That sounds more like a job for Mythbusters, but I’ll take my chances on an answer.
About the video
The video seems to me clearly a montage.
It sure is. But until then nothing wrong with that.
Suppose a company has an idea and thinks it will sell millions, then after some research this company concludes that the project is viable and start development. However as in many of the times these ideas start from small startups they have no money to invest, so what they do is a promotional video to make it very clear what their idea is and advertise behind investors who decide to bet on the idea.
Similarly, in stands sale of apartment in condominiums, there are models, which do not intend to be prototypes, but aims to illustrate the idea of the construction.
Who would be the investors?
There is a site called Kickstarter. He’s an example of a very interesting idea, called crowdfunding. Crowdfunding is a derivation of crowdsourcing, where an organization uses the talent and time of hundreds, thousands or millions of people to create or improve a product or a service. Source: Team. Wikipedia is a beautiful example of a crowdsourcing.
Similarly, Kickstarter uses crowdfunding to pay for creative projects requesting small donations from crowd, in free translation, from populace, who are anonymous investors visitors to the site.
A case of "success"
A project that became very famous in Kickstarter was the Mighty Mug, that promised to make a mug that never tipped, ideal for clumsy.
They even made some prototypes and the video went live on Youtube. Their initial goal of raising $10,000 ($10,000) was exceeded more than 10 times. Yes, they got over $100,000 (one hundred thousand dollars) from over 2,000 people who also bet on the product.
A success!! Or maybe not...
All that glitters is not gold
About a month ago the mugs started to be sent to investors, and the problems began to arise, were since lack of tracking number of shipments, mailings to wrong addresses and the worst of all: the product did not meet expectations.
See one of several investor complaints comments after receiving the product:
I will NEVER support a Kickstarter project Ever after this Experience with Mighty Mug. I Finally get a product that is defective. The top Leaks so bad that any Liquid just pours out. USELESS! No Response from Jayme and no help from Kickstarter.
In free translation:
I will NEVER support another Kickstarter project again after this experience with Mighty Mug. I finally got my product, but it’s defective. The top slot is so bad that any liquid leaks out. USELESS. No response from Jayme (the founder) and no help from Kickstarter.
Author: Someone very angry who invested in Mighty Mug.
Link: Investor comments.
Unfortunately, so far the product has not worked very well.
Where’s the bracelet in Kickstarter?
That’s it. She’s not in Kickstarter because it’s not a crowdfunding. The company is not offering or promising prototypes, it is only collecting donations.
The only thing they say is that the bracelet can be developed if they raise an amount of €700,000.00 (seven hundred thousand euros), which is equivalent to about R$2,300,000.00 (two million and three hundred thousand reais), in today’s quotation.
The company’s only promise, and it has already been fulfilled, is that the bundles of donors will have their names displayed on a hall of fame, which is nothing more than a list of names in a table tosssima on one of their website pages.
But... what if they raise the money and can’t even develop a prototype? Well, I don’t see written down anywhere the warranty on the prototype, and as much as it exists one day, it will be owned by the company, not the donors.
Technical implications of bracelet development
1. Streaming
Streaming in itself will probably be the least of your problems, because the same way you can connect your phone to an HDMI and view your screen on a TV, you can very well send the screen image to another output other than the data cable.
My assessment of the requirement: Superable.
Problem 1: Security
Security can be a problem in this situation, as doing streaming from the screen through third party devices may allow it to store images while you type passwords on the virtual keyboard.
It is not enough to be a deterrent, because in the same way that we entrust our data to cell phone manufacturers we would have to entrust our data to the manufacturer of the bracelet, but it is an extra concern that we should have.
My assessment of the problem: Superable.
2. Projection
Image projection is nothing new to us, but not like this. I can list some problems I thought:
Problem 2: The angle of incidence of the projected light is very inclined
This means that the part of the arm that is closest to the projector will receive much more light than the rest of the arm, which would make the image strong near the projector and weak away from it.
Furthermore, the image would be projected at different distances, which means that we would need a multi-focal projector lens to focus both near and far at the same time. Thing that doesn’t exist today.
My assessment of the problem: Impeditive. I believe there is no solution to this.
Problem 3: The projection angle may vary
If the bracelet is too wide, too tight, or simply moves around the arm, it implies that the angle of the projection must accompany these movements, and this involves many proximity sensors and many adjustments to the projection. Something that in my view is completely unfeasible.
My assessment of the problem: Impeditive. I believe there is no solution to this.
Problem 4: Lens is very close to projection
That means two things:
4.1. The angle of the lens aperture has to be very large;
In order to be able to project at short distances, the lens aperture must be very large.
In the frame, a "Super Wide Angle" lens provides an aperture of up to 95º. The "Fish Eye" lenses capture images at an angle that can be up to 180º. Source: Techtudo: Learn the meaning of the acronyms and numbers of the lens aperture
But everybody knows how the picture looks It’s not even?
Let’s calculate the lens opening of the supposed bracelet. Based on the video images, consider that the distance of 1 cm from the projector to the projection, and that the width of the projection is 4 cm.
resulting in the following calculation:
Opposite cathode = 4 cm / 2 = 2 cm
Adjacent cathode = 1cm
Tg = opposite cathode / adjacent cathode; hence:
Tg α = 2/1 α 65º
Therefore, the aperture of the projector lens should be about 130º. That would leave the screen with a very strange appearance, similar to the fish eye photo.
4.2. The lens must be able to focus at very short distances.
To focus at short distances, the lens needs to close the diaphragm tightly, but closing the diaphragm implies a decrease in the angle of the lens aperture, which means that items 4.1 and 4.2 are conflicting, and consequently, it is not possible to have both simultaneously. Source: Shooting Mania: How to do a macro photograph? Tips for shooting macro
My assessment of the problem: Impeditive. I believe there is no solution to this.
Problem #5: The surface of our arm is not flat
Our arm looks nothing like a wall, where projections usually occur. The irregularities of the surface of our arm could cause shadows in the projection of the image to completely distorted images.
Would anyone have the patience to read whole texts that look more like Captchas infinite?
My assessment of the problem: Gravissímo. Not worth the investment.
Problem #6: Projectors usually work well in the dark
The projectors that we are used to seeing in classrooms and meetings, need little light competing with their lighting, otherwise the projection is almost invisible. In the case of a micro projector the trend is only worse, since the lamp power tends to be lower.
My assessment of the problem: Device would restrict itself basically to indoor environments with very little lighting. It would lose a lot of market with this making its production practically unviable.
Problem 7: The image will be cropped when your finger touches your arm
(Image representing problems 6 and 7 together)
Quite different from the release video, no?
My assessment of the problem: You can live with it. But the application would lose much of its charm and become much less attractive than the video suggests.
3. Gestures
If we are ever concerned about this, it is because we have solved all the previous problems. So just as the bracelet would be smart enough to project a flat image under such adverse circumstances, it would have enough sensors to be able to identify where an object interfered with the projection with a sharp enough angle on the surface to be considered a touch on the "screen".
My assessment of the requirement: Superable.
4. Root
Or it would be a solution only for devices with root and that have been modified in some way?
If this product were actually manufactured, I would say that if root was a must, it would be a problem that wouldn’t last long. We can assume that this product would be so revolutionary that the companies that develop mobile operating systems would do anything to facilitate compatibility with their devices, and possibly even partner to sell cell phone combos that already accompany such a bracelet.
Therefore, I would say that this concern per hour is irrelevant.
My assessment of the requirement: Superable.
Completion
The following points are highlighted:
- There are numerous difficulties in the development of the project, some that I think would make the project unviable;
- Nothing that legally guarantees that the company will use the money raised in the product development.
Without wishing to doubt anyone’s suitability, I would just like to conclude that someone malicious can make a lot of money on top of promises and no legal obligation and commitments.
My verdict is:
I find the idea very interesting. But I think the Airdroid (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.sand.airdroid&hl=pt_BR) allows the device to be controlled by the browser.
– Wakim
@Wakim allows you to send commands to your phone and get answers, but never see the device screen or control other applications. You can list contacts, view notifications, and transfer files. That’s the only thing. Try installing ;)
– Guilherme Bernal
@Guilhermebernal has more strange things in this project than this. One of them is that the projection angle is at least "suspicious". The slightest inclination of the bracelet will change the proportions of the screen absurdly. And if they found a way to make up for it with software or even hardware, you could probably do something much more powerful than that to get it on the market. This angle thing has been a dilemma for the major projector manufacturers in the market for years. As they themselves mention on the page, they don’t have prototype yet. Once they have it, we can examine it better ;)
– Bacco
@Bacco, my fear is that this is all a scam. Because they ask for donations to the direct prototype in a paypal account (instead of something like Kickstarter). And the whole project seems too absurd to me, in many points.
– Guilherme Bernal
@Guilhermebernal I swear that I had not read the comments before writing my answers, but I agree with you, I also think it’s a scam. I still intend to update my reply with more images, other explanations and facts.
– Math