Combination Optical/Electronic Viewfinder

Talk about Head Mounted Displays (HMDs), augmented reality, wearable computing, controller hardware, haptic feedback, motion tracking, and related topics here!
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PalmerTech
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Combination Optical/Electronic Viewfinder

Post by PalmerTech »

Some cameras have optical viewfinders, which use a mirror system to see what the lens sees, and other use an electronic viewfinder, which uses a microdisplay to show what the camera sensor is showing. Obviously, a real world optical view is better quality than the EVF, but an EVF gives you a lot more features in terms of information display.

Head mounted displays have the same factors, for augmented reality applications. Check this out:
http://www.finepix-x100.com/en/x100/hybrid-viewfinder" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

It supports just optical, overlay, or full electronic view. Pretty much perfect for augmented reality, or wearable computing (Since in theory, an HMD using this kind of tech would not occlude any of your field of view when off, and would allow for easy overlay of information).

Not an HMD, not looking like it will be in one anytime soon, but fun to see that the tech is out there in pretty high quality form.
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cybereality
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Re: Combination Optical/Electronic Viewfinder

Post by cybereality »

Yeah, I was reading about that. Looks like the concept could be very useful for an augmented-reality based HMD. So even if there are no plans to integrate it into HMDs right now, the idea is out there. Someone could make it happen.
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