Canon’s quirky new lenses help you create content for Apple Vision Pro and VR

Mixed reality platforms try to seamlessly blend physical and digital objects, but our current technologies have their limits. You can, for example, view a regular photo or video in this virtual world, but it’d be like seeing a TV float in front of you. Such content doesn’t fully convey the power and the possibilities offered by these technologies, for which you’ll require specialized tools that are often well beyond the reach of even the majority of professional content creators. Fortunately, the industry landscape is changing, and more accessible tools are becoming available, like this pair of Canon lenses recording at creating stereoscopic 3D photos and videos that don’t require you to buy a new camera, provided you already have a compatible Canon model.

Designer: Canon

To create a stereoscopic 3D video effect that doesn’t look fake, you’ll naturally need either multiple cameras working in sync or one that records in 3D from the get-go. Since there isn’t a huge demand for the latter, 3D or spatial cameras are rare and expensive. More importantly, they require you to set aside your existing cameras and settle for something unfamiliar and potentially less capable than your pro DSLR or mirrorless camera.

Canon’s solution is to actually equip its interchangeable lens cameras with optics designed to take photos or record videos directly in stereoscopic 3D or spatial video. This does mean using two lenses, which is what the upcoming RF-S7.8mm F4 STM DUAL lens will bring to the table. Details are still slim on this particular lens, other than it’s designed with the Apple Vision Pro in mind, particularly its new Immersive Video capability. Best of all, this lens is compatible with existing cameras, though only the Canon EOS R7 has been named so far.

The RF-S7.8mm F4 STM DUAL lens is, of course, also compatible with Canon’s own EOS VR system, as is a slightly odder RF-S3.9mm F3.5 STM DUAL FISHEYE lens, also for the Canon EOS R7. As the name implies, the lenses for this module are farther apart, allowing for a wider field of vision and a deeper 3D effect. It does make your camera look weird and could potentially block easy access to the grip or buttons on the front of the camera.

At $1,099, the RF-S3.9mm F3.5 STM DUAL FISHEYE isn’t exactly cheap, but it’s also within reach of pro content creators. More importantly, they won’t need to buy another camera and can stick to the powerful Canon EOS R7, presuming they already own this model. The price for the RF-S7.8mm F4 STM DUAL for the Apple Vision Pro will most likely be revealed closer to its launch this Fall.

The post Canon’s quirky new lenses help you create content for Apple Vision Pro and VR first appeared on Yanko Design.

Blackmagic Spatial Camera for Apple Vision Pro looks like a mini spacecraft

A lot of the focus at Apple’s WWDC event has so far revolved around the cleverly named Apple Intelligence and its features for iPhones and iPads. Of course, that’s hardly the only thing the company talked about this week, and one of its more highly debated products did get its fair share of attention as well. Although the initial hype seems to have died down and complaints about the device’s comfort have popped up here and there, Apple is showing that the Vision Pro is still going strong and growing strong, expanding not only its features but also its reach to other markets. In fact, Apple has just revealed how the platform will become an even bigger space thanks to devices that will let creators design content specifically for visionOS, like this two-eyed camera that looks more like a miniature version of a space-faring cargo ship.

Designer: Blackmagic Design

One of the strengths of Apple’s spatial computing platform is the seamless fusion of the physical and digital worlds, which means plain two-dimensional objects like apps and photos look almost natural while floating in the air in front of you. Of course, that doesn’t take full advantage of the strengths of the Vision Pro headset, which requires crafting content designed specifically for it. For that, you’ll also need the right tools for the job, and the upcoming Blackmagic URSA Cine Immersive camera is one such new device made especially for Apple’s visionOS.

Like any camera system designed to capture stereoscopic 3D content, be it photos or videos, this Blackmagic Design spatial camera has two “eyes,” each of which boasts 8160×7200 sensor. The camera also has 16 dynamic range stops for better color quality and accuracy, and it supports recording 3D video at 90fps rates. This imaging is made possible with Blackmagic’s own RAW format as well as the built-in Blackmagic Media Module that provides 8TB of high-performance network storage. In theory, this would allow creators to record over two hours of 8K stereoscopic 3D immersive video in that high-quality format.

The camera’s design itself is as distinctive as its features. Made with a robust magnesium alloy chassis and lightweight carbon fiber polycarbonate composite skin, the camera is designed to keep up with filmmakers, regardless of where inspiration takes them. The URSA Cine Immersive’s blocky yet sleek aesthetic gives it a retro-futuristic flavor reminiscent of the design for spaceships in films and TV shows from the 80s and 90s. Add to the fact that it can be mounted beneath a drone for aerial shots, you shouldn’t be surprised if it gets mistaken for a UFO from afar.

The Blackmagic URSA Cine Immersive camera and an upcoming update to the famed Da Vinci Resolve Studio software are some of the first tools designed for Apple’s new Immersive Video format for visionOS. This is just one of the new features that are coming to the Vision Pro, including the ability to turn any plain 2D image into a spatial photo, with no additional hardware or software required. The Vision Pro headset is also being made available to more countries this month, which will hopefully increase the testing of the headset’s design and its features to help future iterations of Apple’s spatial computing platform.

The post Blackmagic Spatial Camera for Apple Vision Pro looks like a mini spacecraft first appeared on Yanko Design.

Blackmagic Spatial Camera for Apple Vision Pro looks like a mini spacecraft

A lot of the focus at Apple’s WWDC event has so far revolved around the cleverly named Apple Intelligence and its features for iPhones and iPads. Of course, that’s hardly the only thing the company talked about this week, and one of its more highly debated products did get its fair share of attention as well. Although the initial hype seems to have died down and complaints about the device’s comfort have popped up here and there, Apple is showing that the Vision Pro is still going strong and growing strong, expanding not only its features but also its reach to other markets. In fact, Apple has just revealed how the platform will become an even bigger space thanks to devices that will let creators design content specifically for visionOS, like this two-eyed camera that looks more like a miniature version of a space-faring cargo ship.

Designer: Blackmagic Design

One of the strengths of Apple’s spatial computing platform is the seamless fusion of the physical and digital worlds, which means plain two-dimensional objects like apps and photos look almost natural while floating in the air in front of you. Of course, that doesn’t take full advantage of the strengths of the Vision Pro headset, which requires crafting content designed specifically for it. For that, you’ll also need the right tools for the job, and the upcoming Blackmagic URSA Cine Immersive camera is one such new device made especially for Apple’s visionOS.

Like any camera system designed to capture stereoscopic 3D content, be it photos or videos, this Blackmagic Design spatial camera has two “eyes,” each of which boasts 8160×7200 sensor. The camera also has 16 dynamic range stops for better color quality and accuracy, and it supports recording 3D video at 90fps rates. This imaging is made possible with Blackmagic’s own RAW format as well as the built-in Blackmagic Media Module that provides 8TB of high-performance network storage. In theory, this would allow creators to record over two hours of 8K stereoscopic 3D immersive video in that high-quality format.

The camera’s design itself is as distinctive as its features. Made with a robust magnesium alloy chassis and lightweight carbon fiber polycarbonate composite skin, the camera is designed to keep up with filmmakers, regardless of where inspiration takes them. The URSA Cine Immersive’s blocky yet sleek aesthetic gives it a retro-futuristic flavor reminiscent of the design for spaceships in films and TV shows from the 80s and 90s. Add to the fact that it can be mounted beneath a drone for aerial shots, you shouldn’t be surprised if it gets mistaken for a UFO from afar.

The Blackmagic URSA Cine Immersive camera and an upcoming update to the famed Da Vinci Resolve Studio software are some of the first tools designed for Apple’s new Immersive Video format for visionOS. This is just one of the new features that are coming to the Vision Pro, including the ability to turn any plain 2D image into a spatial photo, with no additional hardware or software required. The Vision Pro headset is also being made available to more countries this month, which will hopefully increase the testing of the headset’s design and its features to help future iterations of Apple’s spatial computing platform.

The post Blackmagic Spatial Camera for Apple Vision Pro looks like a mini spacecraft first appeared on Yanko Design.

Meet the world’s first Augmented Reality Laptop – the Spacetop G1

The problem with the Vision Pro, aside from its shocking price tag, is it claims to replace the laptop – a device that has been perfected over decades to be the perfect productivity machine for on-the-go workers. Laptops didn’t need replacing (nobody I know has had a complaint that their laptop wasn’t spatial enough), and honestly, they’re the perfect form factor for the job they do, which is why the Vision Pro may not be the ideal device to replace them… but that doesn’t mean a spatial laptop isn’t a good idea. Meet the Spacetop, a hybrid ‘laptop’ that fills the gap between the conventional Laptop and the Vision Pro. It’s slim, light, affordable, and gives you a traditional laptop experience with an augmented reality twist.

Designer: Sightful

The Spacetop G1 comes from the minds of the folks at Sightful, who believe AR/VR may be the future of work, but current headsets aren’t. The Spacetop G1 is a unique AR laptop that ditches the display for a set of AR glasses. Pop them in and you’ve got yourself a screen that’s wider than your FoV, and the fact that the Spacetop G1 still packs a keyboard and a trackpad means being able to work on a laptop, but just in AR.

The format is very unique, but isn’t surprising. Most AR/VR headsets come with remotes, and are targeted towards entertainment and immersion. The fact that the Spacetop G1 opts for a close-to-laptop-style format means there’s less of a learning curve. Pop the glasses in, have multiple virtual screens unfold in front of you, and begin working. The Spacetop G1 boasts a massive 100-inch virtual workspace, shattering the limitations of traditional laptops. Imagine working on documents, browsing the web, or editing videos on a virtual canvas that feels like a home theater screen. This expansive workspace allows for effortless multitasking and a truly immersive computing experience.

Given its spiritual closeness to a laptop, the Spacetop G1 is designed to be slim enough to fit right into backpacks without any problem. The keyboard and trackpad are as thin as the kind you’d find on most conventional laptops, while the ‘lid’ houses a pair of AR glasses that fold down to a slick format. They aren’t as bulky and cumbersome as the Vision Pro, Hololens, or any of Meta’s headsets, making it less clunky to wear and making you less awkward around other people. Your eyes still perceive the environment around you too, so you’re not completely blocked out of the outer world.

Under the hood, the Spacetop G1 packs a powerful punch. A Qualcomm chipset delivers a 70% performance boost over previous models, ensuring smooth operation even with demanding tasks. With a commendable 8-hour battery life, you can work uninterrupted throughout your workday, or even work in AR while on a train or flight without missing your multi-display setup. The 90Hz refresh rate of the optics translates to crisp and responsive visuals, further enhancing the user experience.

The presence of a 100-inch workspace just means being able to do more with less. You can multitask effortlessly, having various windows within your periphery that you can move around, bring forward, or push backward. Important tasks can occupy the center of your attention. Other windows can lounge in the back or in the corners, still letting you see them if/when you need them.

That being said, the AR laptop doesn’t come cheap. It’s available for pre-order at $1900, which is significantly higher than your conventional laptop, but factoring in the AR aspect makes the price more palatable. After all, you’d spend a lot more on a laptop along with a widescreen/multiscreen layout. The fact that the Vision Pro costs a whopping $3499 is also something that makes the case for the Spacetop G1. Shipments of the Spacetop G1 start as soon as October 2024. Early adopters can secure their unit with a $100 reservation.

The post Meet the world’s first Augmented Reality Laptop – the Spacetop G1 first appeared on Yanko Design.

Acer SpatialLabs Eyes 3D camera adds a new dimension to meetings and live streams

Although the buzz around the Apple Vision Pro has died down, there’s little doubt that spatial computing, mixed reality, and the metaverse will be our unavoidable future. We still have ways to go, of course, but the industry is already trying to get us used to seeing digitally in 3D, whether we’re wearing glasses or just looking at specially-designed monitors. Those 3D objects, however, don’t just pop out of thin air and have to be created one way or another. Not a problem for fabricated 3D models, but it’s a big problem when you want to make real-world physical objects into believable digital 3D objects. As part of its own push for spatial computing, Acer is launching a consumer-friendly stereoscopic 3D camera that lets anyone capture the real world in a way that can be easily viewed in 3D glasses and on glasses-free 3D monitors.

Designer: Acer

Video conferencing and live streams have become quite common these days, the latter even turning into a lucrative business opportunity. But while these mediums are able to bridge distances, there are some things that are still difficult to convey in flat, 2D monitors, things such as miniature models of architectural designs or merchandise you’re trying to sell online. While some online stores now offer 3D views of products or spaces, it’s something that’s way out of reach of regular people because of the lack of accessible and affordable tools.

The Acer SpatialLabs Eyes puts one such tool in the hands of the masses. The rather unassuming compact box packs the hardware necessary for a computer to see in stereoscopic 3D, especially thanks to an 8MP sensor per eye and plenty of controls for both beginners and experts to tweak the video quality. The hardware is encased in a weather-proof shell that has a built-in selfie mirror for easier framing, as well as a touch-sensitive LCD screen on its back.

Although the SpatialLabs Eyes is quite capable of capturing still 3D images, it really shines in its capability to record and stream stereoscopic 3D video in real-time. This makes it a powerful tool for making presentations in video calls, showing off products during live selling streams, or simply committing special, once-in-a-lifetime moments to memory in an extra special way. Of course, you’ll need a way to actually view these videos in stereoscopic 3D, and, not by coincidence, Acer’s SpatialLabs brand has a line of monitors and laptops that won’t require you to wear headsets or even glasses just to do that. The Acer SpatialLabs Eyes stereoscopic 3D camera launches in Q3 of this year for $549 in the US.

The post Acer SpatialLabs Eyes 3D camera adds a new dimension to meetings and live streams first appeared on Yanko Design.

This ‘Office VR Headset’ focuses on productivity without cutting the real world out

Immersive VR is great for entertainment… but for work, not that much. The idea is to be able to interact with spatial elements, but not have them completely cut you off from the real world. Just the way a laptop screen or desktop monitor offers you only with a window of productivity but still gives you the option of stepping away to attend meetings, talk to coworkers, or take notes/make doodles, this VR headset concept from Umeå Institute of Design student Simon Ljungblahd lets you easily switch between real and spatial life.

The VR headset features a familiar design, but instead of having screens strapped to your eyes, this one mounts them on a visor-style hinge that you can flip upwards when not in use, allowing yourself to engage with the real world. Meanwhile, a screen on front acts much like the one found on the Vision Pro, giving people around you a sense of your status, whether you’re busy, free, or even when you’re up for a coffee break!

Designer: Simon Ljungblahd

The headset’s design is relatively lightweight, with a display unit that doesn’t need to be bulky because it doesn’t wrap around your eyes, cutting light from the outside world out. It sits ahead of you almost like a HUD (Heads-up Display), giving you the spatial experience just within a portion of your PoV, like a desktop monitor would. Except, you can move your head around to see more of the spatial environment around you. Or look through the corner of your eye to see the real world. When you want to quickly leave the simulation, flip the headset up and you’re out of virtual reality.

“As screen resolution on these devices increases, the use-case of work, or productivity, becomes more interesting as it enables users to view interfaces with a high density of information, which is necessary for that use-case. Spatial Computing would allow users to have a full 360-degree interface and with depth, which would enable much richer multi-tasking,” says Simon. “The depth aspect would also potentially create more intuitive interfaces when it comes to use cases like 3D modeling, or map viewing. The Spatial Computing headsets that are made for entertainment, social experiences, and simulations are designed to optimize the user experience for those use-cases, but so far, no headset on the market is made to focus solely on the use-case of productivity.”

The headset is unique in that it offers the best of both VR headsets and desktop monitors. VR headsets keep you locked in an environment that can affect your productivity by cutting the real world out, but also give you a sense of fatigue with too much use. Laptops and desktop monitors, on the other hand, don’t give you unlimited virtual space for multiple tabs/windows and the ability to work in 3D. Simon’s design therefore strikes a clever balance between the two. Besides, I love the idea of the display on the front of my headset being used to let others know whether I’m busy, free, or up for a quick break in between work sessions!

The post This ‘Office VR Headset’ focuses on productivity without cutting the real world out first appeared on Yanko Design.

Sony Teases Futuristic Phones and PlayStation Controllers for the Coming Years

“Ten years from now, we will be living in a more multi-layered world where physical and virtual realities overlap without boundaries,” says the entertainment and hardware company. With the number of pies they’ve got their fingers in (you remember they even announced a car a few years ago?), it makes sense for Sony to operate not one but ten steps ahead to make sure they’re leaders in every single industry they’re in. That even means condensing a home theater to a size small enough to fit around your neck). Today, the company unveiled their Creative Entertainment Vision, a demonstration or visualization of what Sony wants the future to look like. It’s a practice that a lot of companies do, helping consumers, investors, and even competitors understand what direction technology and innovation are going to go in. Sony doubles down on mixed reality and spatial entertainment in this segment (they aren’t, after all, an enterprise or productivity company), showcasing a few unique concepts that feature holographic floating screens, absurdly futuristic gaming controllers, and super-slim spectacles that transform into AR eyewear.

Designer: Sony

Somewhere around the 1-minute and 12-second mark, Sony reveals a few very interesting concepts. One of them is what looks like a futuristic PlayStation controller with its own holographic screen. The controller itself looks familiar yet nothing like any controller we’ve seen. It features a hollow center with two grips on each end. The center is supposedly where the holograph projects out of, while thumb-pads on the left and right come with unusual controls to help maneuver the game. The controller is also space-aware and can be tilted as a means of input.

Another concept was a tablet that looks like, as Apple likes to call their iPad, a slab of magic glass. Except, this does feel like glass and the experience is tantamount to magic. There are no bezels, no cameras, not even any perceived electronics. The glass is transparent when the screen is off, and translucent when you’re watching stuff, so you can still see through it.

The third is an extension of Sony’s tablet vision, but in the form of a smartphone. According to Sony, the future of phones isn’t rectangular slabs of glass, it’s capsule-shaped oval slabs of glass. I don’t know what that says for the future of videos and TikTok, but this new form of screen real estate feels unique for sure. Sony displays a music interface on this mobile device, with album art practically existing from edge to edge. The games, videos, and music in all the concepts above are connected to Sony’s hit PlayStation game Horizon Zero Dawn.

These concepts are also coupled with a set of AR glasses that completely immerse you in a virtual world. As slim as a pair of sunglasses albeit with ski goggle-style eyepieces, this concept piece offers a kind of immersion even the Vision Pro can’t promise. You’re turned into a full-body AI avatar, immersed in a virtual world that exists separate from reality. Made more for entertainment, it lets you play games, interact with people, or even see movies in a way that you never have before. Sony even previews a scene where the city’s streets are filled with ghosts and a giant Pillsbury Dough Boy trods across buildings, lifted right out of the Ghostbusters movie.

While these concepts don’t specifically confirm what Sony plans to release in the near future, it’s important to understand their ‘vision’ of what’s to come. Ideas change based on consumer feedback and technological innovation, but in an ideal world, Sony believes the future will be about crafting new and wonderful realities, and living in stories instead of watching or playing them.

The post Sony Teases Futuristic Phones and PlayStation Controllers for the Coming Years first appeared on Yanko Design.

VR controller concept for artists and designers offer a more intuitive design

The Apple Vision Pro’s take on spatial computing would have us imagine a seamless integration of the physical and digital worlds. That dream of the future is shared by virtual, augmented, and mixed reality technologies, and they almost deliver that promise when it comes to the visual aspect. The illusion, however, breaks when you start interacting with and manipulating those virtual entities, an experience that quickly becomes less natural compared to how we do it with physical objects. The problem lies in the tools we use for this, which are often a game controller or two sticks that function in the same way. This concept for a virtual reality controller tries to reshape that standard design into something that, while still technically the same, offers a more familiar form for artists and designers.

Designer: Jiwoong Yan

When you think about it, it’s almost amazing how digital creatives are able to make do with the input tools available to use in the present. At the very least, a stylus approximates the experience of drawing with a pen on paper, though some people are even able to create mind-blowing art using a keyboard and a mouse. On the one hand, it’s pretty convenient that we don’t have to deal with a dozen different pens, brushes, and other tools when creating digital art, but, at the same time, the disconnect between the tool and the desired outcome is often jarring.

This is especially true in a world that tries to have some fidelity with reality like VR. It’s even worse because it makes us believe we’re seeing virtual objects we can touch, but we can never really touch them and have to be satisfied with pointing and clicking with both hands. Medium is a concept design that offers a compelling compromise for artists and designers. It still has that same two-piece approach that puts a controller in each hand, but ones that are designed to actually mimic the tools that artists would be familiar with.

The right hand, for example, can be held either like a paintbrush or a can of spray paint, and the handle can be rotated to accommodate different ways people hold these tools. The left-hand controller, on the other hand (no pun intended), is like a painter’s palette, though it will probably show more than just colors in the virtual representation that you’ll see through VR glasses. Using these two pieces might feel intuitive for some artists familiar with painting, with the “palette” providing tools and options for the “brush” that you draw with.

Such a design is theoretically already possible with today’s technologies, but it requires a manufacturer to take the risk of actually producing a device that might appeal only to a small segment of VR users. But with these companies trying to push mixed reality and spatial computing harder, it might only be a matter of time before more specialized variants of controllers become available, at least as a stopgap measure until we can directly manipulate those virtual worlds with nothing but our hands.

The post VR controller concept for artists and designers offer a more intuitive design first appeared on Yanko Design.

The Apple Vision Pro is already playing a critical role in the Automotive, Filmmaking, and Healthcare industry

Who knew that Porsche would become the Vision Pro’s most valuable customer?!

Addressing people for the first time since the Vision Pro went on sale in March, Tim Cook decided to give viewers an update of the Vision Pro’s success during this year’s iPad keynote. Although it isn’t clear exactly how many spatial headsets the company sold so far, although the Vision Pro is surely finding its footing in certain industries beyond just the average movie-watching and multi-screen workspace scenarios that Apple sold us on back at WWDC last year when the headset was first announced.

Cook mentioned that the Vision Pro is already becoming a crucial part of Porsche’s showroom experience, with the automotive giant investing heavily in building spatial experience centers around the Vision Pro and their cars. Prospective buyers can wear the Vision Pro to easily and quickly see all the car’s color options in virtual reality instead of looking at images or swatches in a catalog. The Vision Pro’s incredibly high resolution displays help customers experience the car in ways that were never though possible, allowing Porsche to provide a new dimension to their showroom’s UX in ways that other car companies cannot. Additionally, the headset also enables track experiences, and can also be used to train service technicians, harnessing the true power of Spatial Computing. Quite like the Apple Watch eventually settled into becoming a healthcare device, even though the company originally wanted it to be a fashion-tech wearable, the Vision Pro is only now finding its footing months after its announcement and delivery.

What’s remarkable is that Apple’s Vision Pro managed to breach the filmmaking industry and the healthcare industry just months after being delivered – something that Meta hasn’t really spoken at length about when it comes to their devices, and something that Microsoft’s own Hololens has taken years to achieve (at least in the healthcare and military research industries). Cook spoke about Dr. Tommy Korn, using the Vision Pro to improve surgical eye care through simulations and visualizations, while director Jon M. Chu was using the Vision Pro to oversee the entire post-production process for his upcoming film Wicked.

While entertainment and healthcare seemed like sure shot areas where the Vision Pro would create some form of procedural disruption, seeing Porsche invest so heavily in reinventing their showroom and technical training domains by relying on Vision Pros is fascinating. It’s been just over 2 months since the first Vision Pro was delivered to customers, so one can only wait and see what updates Apple provides us with over the next few months. The 2024 WWDC will mark the first anniversary of the headset’s announcement, and maybe we’ll get a few more upgrades to the device’s software as well as some updates on its industrywide acceptance. Hopefully even a price drop, perhaps? Or maybe that’s just wishful thinking!

The post The Apple Vision Pro is already playing a critical role in the Automotive, Filmmaking, and Healthcare industry first appeared on Yanko Design.

Overlay next-gen home display wants to skim down multiple display demands with one AR Screen

Thanks to smart home technology integration, we have become dependent on digital displays for communication, infotainment, and even for preparing culinary bites in the kitchen. This means we need multiple displays: one in the family room for entertainment, another in the bathroom to read news and weather updates, one in the study for working from home, and if you’re not a Michelin chef yourself, a display in the kitchen to run the recipe guide for help!

Investing in all such displays, and still having them suffice for only one purpose at one place doesn’t really add up in 2024. If you’re in the same league of thought, Overlay – designed for Samsung – is the “Next Home Display” that wants to skim down the multiple display demand and fill it with one wholesome unit that has mobile roots.

Designers: Susanna Kim

More than an adjustable, mobile display, the Overlay is a sensor-enabled contraption that can move about the house – on preset commands or on call – to suffice a multitude of infotainment objectives and more. The onboard mapping sensors allow the mobile display to map the space and divide it into understandable zones. Users can pin the desired location on the map and set content (entertainment, information, etc) for each pin with a time. For instance, “the user” can pin the dining “table area to watch Netflix” while dining.

When it is time for dinner, the Overlay will automatically arrive at the table and turn on Netflix, as advised. The user can adjust the height of the display to their liking and watch the movie on Netflix without additional setup requirements (it has an integrated speaker system). In case you are too lazy to adjust the height, Overlay is designed to do that automatically for you. Auto height adjusting display rests on a solid base which is equipped with small radius omni-wheels for smooth maneuvering within the mapped space.

It can be teamed up with the TV or other devices in the house as an enlarged display for them. The unit can overlay more information about what you’re watching on TV or stand by the washing machine and give you a heads-up about when it’s time to take them to the dryers. It comes with an AI assistant to take voice commands and has a transparent screen to display match or player statistics when you’re watching a game of football on TV for instance.

Alongside being an omnipresent mobile display, the Overlay comes with motion sensors and LiDAR camera that provide it the ability to identify objects and perhaps provide plant and pet care tips to the user. Over and above monitoring the condition of plants in its mapped space, it can even regulate watering for personalized, automated care. All this functionality demands great power, for which the Overlay is pretty self-sufficient as well. It is powered by a rechargeable battery that it juices up by heading straight to the charging dock when the power is running low (no human intervention required here either). Capable of bringing MR experience to the home, the Overlay is designed in four distinct colors that should complement any home effortlessly.

The post Overlay next-gen home display wants to skim down multiple display demands with one AR Screen first appeared on Yanko Design.