Apple Project Mirrorshades: News and rumors

Apple talked about ARKit, a new augmented reality platform, at its annual Worldwide Developer Conference on Monday, but the iPhone maker might have far more interesting AR tech up its sleeves. According to three alleged Foxconn employees who published details about upcoming Apple products last week, the Cupertino company’s skunkworks has been Google Glass-like AR glasses with motion detectors, transparent displays, and integrated touch panels.

Here is everything we know so far.

Specs

According to the alleged employees, Apple’s prototypical AR glasses are constructed from Kopin NED Acetate frames, “polarized or prescription [lenses],” and Zeiss optics. Tiny projectors beam images onto a 428 x 240 glass prism in front of the lenses, and DC motors produce sound by vibrating through the small bones the user’s ears, like Google Glass.

Project Mirrorshades has a touch-sensitive strip on the arm that allows users to accept calls and control the volume, but taps on motion as the primary means of navigation. A combination magnetometer and light sensor detects when a wearer shakes his or her head, and responds accordingly — a Tinder app user, for example, could shake their head for no, or nod for yes.

When it comes to Mirrorshades’ build materials, Apple’s reportedly spared no expense. The glass’s frames made out of “cellulose acetate injection mold frames [in] an aluminum mold” with a P3 frame design, and come in two sizes: Men’s and women’s. At least three color options, including crystal, black, and champagne, are in the works, in addition to seasonal updates.

The alleged Foxconn employees note that the material cost for the glasses would total roughly $150, and that Apple would likely price them around $600. But they caution that the fate of Mirrorshades was uncertain because of its “expensive” design and difficult-to-produce batteries.

Name and release date

It is not the first time rumors of Apple-made AR glasses have emerged.

Over the past three years, Apple has acquired companies with an expertise in AR, 3D mapping, and computer vision — including from PrimeSense, which pioneered the depth-tracking technology behind the Kinect, and Metaio and Flyby.

In September 2016, Apple hired two veterans from Oculus VR and Magic Leap, two companies with a pedigree in augmented reality and virtual reality technologies. And in November 2016, Bloomberg reported that Apple was working on a pair of glasses that blended an augmented reality display with a standard pair of glasses. It’d begun talks with potential suppliers for components like near-eye displays, with the goal of developing a pair of glasses that could connect wirelessly to an iPhone and overlay information on the wearer’s field of vision.

The earliest time frame was said to be 2018.

“[…] AR can be really great,” Tim Cook said when asked about Pokémon Go during an earnings call in 2016. “We have been and continue to invest a lot in this. We are high on AR for the long run, we think there’s great things for customers and a great commercial opportunity.”