ORA-1 Smart Glass by Optinvent SA
ORA-1 Smart Glass Kickstarter campaign successfully funded $104,656 USD in October 2014. 224 backers pledged. The early bird backers’ shipment is packed on flight and shipping on March 15, 2015. The early bird backer’s ORA-1 Smart Glass is shipping this month.
The glass is said to be the most technologically advanced smart glasses available on the market. It is a next generation augmented reality display glasses made by Optinvent SA. The company was founded by Kayvan Mirza and Khaled Sarayeddine, and specialized in making disruptive ORA Smart Glasses.
ORA-1 Smart Glass’s strongest capability is the patented Clear-VU display engine which enables and allows see-through vision while displaying virtual images and icons simultaneously.
On Optinvent SA’s official website, if you navigate to the AppstORA section, there are 4 categories ( Augmented Reality, Social Network, Utility, Games ) of applications available. Therefore, Kickstarter backers can start using ORA-1 Smart Glass immediately out of box when it arrived.
From the teaser and movie-like demo video, we can see the user interface, app display are much better and more advanced than what Google Glass offered.
Let’s put ORA-1 Smart Glass’s function aside first, let’s talk about its look and design. In my humble opinion, a large part of Google Glass’s failure, besides it was overpriced, was due to the appearance of the Glass. Google Glass immediately makes you look like a techy dork, and in a creepy sense.
Not to mention the worst look of Sony Smartglass out of the three. ORA Smart Glass’s design is back from the future, its sleek appearance reminds me of sunglasses made the brand by Oliver People. I hope this would remind Google and Sony that, people make purchase based on how the product make them feel. Optinvent’s design just looks better than the other two.
Below is the key feature from ORA-1 Smart Glass Specs, the full specs is available here.
- See through landscape mode with 33 pixels / degree resolution
- Image can be centered for AR or in your peripheral vision for info snacking
- The glass only weight 80g with battery
- Bluetooth and wifi interface
- 8 hours battery life
As of now, at least in smart glass category, Optinvent SA’s ORA-1 seems to have the most advanced developer platform and app ecosystem up and running. The platform also supports many existing android apps. ORA-1’s price is much lower than Google Glass; today, you can still buy ORA-1 Developer’s Version on this page: http://optinvent.com/buy-ORA-AR-glasses-SDK
