A Real Life HUD: The Vuzix Raptyr

The one gadget that I want above all others and it is very simple, but extremely powerful.  All of these monitors and screens and gadgets in our life could be replaced with the single gadget that would rule them all, a wearable HUD.  Personally, I'm not interested in the hardware as long as it works, but once it is out there it will be impossible to prevent me from developing software for a functional HUD.

There have been some baby steps towards creating a HUD, but it looks like some major progress was announced at CES 2011.  The Raptyr glasses by Vuzix won the CES Innovation Award.

The details seem to be sparse, but they are see through and seem to be exactly what I am looking for, or at least an early model.  Hopefully more details including price become available later this year.  I would be partial to an Android based interface since I already have an Android phone and experience developing on that platform.  The important part of the augmented reality component would be overlaying information on real world objects.  While truly accurately versions of a HUD overlay is still years away, I'm excited to see the progress that some companies are making.

Raptyr is the world’s first sunglass style  Video Eyewear that is designed specifically for the wide variety of Augmented Reality  applications  that are in development  for consumer, commercial, medical, educational, gaming and defense markets. It provides a natural and easy to use interface to applications and  it  is a very powerful  platform that offers a personalized and mobile home-theatre experience that enables digital content to be mixed into a real worldview. Today Raptyr is compatible only with  devices with VGA and USB  interfaces. Future enhancements to the product will include HDMI compatibility and connectivity for mobile devices such as the iPhone and Android phones.  Initial markets for Raptyr will be commercial and research applications.  As enhancements are made to Raptyr and as sales volumes increase, the company expects  consumer applications to become available.

The real inspiration for a HUD comes from the books Daemon and Freedom.  Hopefully we are only a few years away from a fully wearable computer system.