Snap’s new Spectacles 3 don’t
look that different from their predecessors. They consist of a metal designer
frame with a couple of HD cameras. In exchange for the embarrassment of wearing
them, the Spectacles 3 offer the chance to shoot 3D video hands-free and then
upload it to the Snapchat app, where it can be further affected. And that’s
pretty much it. You can’t view the video, or anything else, in the lenses.
There are no embedded displays. Still, the new Spectacles foreshadow a device
that many of us may wear as our primary personal computing device in about 10
years. Based on what I’ve learned by talking AR with technologists in companies
big and small, here is what such a device might look like and do.
Unlike Snap’s new goggles, future
glasses will overlay digital content over the real-world imagery we see through
the lenses. We might even wear mixed reality (MR) glasses that can
realistically intersperse digital content within the layers of the real world
in front of us. The addition of the second camera on the front of the new
Spectacles is important because in order to locate digital imagery within
reality, you need a 3D view of the world, a depth map. The Spectacles derive
depth by combining the input of the two HD cameras on the front, similar to the
way the human eye does it. The Spectacles use that depth mapping to shoot 3D
video to be watched later, but that second camera is also a step toward
supporting mixed reality experiences in real time.
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