The future of official collaboration would be vastly different from what it is now, and industries are already getting ready to embrace the inevitable. Augmented Reality would play a key role in keeping workplaces connected, with Smart Glasses as a necessary advantage. How? Let’s understand through this article. 

How Does it Work?

AR smart glasses are interactive eye frames that generate and overlay graphical content, images, videos, animations, etc. In fieldwork parlance, this could be a digital guide, manual, or AR annotations. It works by capturing the real-world environment. The functionality of AR glasses may change according to the different manufacturers, but here’s a typical note on how it works:

The Combiner – AR display has another name – a combiner. The component, as the name suggests, combines glass lenses that allow natural light to pass on through to the eyes with digital LED or OLED displays that send the computer-generated image to the eyes. 

The Camera – No AR platform can see through your eyes. It needs a camera to record real-world images. The camera used for recording is attached to the AR glasses. 

Registration – The registration includes icons that may not be visible. Through these icons, the computerized part of the devices places an AR object in the real world, like a piece of brand new furniture in your room when you are trying a home décor.

Computer Vision – This is where a programmed app or software suite combines the two types of images – the one supplied by the camera and the one generated by the registration by using markers.

All the above technicalities give you the 3D image that you get to see on your AR Smart Glass.  

Smart Applications for a Smarter Future 

Smart Glasses have the potential to be a part and parcel of all industrial processes. It can take AR capabilities to the next level. 

For FieldWork 

AR can help experts remotely assist field teams to do complicated, advanced installations and repairs on factory floors without having to travel to and fro across locations. Doing this with smartphones can make this process a little complicated, given the need to handle various devices during work. Smart glasses take away the need for the field forces to hold a phone in one hand and a piece of workplace equipment in the other.

When Smart Glasses are connected with safety helmets, it enables hands-free functionalities and makes machine services, maintenance, and other associated fieldwork easier and more efficient. This significantly improves the FTRs and the overall output while impacting the ROI positively.  Newly recruited technicians can also adapt to the nature of work faster with a smart glass at their aid.  

Other benefits include:

  • The 3D experience it offers renders a more accurate overlay, which is important in scenarios where total precision is a must. 
  • Integrated Voice-command interface that allows field service technicians to speak with engineers or other subject-matter experts while showing them the customer’s equipment
  • Full-field view of the worksite 

The feature applies to almost all the fieldwork utilities such as maintenance, installation, production across automotive and other industries, construction, the military, the healthcare industry, etc.  

For the Knowledge Worksite

AR Smart Glasses can enhance WFH collaboration in many ways. The device provides an additional screen or heads-up display into the user’s line of sight, which helps minimize the workspace as any unnecessary monitors and space-consuming devices or documents can be removed. It eases the streamlining of tasks that require a second screen. 

The wearable devices bring office space to remote homes, thereby bridging any atmospheric differences.  In other words, you can step into a digital office room by even eliminating the challenges usually faced in shared environments (say background noise). 

While smart glasses are increasingly being used for fieldwork, their worksite capabilities, though assured, are still in infancy. 

How Does the Future Look?

The efficacy of smart glasses is increasingly hitting the limelight, especially when industries are on the lookout for wearable devices that improve the flow of work.  And when compared to other wearable devices, smart glasses are easier to wear for a longer period of time. The recent future looks bright and welcoming, with forecasts suggesting that the revenue of AR glasses will close to $ 20 billion by 2022.