Exclusive: We tried Meta's AR glasses with Mark Zuckerberg

Summary

Orion, Meta's AR glasses prototype, offers a glimpse into the future of smart glasses. With a 70-degree field of view and ULED projectors, Orion provides an immersive experience. It features a neural wristband for gesture control, enhancing interaction. Despite its impressive tech, the software is still in early stages, and Meta plans to refine it before a commercial release.

Takeaways

• 🤖 Orion is a prototype AR glasses project from Meta, not intended for commercial sale but to showcase future hardware innovations.
• 👓 The glasses include a neural wristband for control and a wireless compute puck to improve battery life and reduce heat.
• 👀 Navigation is achieved through eye and hand tracking, voice commands, and the neural wristband which interprets neural signals into inputs.
• 📱 The neural wristband uses electromyography to recognize specific hand gestures, providing a new way to interact with AR glasses.
• 🖥 Orion offers a 70-degree field of view, wider than any AR glasses tested, providing a more immersive experience.
• 🔍 The glasses use ULED projectors and wave guide lenses to display graphics, and seven cameras and sensors to anchor virtual objects in the real world.
• 🍹 A demo showcased Meta AI's ability to identify ingredients and suggest recipes, indicating potential uses of AR in everyday tasks.
• 💻 The software is still in early stages, with demos being guided and limited in scope, showing there's room for improvement.
• 🤝 Despite the advanced technology, there were moments where the AR experience felt intrusive or disconnected from reality.
• 🚀 Orion represents Meta's vision for the future of AR glasses and the Metaverse, even if the technology isn't ready for mass-market yet.
• 🔮 Meta is using the prototype to demonstrate the potential of AR glasses and to gather feedback for future development.

Q & A

What is the significance of Meta's Orion AR glasses?

Orion is a prototype that provides a glimpse into the future of smart glasses and Meta's hardware releases. It's not a product for sale but a marker of the direction AR glasses are heading.

What are the three main components of the Orion AR glasses system?

The Orion AR glasses consist of the glasses themselves, a neural wristband for controlling them with finger movements, and a wireless compute puck that offloads app logic to improve battery life and reduce heat.

How does the neural wristband work?

The wristband uses electromyography to interpret neural signals and translate them into input for the glasses. It recognizes specific gestures like pinching fingers to select or invoke menus and swiping to scroll.

What is the field of view like with Orion AR glasses?

Orion offers a 70-degree field of view, which is wider than any AR glasses tried to date. This allows AR graphics to fill more of the user's vision.

How are graphics projected in the Orion AR glasses?

ULED projectors inside the frame beam graphics in front of the user's vision via wave guides in the lenses, which are made of silicon carbide instead of glass.

What role do the cameras and sensors in the Orion frames play?

Seven cameras and sensors in the frames sense the world around the user to anchor virtual objects in space, allowing for a realistic AR experience.

What was the user's experience with the graphics quality in the Orion AR glasses?

While the graphics quality wasn't high enough for watching movies, the user had no problem reading text on a webpage several feet away.

What was a notable demo experience with the Orion AR glasses?

A notable demo involved using Meta AI to identify ingredients for a smoothie and then showing a recipe with instructions, demonstrating the potential intersection of generative AI with AR glasses.

What challenges did the user encounter during the demo?

During the demo, an incoming video call pushed a window over a person the user was sitting across from, making it feel like the glasses were breaking reality rather than augmenting it.

Why is Meta showing Orion to the world if it's not for sale?

Meta is showing Orion to demonstrate the progress they've made in AR technology and to give a glimpse into the future of AR glasses, even though they are not yet ready for mass-market release.

What is the current status of the Orion AR glasses in terms of production and availability?

Meta has made about 1,000 pairs of Orion for internal prototyping and demos. The glasses are not available for sale and were initially intended to be a product until Meta realized the manufacturing challenges.