[SS-Traveller]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1OlqditIsoM

This 53-second video released on YouTube yesterday is amazing.

Land Rover reveals world's first Transparent Bonnet concept allowing a new level of driver awareness with a 'see-through' augmented reality view of the terrain ahead, making the front of the car 'virtually' invisible from inside the cabin.

OTR spotters may well be rendered redundant with this technology.

The video shows a prototype vehicle with a camera-generated image of the terrain under the bonnet and the position of the front wheels being projected onto a 'smart' windscreen. The concept is explained in the diagram below.

Now, this would make off-roading more reliable and predictable, but would it take away the fun quotient? And who in India takes their LRs off-roading anyway?

[svsantosh]

Amazing Idea, should implement for whole under carriage and couple it with front and rear bumper cams too. It wouldnt make the spotter 100% redundant, but yes - supremely helpful for the lone travellor who doesnt have a extra pair of eyes. Like in extreme hot or cold places where one cant step out to spot.

PS- Before opening the thread I was hoping for a 4ft*3ft hole in the bonnet with acrylic see thru plexi glass with hidden LEDs to light up the engine bay

PPS - Seen it in blore - pimped Citys/accents about 10 years ago, was wondering why LR caught up so late

[roy_libran]

I have been toying with the idea of using Reversing Cameras, fixed up front, and showing the wheel track, for precisely this function for quite some time, but haven't come around to doing it yet.
The worst challenge I face is lining up my vehicle perfectly for a sheer drop, and this is where it can really help.
Now I need to get this done ASAP!

[Rehaan]

I'm always suspicious of any kind of "augmented reality" system that is supposed to seamlessly integrate a digital image with a real-world scene.

Reason: Parallax and field of view. For a system like this to work perfectly well, it would need to know where exactly the driver's eyes/head were positioned, and change the digitally displayed image accordingly. Though this isn't impossible with today's technology, it makes things extremely expensive and complex - and therefore unlikely.

Same applies whenever i see a concept for "augmented reality" overlays on car windshields.

cya
R

[SPIKE ARRESTOR]

SS Da, is it actually a test vehicle? I am asking this because the video says "Virtual Prototype in testing".

Or have I understood something wrong?

Spike

[DirtyDan]

Originally Posted by Rehaan

I'm always suspicious of any kind of "augmented reality" system that is supposed to seamlessly integrate a digital image with a real-world scene.

Reason: Parallax and field of view. For a system like this to work perfectly well, it would need to know where exactly the driver's eyes/head were positioned, and change the digitally displayed image accordingly.

Yeah...limited benefit in exchange for a whole lot of pictures of Ben Kingsley, too.

Unimog has a more direct approach. They call their approach, "eyes".

[SS-Traveller]

Originally Posted by SPIKE ARRESTOR

SS Da, is it actually a test vehicle? I am asking this because the video says "Virtual Prototype in testing".

Or have I understood something wrong?

Spike

LR(UK)'s website seems to suggest it is an actual vehicle prototype.
http://www.landrover.com/gb/en/lr/ne...covery-reveal/

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Rehaan

I'm always suspicious of any kind of "augmented reality" system that is supposed to seamlessly integrate a digital image with a real-world scene.

Reason: Parallax and field of view. For a system like this to work perfectly well, it would need to know where exactly the driver's eyes/head were positioned, and change the digitally displayed image accordingly. Though this isn't impossible with today's technology, it makes things extremely expensive and complex - and therefore unlikely.

Same applies whenever i see a concept for "augmented reality" overlays on car windshields.

cya
R

I dont think that is quite true, maybe I misunderstand what you mean?

The Parallax is applicable to how the camera sees the outside world. It can be adjusted through clever software or mechanically by tilting the camera's sensor. There is no parallax effect, if I can call it like that, between your eyes and a monitor/screen. We can watch TV from an angle perfectly! It does not change our perception on what the picture looks like. That's because a screen is just 2D.

As far as I can tell these are fixed cameras so the parallax can be fixed if needed. It doesnt come into play between the driver and the screen he or she is looking at. You just see a 2D representation of a 3D world.

I have no experience with these kind of systems on cars, other than the odd reverse camera. But as a pilot I have flown with so called "Synthetic Vision Technology". See http://whycirrus.com/advancements/Ci...e-cockpit.aspx

Not to be confused with HUD (Heads up Display), SVD projects the outside world on your main instrumentation screen. I found it very confusing at first but quickly got used to it and then it does become very usefull.

Jeroen

[androdev]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

The Parallax is applicable to how the camera sees the outside world. It can be adjusted through clever software or mechanically by tilting the camera's sensor. There is no parallax effect, if I can call it like that, between your eyes and a monitor/screen. We can watch TV from an angle perfectly! It does not change our perception on what the picture looks like. That's because a screen is just 2D.
Jeroen

The TV analogy may not suit well here because in this case the projected image has to be aligned with the background world to offer a 'seamless' view. TV has no requirement to blend its image with the background scene. I suppose the driver can adjust the cameras till a seamless image is rendered from his point of view.

This is a promising tech for sure and looks like it wont be that expensive to make so will eventually get perfected. The state-of-the art for camera usage and HUD in cars is pretty advanced to support something like this.

But what I wonder is.. once you see the ground under your hood, what are you going to do? It might be a bit late to take corrective action, unless you are doing some near-stationary off-road hustle.

[Skyline GT-R]

Playing a video game will be even more fun.

[jinojohnt]

1. In on-road situations, I think this feature is needed more for the road area adjacent to the passenger door.
2. This feature can be dangerous if used on road, specially in bumper to bumper traffic (you can accidentally crash on to the vehicle in front, if you think for a moment that your car body ends at the front windscreen).

[KL01BE]

Too much information can also be a problem. This might be useful in the OTRs but how use this is going to be in regular runs - is debatable. In most of the cars we cannot see even the bonnet!

[Rehaan]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

I dont think that is quite true, maybe I misunderstand what you mean?

I think you're overlooking one part of the problem. Will explain below.

Originally Posted by Jeroen

There is no parallax effect, if I can call it like that, between your eyes and a monitor/screen. We can watch TV from an angle perfectly! It does not change our perception on what the picture looks like. That's because a screen is just 2D.

Agreed here. TV is 2D (for the most part!) and therefore moving your head does not create a parallax effect.

Also, the "augmented reality" apps we get on our smartphones composite reality + overlay graphics onto that 2D screen. So that too has only 2 entities (viewer & screen) and therefore works parallax free as well.

However, the issue with the Land Rover concept is that you are taking a 2D image (the 'tv' on the hood) and then placing it in front of a backdrop (the environment ahead of the car). That in itself becomes 3D -- and with anything 3D there will be parallax!

^ This alignment will be the main problem. If this can be worked around, it might still be an impressive technology.

(there are also a lot more smaller issues w.r.t the camera POV & FOV, etc. - but those wont cause as much of a visual disturbance).


I'll give you another "real-world" yet 'concept' example. The Mercedes Invisible car:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWtcz9PMFHo

Quite cool, yes. But the fact is that it only works absolutely perfectly from ONE point of view, and decently well from one line of view, but certainly doesn't work seamlessly from other viewpoints.

cya
R

[dj78]

LR is better off not bringing this to India - One would be terrified to see the view beneath the undercarriage.

[Rehaan]

This might be a clearer example.

Imagine you had someone hold a phone like this in real life. And then you moved your head from side to side / up-down etc. Would the image of the mouth still line up correctly?



cya
R