We might not be able to go to Vegas but CES has come to WEPC instead, What's going on today?
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CES 2021 was always going to be a little different, being online and all, but there are still some interesting technologies catching our eye even though we aren’t fortunate enough to be in Las Vegas this year.
Here on Day One of the show one device has piqued our interest and it is the Eyeware Beam, which takes an ordinary iPhone and turns it into a clever eye-tracking device.
Eyeware Beam is an iPhone app that turns your iPhone into an eye tracker, a head tracker, and a webcam. It works with both an iPhone or an iPad with Face ID (iPhone XS, XR, 11, 11 Pro, iPad Pro) and it uses proprietary 3D eye and head tracking technology. The solution takes advantage of Apple’s TrueDepth camera technology, using the user-facing camera to enable remote and accurate eye and head tracking functionalities. A PC software counterpart needs to be installed and once paired with the phone, a user is ready to stream their gaze or play simulator games that support head tracking.
This kind of tech brings a whole new way of playing games like Microsoft Flight Simulator outside of VR and means you can look around with your head, rather than using your mouse.
It is also being used by streamers who want to show viewers where they are looking on the screen while they are playing FPS games such as Apex Legends and is used as a training tool by the pros to see analyze their performance.
Bastjan Prenaj, co-founder and CBDO of Eyeware, told us: “Currently you need to buy extra hardware to enrich your gameplay and your stream with eye tracking and head tracking features. Our goal is to eliminate the entry barrier that streamers and gamers are experiencing today and get them started right away turning the iPhone into an eye tracker with the Eyeware Beam app. We’ve added features like head tracking to control your camera naturally in simulator games or the virtual camera, which allows you to use the high-resolution phone camera of your phone in streams and video calls, which we believe gamers, streamers and anyone working from home will enjoy using and which will accelerate the adoption of this enhanced way to interact through and with your PC.”
We are looking forward to getting hands-on with the app as soon as we get our access granted from Eyeware. Watch this space.
