AR IN THE FRAME

Augmented reality has hitherto focused firmly on image overlays. But one company has delivered something different — ‘audio-first’ AR, with more clever stuff to come.

Augmented reality has hitherto been an image thing, but Bose’s sunglasses do ‘audio-first AR’.

The simplest definition for augmented reality goes like this one, from the online dictionary dot com: “a technology that superimposes a computergenerated image on a user’s view of the real world, thus providing a composite view”. So you might think of augmented reality (or AR for short) as something that happens inside a set of goggles, or glasses, or perhaps when watching images overlaid across live camera images on your phone’s screen. And mostly, you’d be right. The majority of AR applications are primarily a visual experience. But why shouldn’t augmented reality also apply to the other senses — touch, smell and hearing?

Speaker and headphone manufacturer Bose has gone in a new direction. Released in the US, and in Australia just as we go to press, it has introduced ‘Bose AR’ which, according to the publicity, is an ‘audio-first’ approach to augmented reality.

Currently, ‘audio-first’ really means audio-only. There are just two products that are “enabled with Bose AR”, one being a version of the successful QuietComfort noise-cancelling headphones, and the second being Bose Frames, just released here in two styles at $299. Bose describes the Frames as “audio sunglasses”, and there’s quite a bit going on inside the chunky-looking frames that enclose the tinted lenses.

Sunnies with benefits

The most obvious features are the tiny speakers built into the frames that direct sound toward your ears but away from others who may be near you. US reviewers have been generally positive about the sound quality, though bass from such tiny speakers is never going to compare with headphones or even high-quality earbuds. The great advantage, of course, is that your ears are completely open, allowing you to stay connected to everything and everyone around you. Amazingly, though, the sound is apparently loud enough for the wearer, easily allowing phone calls on the street, yet people around you won’t hear your music or the voice of your caller unless you have it on full blast.

To achieve this it uses noise-cancellation techniques not to keep external noise out but to keep your music in! This is a first, according to Bose, with the technique for the directing of sound just to the wearer and away from others being something they learned from the waveguides in their other wearable speaker, the SoundWear Companion.

What am I looking at?

While the idea of sunglasses with stealth speakers is novel, there’s a feature that elevates Frames further above normal Bluetooth headsets. A nine-axis on-board sensor enables connected AR apps to tell which way you are looking, and to recognise gestures like a nod of the head. That’s potentially powerful, because combined with the GPS on your connected phone, the sensor allows AR apps to guide you with spoken information about what you are actually looking at, not just facts about your general locality.

The bad news is that, at the time of its US launch, these AR apps were yet to appear, leading to a luke

warm reception by the tech community. That situation should change, though, as Bose has recognised that content is king and has invested US$50m directly in AR apps and developers via a new venture capital arm, Bose Ventures.

The company has reportedly invested in, or is collaborating with, a range of companies working in the areas of fitness, travel, learning, music, games and health. The website (bose.ventures) lists investments in Whoop (human performance optimisation) Adaptiv (trainer-led, music-driven audio workouts), wispr (voice guidance for frontline service delivery) and Aria (visual information on demand for blind or low vision clients). Other collaborations have been announced with ASICS Studio, TripAdvisor, TuneIn, and Yelp, so we may start to see the kind of apps Frames are aiming for later this year.

No vision

One thing that is not part of Frames is any kind of video display, as promised by Google Glass1 or Microsoft’s HoloLens. The inevitable comparisons have led to some comments that this isn’t really AR at all, but that’s to argue definitions; users will judge for themselves, and we don’t see why being audio-only should disqualify Frames as augmented reality. Frames are their own thing, and at around US$200 they are not intended to compete with the $1500+ Google wearable computer or the $3500 HoloLens II2.

It is rare to find a genuinely new class of product but Frames certainly have enough going on to qualify as unique in the market. Leveraging the strides made in both Audio Assistants and Artificial Intelligence, Bose has found a way to very discreetly provide the benefits of augmented reality without needing a screen and without disconnecting the user from the world around them.

The future is wearable

So is there a future for audio eyeglasses like Frames? That’s hard to foresee. On the one hand, some are predicting that wearables will be the way of the future. Earlier this year, AT&T’s CEO Randall Stephenson told the Economic Club of Washington DC that today’s phones should make way for wearable tech. “We carry around these devices and they’re bigger than they should be... I say they go away,” he declared. “It is conceivable that we’re going to be moving into a world without screens, a world where [glasses are] your screen. You don’t need any more form factor than [that].”

On the other hand, that “form factor” Stevenson mentioned is likely to be pretty obtrusive for a few years to come. And let’s be clear, Frames need to work with your phone and aren’t intended to be a replacement. Still, if you aren’t keen to look like a cyborg and you don’t want to go through life eyes-down and disconnected from the world of sound around you, maybe you are in the frame for Bose Frames. Derek Powell

1: In case you are wondering, Google Glass is still around, though it is not available as a consumer product and is now only sold as an Enterprise version. You can find out a little more at https://x.company/glass/

“The Frames use noise-cancellation not to keep external noise out but to keep your music in!”

2: HoloLens has just had a revamp with HoloLens II introduced earlier this year. But like the Google product, the chunky HoloLens II headset is not cheap and still currently pitched at business, not consumers.