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North Focals

A project log for Mica Sunglasses

Muscovite Optics

david-troetschelDavid Troetschel 07/18/2019 at 21:573 Comments

John Cecil and I went to the North pop-up-shop today to demo the Focals.

First contact

The inspection

Overview:

Wearing

I had a lot of trouble seeing the screen until I tried on John's pair and got it calibrated. There is very little perspective, but colors look good. Refresh rate seems okay? I noticed some strobe effect, but mainly as the eye looks around.

Definitely looks better from the side.

Scanner for sizing:

After some processing, a 3D model for sizing. They had me wear a head band to keep stuff away from my ears.

Huge charging case.

Tortoise shell frames:

Lots of people stopped to ask questions:

Overall; we both agreed that as much as these really seem to work, they're not quite there yet. At-least for me, I think that only true AR or spatial computing will convince people to make the jump. $600USD+ is a too much for what is really just a perceived .25" see through smartphone or smart-watch screen. I did try to access the language learning app, which was thankfully easy to find and activate.... but, it took too long to boot (over five minutes) so I had to give up. The pop-ups were pretty distracting, maybe more-so than a normal phone even. The controller was surprisingly easy to use. Other people might not see the display but they will definitely notice some weird eye movement. John noticed that the projector got a little warm during use, but it seemed within normal limits. Knowing the realities of producing something like this, the price is probably fair while something like Magic Leap is actually under-priced. Considering the market; North is probably safe for now, but as more products come out North will have to expand their devices functionality or suffer getting left behind.

Following photos are from John Cecil:

Nice!

Discussions

Richard Hogben wrote 07/18/2019 at 22:01 point

Interesting, frame balance seems a bit off with the large legs.

Did the last sentence above get cut off? "Overall; we both agreed that as much as these really seem to work, even..."

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David Troetschel wrote 07/18/2019 at 22:07 point

Sorry, was mid-post. Finished now. Frame balance was actually fine, maybe they are leaving room for expansion? Felt pretty light. When you look at something like Nreal... same form factor or better and just a little more things. But tethered to an external processing unit. These are indeed early-adopter devices.

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Richard Hogben wrote 07/18/2019 at 22:13 point

Got it. Also I noticed a few of your logs follow the photo/text, format. Wondering if you have seen the Hackaday photo/log app? It's available for ios and android any feedback to improve it is welcome :)

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