Eye-Controlled Head-Mounted-Display Prototype Shown By Fraunhofer IPMS

We've been tracking the Fraunhofer IPMS' research into bi-directional OLED displays for a few years now: panels that integrated both a display and a camera, so that they can simultaneously track an object and display something. The institute has long promised that our head-up display (HUD) ambitions could well be satisfied with the technology, and now it has a prototype to show us. Set to make its debut at SID Display Week 2011 in May, the OLED microdisplay-based eye tracking HMD (head-mounted display) is, as the name suggests, capable of being controlled simply by eye movements.

By combining the display and eye-tracking camera into a single component, the HMD as a whole can be smaller, lighter and use less power. Rigo Herold, one of the researchers behind the prototype, suggests that it could be used to show bio feedback during exercise, or even play videos, advancing through different screens or various clips in a library by looking between different controls presented in the field of view.

The demonstration model is a monochrome display with a 32-degree viewing angle and 1500 cd/m2 luminance. Unfortunately all we have so far is this tiny little image of it, but it certainly looks like it would be ideal for augmented reality applications involving overlaying graphics over a real-world view and then controlling a UI with eye-movements.

[via OLED-Display]