Hands-on: Lumus Prototype AR Glasses Are Smaller & Better Than Ever

Lumus’ latest waveguide, dubbed Maximus, is now even more compact thanks to 2D image expansion. With impressive image quality and a more compact optical engine, the company is poised to have a leading display solution for truly glasses-sized AR headsets.

2D expansion adds an additional light bounce to expand the image, allowing for a smaller optical engine

Lumus has been touting its Maximus waveguide since as far back as 2017, but since then its waveguide display has improved and shrunk considerably, thanks to so-called ‘2D expansion’ which allows the optical engine (the part of the waveguide display which actually creates the image) to be considerably smaller without sacrificing quality or field of view. The improvements have moved the company’s display solution closer than ever to actually looking and working like a pair of glasses.

For comparison, here’s a look at the first time we saw Maximus back in 2017. It had thin optics and a fairly wide field-of-view, but the optical engine was huge, requiring a large overhead structure.

Photo by Road to VR

The company’s latest Maximus waveguide has shrunk things down considerably with 2D image expansion. That means the light is reflected twice to magnify the image vertically and then horizontally before bouncing it into your eye. Doing so allows the optical engine (where the display and light source are housed) to be much smaller and mounted on the side of the glasses while retaining plenty of peripheral vision.

What you’re seeing here is a fully functional display prototype (ie: working images through the lens, but battery and compute are not on-board) that I got to check out at last week’s AWE 2022.

Here’s a look at how the optical engine has been shrunk when moving from 1D expansion to 2D expansion. It’s clear to see how much easier it would be to fit the left one into something you could really call glasses.

Lumus waveguide and optical engine with 2D expansion (left) and 1D expansion (right)

Actually looking through the prototype glasses you can see a reasonably wide 50° field-of-view, but more importantly an impressively uniform image, both in color and clarity. By comparison similar devices like HoloLens 2 and Magic Leap tend to have hazy color inconsistency which often shows a faint rainbow haze from one side of the view to the other. Our friend Karl Guttag captured a great through-the-lens comparison from a similar Lumus prototype:

Image courtesy Karl Guttag

Brightness in the Lumus Maximus glasses is also a major advantage, so much so that these glasses don’t need to dim the incoming light at all, compared to many other AR headsets and glasses that have sunglasses-levels of tinting in order to make the virtual image appear more solid against even ambient indoor light. Lumus says this Maximus prototype goes up to 3,000 nits which is usable in broad daylight.

The lack of heavy tinting also means other people can see your eyes just as easily as if you were wearing regular glasses, which is an important social consideration (wearing sunglasses indoors, or otherwise hiding your eyes, has a connotation of untrustworthiness).

The image through the glasses is also quite crisp; the waveguide is paired with a 1,440 × 1,440 microdisplay which resolves small text fairly well given that it’s packed into a 50° field-of-view. The company says the waveguide in no way limits the potential resolution—all that’s needed is a higher resolution microdisplay. In fact the company has previously shown off a similar version of this prototype with a 2,048 × 2,048 display, which was measured to achieve a retina resolution of 60 pixels per-degree.

Lumus’ waveguide offerings clearly have a lot of advantages compared to contemporaries, especially with overall image quality, brightness, and social acceptability. The big question at this point is… why aren’t we seeing them in consumer products yet?

The answer is multifaceted (if anyone from Lumus is reading this, yes, that’s an intentional pun). For one, what Lumus is showing here is a display prototype, which means the displays are functional, but the glasses themselves have none of the other stuff you need for a pair of standalone AR glasses (ie: battery, compute, and sensors). You can of course offload the compute and battery into a tethered ‘puck’ design, but this significantly reduces the consumer appeal. So those other components still require some miniaturization R&D to be done before everything can fit comfortably into this form-factor.

Another reason is manufacturing costs. Lumus insists that its waveguide solutions can be affordably manufactured at large scales—even for consumer-priced products—and has the backing of major electronics manufacturer Quanta Computer and glass manufacturing specialist Shott. But manufacturing at small scale may not be reasonably affordable when it comes to a device priced for the consumer market. That means waiting until a big player is ready to place a big bet on bringing an AR device to consumers.

For Lumus’ part, the company says it has been working closely with several so-called ‘tier-1’ technology companies (a category which would include Facebook, Apple, Google, and others) for years now. Lumus expects to see the first major consumer product incorporating its waveguide solution in 2024.

The post Hands-on: Lumus Prototype AR Glasses Are Smaller & Better Than Ever appeared first on Road to VR.

Lumus Release Infographic That Shows AR Technology Is Not Just For Gaming

Augmented reality (AR) company Lumus, who last year entered a partnership with Quanta to create consumer AR optics, have released a detailed infographic that reveals the current trends within the AR sector.

Lumus Infographic 01

As technology continues to become more accessible with new solutions offering more affordable solutions for consumers and content creators, the adoption rate of AR has raised greatly in the last year alone. Now, Lumus have released an inforgraphic which explores an umber of different areas within the sector to showcase just how far the industry has come and what the future might hold.

With the title message that “AR is not just for gaming anymore” the infographic lists some of the biggest industries for AR by potential 2025 revenue. Though videogames sits at the top with an impressive $11.6 billion (USD) this is followed by health care and engineering with $5.1 billion and $4.7 billion respectively. Most interesting from the potential revenue side of things is that military and education sit at the bottom end of the scale with $1.4 billion and $7 million respectively.

“The big players in consumer tech are making huge bets and putting serious capital and human resources into their AR product roadmaps. This IS a race. No one wants to be last but no one also wants to deliver a product that is less than “Wow, how do I ever live without this?” either. No one wants to be the Newton, and EVERYONE wants to be the iPhone” Ari Grobman, CEO, Lumus.

Lumus Infographic 02

The second section of the infographic explores where AR technology is going within a number of different sectors. The real estate and home improvement sector, which is expected to have a potential revenue of $2.6 billion (USD) in 2025, is using the technology to help consumers visualize what products might look like in their home. In 2016 it is reported that 51% of consumers put off home improvements because they couldn’t imagine what the finished product would look like. With apps like the IKEA Place app, consumers can see if a product is right for them before even ordering it.

In the medical sector, which is expected to have a revenue of $5.1 billion by 2025, is seeing AR solutions being used to aid in detection and treatment of many conditions. It is reported that 24% of technology insiders expect to see the most advancements for AR technology within the healthcare sector. Solutions like AccuVein allow for projects of veins allow for nurses and doctors to more easily find them on their first try. This is in response to the 40% miss rate on first attempts of IVS.

The full infographic can be viewed on Lumus’ website and offers interesting insights into the potential future of the AR industry. With more people adopting to the technology the only way for the industry to go is up from here on out.

For more on immersive technology in the future keep reading VRFocus.

Bericht: Apple-Zulieferer Quanta lizensiert AR-Linsen für günstige Brillen

Quanta ist ein langjähriger Hardware-Herrsteller für Apple und andere große Anbieter von Elektronik-Produkten. Einem Bericht von Bllomberg nach hat der Zulieferer ein Lizenabkommen mit dem AR-Komponenten-Entwickler Lumus Ltd. verhandelt, um Linsen für eine AR-Brille zu fertigen. Sie sollen besonders günstig produziert werden können und komplette AR-Headsets ermöglichen, die nicht teurer als Premium-Smartphones sein könnten.

Lumus: Günstige AR-Linsen durch Lizenz für Quanta

Die gewöhnlicherweise gut informierte Quelle Bloomberg hat Details zu einem Deal zwischen Quanta und Lumus veröffentlicht, die einen Ausblick auf die AR-Pläne von Apple werfen sollen. Das taiwanische Unternehmen Quanta fertigt für etliche Firmen Hardware, beispielsweise für Apple, Dell, Lenovo und Sony. Ein Lizenz-Abkommen mit dem AR-Hersteller Lumus Ltd. sieht vor, dass das israelische Unternehmen seine AR-Linsen an den Groß-Fertiger lizensiert. Quanta könnte die Hardware dann an andere Technologie-Unternehmen verkaufen. Letztes Jahr hat das taiwanische Unternehmen 45 Millionen US-Dollar in Lumus investiert.

Der CEO von Lumus – Ari Grobman – äußert sich zu dem Deal: „Das bedeutet, dass der teuerste Teil einer AR-Brille nun zu einem erschwinglichen Preis produziert werden kann, was den Endkundenpreis für AR-Brillen effektiv verringert. Quanta denkt, dass ein vollständiges AR Headset weniger kosten könnte als ein High-End-Smartphone. Das ist eine große Sache.“

Vrvana und T288

In letzter Zeit verdichten sich die Gerüchte um eine AR-Brille von Apple. So hat das Unternehmen aus Cupertino vor kurzer Zeit das Start-up Vrvana für 30 US-Millionen gekauft. Das Unternehmen entwickelte das Totem Headset, das wir 2015 auf der gamescom in Augenschein nehmen konnten. Der VR-Prototyp verfügte bereits über ein Inside-Out-Tracking, was seinerzeit allerdings noch nicht einwandfrei funktionierte.

Zuvor hatte Bloomberg bereits berichtet, dass Apple an einer AR-Brille unter dem Code Namen T288 arbeitet. Demnach könnte sie im Jahr 2019 fertig sein und 2020 auf den Markt kommen. Sie soll mit rOS ein eigenes Betriebssystem erhalten, erste Früchte der Entwicklung war Apples ARKit, das Teil von iOS 11 ist und eine bessere Augmented-Reality-Erfahrung auch ohne zusätzliche Hardware ermöglicht.

(Quelle: Bloomberg)

Der Beitrag Bericht: Apple-Zulieferer Quanta lizensiert AR-Linsen für günstige Brillen zuerst gesehen auf VR∙Nerds. VR·Nerds am Werk!

Lumus and Quanta Enter Partnership to Create Consumer AR Optics

With augmented reality (AR) gaining ground on virtual reality (VR) as a technology to take notice of, developer of transparent AR displays, Lumus has announced a new agreement with Quanta Computer to license several AR optical engine models which could help in the mainstream adoption of AR eyewear.

Lumus has licensed several of its advanced optical engines to Quanta in an agreement to produce and market AR headsets featuring “Lumus Inside.” Under this agreement, Quanta will also be mass producing Lumus optical engines for other Tier 1 ODMs and consumer tech brands.

LUMUS

“This is truly an historic deal. In years to come, when we look back at the major events along the timeline toward mass adoption of augmented reality, we believe this will be recognized as a pivotal moment,” Lumus CEO Ari Grobman said in a statement. “We’re excited to be partnering with Quanta, which is one of the world’s most trusted technology ODMs, as this will allow Lumus optics to meet mass consumer market price points and bring AR glasses to the masses.”

“Quanta Computer is a big believer in AR market opportunities, and this partnership with Lumus allows us to lead the next generation of computing that augmented reality represents,” says C.C. Leung, Vice Chairman and President of Quanta Computer. “Our confidence in Lumus’ high-performance optics compelled us to become a partner to incorporate their technology into future optical engine applications. We look forward to leveraging our manufacturing expertise in building AR, VR and MR hardware as part of a very successful collaboration.”

Quanta-built AR headsets with Lumus optics are expected to be available on the consumer market within the next 12 to 18 months.

The deal follows Quanta’s investment in Lumus in November 2016, when the AR firm completed a series C funding round, raising $45 million USD, helping continue development of the Lumus DK-50 smartglasses and its patented Light-guide Optical Element (LOE) waveguide.

VRFocus will continue its coverage of Lumus, keeping you up to date to the latest announcements.