8 ms·

Magic Leap Review Part I

166 points by UpshotKnothole 8y ago

IshKebab 8y ago
To be honest it doesn't look that much worse than the Hololens and the Hololens was perfectly fine. Not perfect, sure, but technology has limitations. People still buy LCDs even though they reflect ambient light, don't work outdoors, etc. I don't see what the point is of complaining about having to look through a diffraction grating if we have no other way of doing it.
- tfha 8y ago
  No, hololens just isn't good enough. Won't see market traction, because it's too unrealistic, the immersion factor too low. There's a minimum bar of realism we need to hit to have reasonable AR and VR. The original Vive hit that bar for VR, but nothing has hit that bar yet for AR.
  - IshKebab 8y ago
    Sure but that's because pretty much only because of the terrible field of view. Not because you're looking through a diffraction grating.
t0mbstone 8y ago
Wow, I had no idea it was actually that terrible! The fact that 85% of the normal room lighting is blocked by the lens means that wearing it would essentially be like wearing sunglasses. On top of that, the diffraction grating also looks like it introduces a bunch of visual artifacts like smearing, ghosting, and rainbows.
- p1necone 8y ago
  I kind of assumed all along. I was crying vaporware the whole time though - I'm surprised they released something. The signs were there in the marketing - they never showed anything other than pretty cg mockups the entire time, the only videos they showed of functionality were clearly fabricated mockups - even < 1 year to release date. The closest they ever came to actually demoing the thing was showing some celebrity using it. If they actually had anything nearly as impressive as they were claiming they wouldn't acted so obviously shady.
  - drcode 8y ago
    Despite this, I think they still deserve some credit for actually releasing something. I was on the Magic Leap hate train, but now that they actually released their gimpy headset I'm actually kinda rooting for them.
    - Fnoord 8y ago
      Theranos also released 'something'...
      - drcode 8y ago
        Not really- "releasing" implies a regular person could buy it... No human being outside of Theranos was ever allowed to be in the same room as an Edison machine.
- ericd 8y ago
  Keep in mind that this author is a long-time Magic Leap critic. He's not exactly looking hard for silver linings.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - UpshotKnothole 8y ago
    Are you seeing a “silver lining” he missed? If not, don’t you think it’s possible that he’s been a long time critic because it was crap and exception from the get-go? If not, I think it’s worth remembering that this critic correctly predicted all of the major problems with the device months (and longer) before it was released. He called the “lightfield” and other marketing dishonesty out quite a long time ago, and seems to have been batting nearly .1000. So... what do you see that he missed? I understand that you’ve been very supportive of this for months, but unless you’re invested in or affiliated with Magic Leap it might be time to let it go in the face of the reality.
    - ericd 8y ago
      Yes, I've watched a few long form video reviews of the ML One, and I've generally been impressed with what I've seen in the videos. The reviewers have generally seemed impressed as well. They usually say it could use a bit of work before being unleashed to consumers, and that it's a long way from fulfilling all of AR's potential, but being that it's explictly a dev kit of a V1 of potentially a whole new industry, I think that's all acceptable. This reviewer has clearly had an axe to grind with ML's claims for years, and this is a continuation of that. EDIT: that doesn't seem like the same comment I replied to, did you significantly expand it?
      - muglug 8y ago
        I think you can quibble about the author's bias, but Magic Leap has so far failed to deliver on the promise that its early videos promised: the ability to seamlessly blend the real world with a computer-generated one. Other systems in the same space (like Hololens, the Rift and the Vive) didn’t put such simulated imagery front-and-centre in their marketing materials.
- rl3 8y ago
  >The fact that 85% of the normal room lighting is blocked by the lens means that wearing it would essentially be like wearing sunglasses. As part of a costume I bought some $4 sunglasses at the thrift store and wore them in a dimly-lit bar the other night. Ended up bumping into people because I couldn't see. I imagine this is what Magic Leap is like.
- vackosar 8y ago
  now u just need Magic Leap Autopilot :)
  - stephengillie 8y ago
    Each one comes with a free smart contract.
- Animats 8y ago
  Well, of course it has to block most of the room lighting. They can't draw dark. The display has to be brighter than the ambient light. I'm surprised these things don't have an auto dimming shutter, like a welding mask, to adjust how much outside light gets through.
  - jacobush 8y ago
    Well, there is this rear view mirror in cars which essentially draws dark by blocking out the area where the sun would reflect into your eye. Expanding on that, maybe with some kind of holographic shenanigans, we can have something that not exactly draws dark, but occludes light very cleverly.
    - ddalex 8y ago
      Like an LCD of some sorts.
      - jacobush 8y ago
        Exactly my point. :)
    - Animats 8y ago
      The update rate has to be very high and the alignment perfect or it will drive users nuts. Which means it will probably be done soon, although not in this round. Doing it with lightweight short path optics is also difficult. All this stuff with diffraction gratings and Fresnel lenses makes for a crappy image. That can sometimes be overcome; the Polaroid SX-70 camera had a very compressed optical system with Fresnel lenses without compromising image quality too much.[1] The other option is simply to show the real world via a camera feeding into the system. That's been tried many times, and it works OK, although lag will make users faceplant or ill. [1] https://www.technologizer.com/2011/06/08/polaroid/sx70-light-2/ https://www.technologizer.com/2011/06/08/polaroid/sx70-light...
      - jacobush 8y ago
hello_asdf 8y ago
Mirror: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:WNHDj65VpE0J:https://www.kguttag.com/2018/09/26/magic-leap-review-part-1-the-terrible-view-through-diffraction-gratings/%2B&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:WNHDj6...
gwern 8y ago
Theranos also talked a lot about military contracts.
- redisman 8y ago
  Endless pool of money with little oversight and nowhere near private-sector level expectations on results
rhymenoceros 8y ago
I think Fernando Serrano captured it perfectly: https://twitter.com/fernandojsg/status/1017411969169555457 https://twitter.com/fernandojsg/status/1017411969169555457
- adpirz 8y ago
  Make sure the audio is on; Absolutely brilliant.
  - simonebrunozzi 8y ago
    I don't get the audio reference; what's that music from?
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - vishnugupta 8y ago
      Amazingly hilarious. It's Jurassic Park OST. Starts off as an OST and rapidly degenerates along with the graphics.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - desdiv 8y ago
      The video is a reference to this No Man's Sky parody video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvAwB7ogkik https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvAwB7ogkik
    - Sholmesy 8y ago
      It's a genre of video where a shitty harmonica version is dubbed over the original theme. I believe the jurrasic park one is the original; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-w-58hQ9dLk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-w-58hQ9dLk "They do move in herds"
cm2012 8y ago
The last time I compared Magic Leap to Theranos I was downvoted to -4 (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16713546 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16713546). It's interesting to see people's reasoning back then vs the product now, 6 months later.
- gkoberger 8y ago
  There's a huge difference between a highly funded startup that is trying to build something completely revolutionary and hasn't quite gotten there yet, and a company actively and knowingly engaging in fraud in the medical space. Nobody is going to die because of Magic Leap.
  - manigandham 8y ago
    > highly funded startup that is trying to build something completely revolutionary and hasn't quite gotten there yet That's exactly what Theranos was, until it wasn't.
    - gkoberger 8y ago
      Sure, but so far Magic Leap hasn't done anything illegal or unethical or immoral... they've just been a bit behind schedule. They also aren't in the medical space. Nobody is going to die because of them.
      - cm2012 8y ago
        With all of their secrecy, you have no idea if they're being unethical or not. Their marketing materials are certainly nothing near reality.
        threeseed 8y ago
        You're being completely disingenuous. Magic Leap is a glorified toy. It is not going to affect your life.
scandox 8y ago
> No amount of money or effort is going to change the physics of diffraction gratings. On the other hand there is an amount of money and effort that will persuade people to pretend the physics has changed.
deltron3030 8y ago
Is there a chance of proper text rendering with this technology, usable browser windows and such? I think overcoming the laptop screen and enabling "portable workstations" (portable like a laptop, not phone) could replace laptops and improve desktop -> laptop workflows.
srrge 8y ago
This is very impressive that someone would take the time to experiment an document so thoroughly this product. I am thankful because I find this very interesting and I always thought of Magic Leap as vaporware.
partiallypro 8y ago
The worst part is that Hololens is now almost 3 years old and is going to ship a new model next year (rumored)...so Magic Leap is also so so so far behind. Microsoft is smartly pushing Hololens for industrial uses, where Magic Leap plans on military contracts? There is about a 0% chance the military will be using AR in any official capacity in the field for a while. This kind of reminds me of Leap Motion, which is a very cool tech, but I could never find any practical use for it....at least Leap Motions are cheap.
- jmcgough 8y ago
  Some of the frustrations I've seen of people using ML1 remind me a lot of LM, specifically the lack of uniform interface between applications.
- Holomakerbot 8y ago
  This was reported just the other day: "The original HoloLens has been out for a long time now, so a new (hopefully cheaper) version is overdue, but it now looks like we won’t see it before 2020." https://www.techradar.com/news/hololens-20-could-be-delayed-by-windows-core-os https://www.techradar.com/news/hololens-20-could-be-delayed-...
yodon 8y ago
Discussion of part 2: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18110225 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18110225

To be honest it doesn't look that much worse than the Hololens and the Hololens was perfectly fine. Not perfect, sure, but technology has limitations. People still buy LCDs even though they reflect ambient light, don't work outdoors, etc. I don't see what the point is of complaining about having to look through a diffraction grating if we have no other way of doing it.

tfha 8y ago
No, hololens just isn't good enough. Won't see market traction, because it's too unrealistic, the immersion factor too low. There's a minimum bar of realism we need to hit to have reasonable AR and VR. The original Vive hit that bar for VR, but nothing has hit that bar yet for AR.
- IshKebab 8y ago
  Sure but that's because pretty much only because of the terrible field of view. Not because you're looking through a diffraction grating.

t0mbstone 8y ago

Wow, I had no idea it was actually that terrible! The fact that 85% of the normal room lighting is blocked by the lens means that wearing it would essentially be like wearing sunglasses. On top of that, the diffraction grating also looks like it introduces a bunch of visual artifacts like smearing, ghosting, and rainbows.

p1necone 8y ago
I kind of assumed all along. I was crying vaporware the whole time though - I'm surprised they released something. The signs were there in the marketing - they never showed anything other than pretty cg mockups the entire time, the only videos they showed of functionality were clearly fabricated mockups - even < 1 year to release date. The closest they ever came to actually demoing the thing was showing some celebrity using it. If they actually had anything nearly as impressive as they were claiming they wouldn't acted so obviously shady.
- drcode 8y ago
  Despite this, I think they still deserve some credit for actually releasing something. I was on the Magic Leap hate train, but now that they actually released their gimpy headset I'm actually kinda rooting for them.
  - Fnoord 8y ago
    Theranos also released 'something'...
    - drcode 8y ago
      Not really- "releasing" implies a regular person could buy it... No human being outside of Theranos was ever allowed to be in the same room as an Edison machine.
ericd 8y ago
Keep in mind that this author is a long-time Magic Leap critic. He's not exactly looking hard for silver linings.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- UpshotKnothole 8y ago
  Are you seeing a “silver lining” he missed? If not, don’t you think it’s possible that he’s been a long time critic because it was crap and exception from the get-go? If not, I think it’s worth remembering that this critic correctly predicted all of the major problems with the device months (and longer) before it was released. He called the “lightfield” and other marketing dishonesty out quite a long time ago, and seems to have been batting nearly .1000. So... what do you see that he missed? I understand that you’ve been very supportive of this for months, but unless you’re invested in or affiliated with Magic Leap it might be time to let it go in the face of the reality.
  - ericd 8y ago
    Yes, I've watched a few long form video reviews of the ML One, and I've generally been impressed with what I've seen in the videos. The reviewers have generally seemed impressed as well. They usually say it could use a bit of work before being unleashed to consumers, and that it's a long way from fulfilling all of AR's potential, but being that it's explictly a dev kit of a V1 of potentially a whole new industry, I think that's all acceptable. This reviewer has clearly had an axe to grind with ML's claims for years, and this is a continuation of that. EDIT: that doesn't seem like the same comment I replied to, did you significantly expand it?
    - muglug 8y ago
      I think you can quibble about the author's bias, but Magic Leap has so far failed to deliver on the promise that its early videos promised: the ability to seamlessly blend the real world with a computer-generated one. Other systems in the same space (like Hololens, the Rift and the Vive) didn’t put such simulated imagery front-and-centre in their marketing materials.
rl3 8y ago
>The fact that 85% of the normal room lighting is blocked by the lens means that wearing it would essentially be like wearing sunglasses. As part of a costume I bought some $4 sunglasses at the thrift store and wore them in a dimly-lit bar the other night. Ended up bumping into people because I couldn't see. I imagine this is what Magic Leap is like.
vackosar 8y ago
now u just need Magic Leap Autopilot :)
- stephengillie 8y ago
  Each one comes with a free smart contract.
Animats 8y ago
Well, of course it has to block most of the room lighting. They can't draw dark. The display has to be brighter than the ambient light. I'm surprised these things don't have an auto dimming shutter, like a welding mask, to adjust how much outside light gets through.
- jacobush 8y ago
  Well, there is this rear view mirror in cars which essentially draws dark by blocking out the area where the sun would reflect into your eye. Expanding on that, maybe with some kind of holographic shenanigans, we can have something that not exactly draws dark, but occludes light very cleverly.
  - ddalex 8y ago
    Like an LCD of some sorts.
    - jacobush 8y ago
      Exactly my point. :)
  - Animats 8y ago
    The update rate has to be very high and the alignment perfect or it will drive users nuts. Which means it will probably be done soon, although not in this round. Doing it with lightweight short path optics is also difficult. All this stuff with diffraction gratings and Fresnel lenses makes for a crappy image. That can sometimes be overcome; the Polaroid SX-70 camera had a very compressed optical system with Fresnel lenses without compromising image quality too much.[1] The other option is simply to show the real world via a camera feeding into the system. That's been tried many times, and it works OK, although lag will make users faceplant or ill. [1] https://www.technologizer.com/2011/06/08/polaroid/sx70-light-2/ https://www.technologizer.com/2011/06/08/polaroid/sx70-light...
    - jacobush 8y ago

hello_asdf 8y ago

Mirror: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:WNHDj65VpE0J:https://www.kguttag.com/2018/09/26/magic-leap-review-part-1-the-terrible-view-through-diffraction-gratings/%2B&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:WNHDj6...

gwern 8y ago

Theranos also talked a lot about military contracts.

redisman 8y ago
Endless pool of money with little oversight and nowhere near private-sector level expectations on results

rhymenoceros 8y ago

I think Fernando Serrano captured it perfectly: https://twitter.com/fernandojsg/status/1017411969169555457 https://twitter.com/fernandojsg/status/1017411969169555457

adpirz 8y ago
Make sure the audio is on; Absolutely brilliant.
- simonebrunozzi 8y ago
  I don't get the audio reference; what's that music from?
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - vishnugupta 8y ago
    Amazingly hilarious. It's Jurassic Park OST. Starts off as an OST and rapidly degenerates along with the graphics.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - desdiv 8y ago
    The video is a reference to this No Man's Sky parody video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvAwB7ogkik https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvAwB7ogkik
  - Sholmesy 8y ago
    It's a genre of video where a shitty harmonica version is dubbed over the original theme. I believe the jurrasic park one is the original; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-w-58hQ9dLk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-w-58hQ9dLk "They do move in herds"

cm2012 8y ago

The last time I compared Magic Leap to Theranos I was downvoted to -4 (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16713546 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16713546). It's interesting to see people's reasoning back then vs the product now, 6 months later.

gkoberger 8y ago
There's a huge difference between a highly funded startup that is trying to build something completely revolutionary and hasn't quite gotten there yet, and a company actively and knowingly engaging in fraud in the medical space. Nobody is going to die because of Magic Leap.
- manigandham 8y ago
  > highly funded startup that is trying to build something completely revolutionary and hasn't quite gotten there yet That's exactly what Theranos was, until it wasn't.
  - gkoberger 8y ago
    Sure, but so far Magic Leap hasn't done anything illegal or unethical or immoral... they've just been a bit behind schedule. They also aren't in the medical space. Nobody is going to die because of them.
    - cm2012 8y ago
      With all of their secrecy, you have no idea if they're being unethical or not. Their marketing materials are certainly nothing near reality.
      - threeseed 8y ago
        You're being completely disingenuous. Magic Leap is a glorified toy. It is not going to affect your life.

scandox 8y ago

> No amount of money or effort is going to change the physics of diffraction gratings. On the other hand there is an amount of money and effort that will persuade people to pretend the physics has changed.

deltron3030 8y ago

Is there a chance of proper text rendering with this technology, usable browser windows and such? I think overcoming the laptop screen and enabling "portable workstations" (portable like a laptop, not phone) could replace laptops and improve desktop -> laptop workflows.

srrge 8y ago

This is very impressive that someone would take the time to experiment an document so thoroughly this product. I am thankful because I find this very interesting and I always thought of Magic Leap as vaporware.

partiallypro 8y ago

The worst part is that Hololens is now almost 3 years old and is going to ship a new model next year (rumored)...so Magic Leap is also so so so far behind. Microsoft is smartly pushing Hololens for industrial uses, where Magic Leap plans on military contracts? There is about a 0% chance the military will be using AR in any official capacity in the field for a while. This kind of reminds me of Leap Motion, which is a very cool tech, but I could never find any practical use for it....at least Leap Motions are cheap.

jmcgough 8y ago
Some of the frustrations I've seen of people using ML1 remind me a lot of LM, specifically the lack of uniform interface between applications.
Holomakerbot 8y ago
This was reported just the other day: "The original HoloLens has been out for a long time now, so a new (hopefully cheaper) version is overdue, but it now looks like we won’t see it before 2020." https://www.techradar.com/news/hololens-20-could-be-delayed-by-windows-core-os https://www.techradar.com/news/hololens-20-could-be-delayed-...

yodon 8y ago

Discussion of part 2: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18110225 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18110225