only will drivers have to concentrate on what’s happening on the road around them as they’ve always done, they’ll also have to attend to whatever warning pops up on the windshield in front of them.”
The professor ran the augmented reality display tests with two of his students to better understand the visual data.
Spence worked with Sijing Wu and Yuechuan Sun, two of his students, in designing tests that would be able to measure the impact of displaying the additional information as an overlay on the reality seen by a driver. At first, the participants in the research were asked to complete a series of computer based trials. Within those trials, they reported several randomly arranged numbers (which ranged from one through nine) that were displayed on the screen. They needed to identify them as rapidly and accurately as possible once they were prompted to do so.
In some of the trials, they were also presented with a black-outlined square in order to provide a secondary form of stimulus. Those that received that additional stimulus were asked to report whether or not they had seen it. The numbered spots and the shape were displayed at the same time, and the shape appeared in only some trials in an unpredictable pattern among the participants.
When the squares were absent, the accuracy was quite high, which indicated that there wasn’t a lot of attention required in order to identify whether or not the square had appeared. However, when the square appeared along with the numbered spots, the average rate of missing it was one in 15. The higher the number of spots, the greater the average rate of missing the square. This indicated that if the user’s attention is occupied by additional information such as that displayed in augmented reality, it will also be increasingly distracted from the primary task, such as driving.
The company says that its Smart Helmet will be helpful for workers in a range of different industrial ecosystems.
The latest unveiling from Daqri, in its ongoing tradition of forward thinking and providing special features for which its customers will be willing to pay a premium price, has been a unique type of augmented reality helmet.
This strategy takes the company in the exact opposite direction from the rest of the sector.
The majority of companies in this area focus more on ensuring the lowest possible price in order to stand out. Daqri has decided to look for incredible features that will be attractive to its customers and worth the money that they pay. The company is a startup based in Los Angeles and it has now unveiled an augmented reality hardhat that it feels will be highly attractive to industrial employers who are seeking to improve the ability of their workers to do their jobs accurately and efficiently.
Daqri is betting that those employers will be willing to spend in order to obtain these high quality augmented reality features.
The Smart Helmet looks like a traditional hard hat that has travelled to the future. It is built to include a transparent visor as well as special lenses to provide it with a kind of heads up display (HUD). Also built into this protective equipment is a series of sensors and cameras that give users the ability to gather and access a considerable amount of information about his or her present environment.
Daqri has already been selling software that gives businesses the ability to incorporate AR technology into their functions. This type of application will usually involve the use of a smartphone, so that the camera can be directed at trigger image which will then bring the broader function “to life”. For example, if the trigger was worked into a magazine ad, then viewing it through a smartphone could cause a video to play. An instruction manual could offer audio or video instructions to enhance the text and diagrams.
This latest product, however, would build the augmented reality experience right into the helmet and would broaden its capabilities quite a bit.
