Researchers at the MIT Media Laboratory and the University of California at Berkeley have developed a new display technology that automatically corrects for vision defects — no glasses (or contact lenses) required.

The technique could lead to dashboard-mounted GPS displays that farsighted drivers can consult without putting their glasses on, or electronic readers that eliminate the need for reading glasses, among other applications.

“The first spectacles were invented in the 13th century,” says Gordon Wetzstein, a research scientist at the Media Lab and one of the display’s co-creators.
“Today, of course, we have contact lenses and surgery, but it’s all invasive in the sense that you either have to put something in your eye, wear something on your head, or undergo surgery.
We have a different solution that basically puts the glasses on the display, rather than on your head.
It will not be able to help you see the rest of the world more sharply, but today, we spend a huge portion of our time interacting with the digital world.”

Wetzstein and his colleagues describe their display in a paper they’re presenting in August at Siggraph, the premier graphics conference.
Joining him on the paper are Ramesh Raskar, the NEC Career Development Professor of Media Arts and Sciences and director of the Media Lab’s Camera Culture group, and Berkeley’s Fu-Chung Huang and Brian Barsky.

Knowing the angles

The display is a variation on a glasses-free 3-D technology also developed by the Camera Culture group.
But where the 3-D display projects slightly different images to the viewer’s left and right eyes, the vision-correcting display projects slightly different images to different parts of the viewer’s pupil.

A vision defect is a mismatch between the eye’s focal distance — the range at which it can actually bring objects into focus — and the distance of the object it’s trying to focus on.
Essentially, the new display simulates an image at the correct focal distance — somewhere between the display and the viewer’s eye.

Statistics: Posted by skataJeffKang — 01 Aug 2014, 07:08