Electrodes Turn Your Eyelids Into 3D Shutter Glasses

[Jonathan Post] has a way to watch 3D video without wearing shutter glasses but it might be kind of a hard product to break into the market. As you can see above, a pair of electrodes are stuck on a viewer’s eyelids, using electricity to alternately close each eye. The video after the break shows a demonstration of this technology. Obviously a camera can’t capture the image that the viewer sees, but this man describes a perfect 3D image. This reminds us of those ab exercisers that use electrodes to stimulate the muscles. Do you think a 3 hour epic would leave your eyelids tired and sore, eventually resulting and a steroid-esque muscle-ridden face?

Edit from [Caleb]: Judging from the comments, some people believe this to be an absolute impossibility. While we concur that this example is pretty silly (what’s powering those electrodes?), we invite you to watch [Daito Manabe]’s facial electrodes fun.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uef17zOCDb8&w=470]

[Thanks Keba]

153 thoughts on “Electrodes Turn Your Eyelids Into 3D Shutter Glasses

  1. a blink is 1/63 second for the full motion (yahoo it). at 120 hz (as demonstrated) that just inst possible as you must be fully closed for a whole 60th second per eye at a time.

    Matskat – dont be a troll. he recorded in slow motion and speed it up.

  2. WTF? What is this? Is HaD some sort of youtube? What a bunch of losers with the FAKE comments.

    1) To stimulate a muscle you don’t need much of a current, just the right voltage. It is entirely plausible that they are running the wireless electrodes from tiny cells.

    2) If you morons even cared to google, you would find that the electrodes are in the right spot, that is, over the orbicularis oculi muscle:
    http://www.infofisioterapi.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/M.-Occipitofrontalis.jpg

    3) He seems to have deliberately programmed the stimulation to start and stop gradually possibly to somewhat make it less aggressive.

    4) So it is perfectly plausible to have abdominal stimulation devices running from two AAA batteries but it is totally “FAKE” to stimulate the orbicularis oculi muscle? What a bunch of idiots..

    Hack-a-Day thank you for posting this. I wish that someday we will have moderation here, the comment SNR is getting very low :|

  3. As for the “what’s powering those things” comment on the main post, what powers a tiny bluetooth earpiece? Or how about hearing aids? The amount of power you need to make muscles twitch isn’t that much, just needs a way to get under the skin (conductive gel or needle), or high voltage (but very low current).

    The other issue here is that people assume that because the guy said you need a 120Hz tv that you don’t possibly have enough time. But you do. The reason for 120Hz is possibly to reduce ghosting effects, the actual 3D is probably only 30fps each side.

    Now, it could all be a hoax, but the guy would have to be pretty good with aftereffects (for eyelid motion) or very good with slowing down his speech (and good at dubbing). My bet is that it’s not a hoax (eyelid part), but that the 3D effect isn’t actually working as expected.

  4. This is like the airplane on a treadmill…

    We need the Mythbusters to put this to the test and settle this once and for all.

    Yes, you can stimulate muscles to contract with a small amount of current and the right voltage at the right point on the body. But this did not actually happen – it’s fake and I am deeply disturbed by the fact that so many otherwise intelligent people are completely falling for it.

  5. Ive played with a muscle stimulator before and while you can send these fast pulses to your muscles I doubt the muscle would respond as fast but you could get pretty close. Id have to try it, Im alittle sketchy about the size of the stimulators hes using they seem extremely small to be real but im no expert on stimulator design. The fake comments need to stop, All this isnt out of the realm of possibility. Ohh and everyone should own a muscle stimulator their fun as hell but dont go overboard.

  6. I also like to add to the speculation of this video being a hoax is that I see a wacom tablet on his desk so either hes drawing dirty hentai pics or hes a special FX artist. I dont think many builders/hackers own a wacom for designing due to the fact that they would have no use for the pressure sensitivity feature. Why not just use a mouse?, altho I might be way off base on this one.

  7. i dont think this is real … the units on his eyes do not seam large enough and trying to get them to sync just right would be a huge bother … getting my nvision kit to sync right is pain enough XD

    @markus
    agreed
    they should put some anti trolling rule

  8. just to add on to my previous comment i think thoes things on his eyes just blink and he uses that in post to make a simulation of a rapidly blinking eye
    the beep from the remotes, slow start up, his monitor does not look like a 120 HZ monitor, his use of a tablet, no visible IR receiver on any eye thing and a few other details make this look extremely fishy to me

    despite the fact that he offers information via email no news origonations has been able to conferm this

    like i said its all very fishy … id say either not possible or not safe

  9. This has to be fake. I won’t site maximum blink rates, or how this would somehow wirelessly sync for R/L frames from the tv, or how the lack of a perceived drop in brightness isn’t right (think 50% pwm on your eye). I will instead point towards how muscles react when used repeatedly and rapidly. They run out of oxygen and start working anaerobically. This causes a buildup of H+ ions which help the muscle use more oxygen but will result in a condition called acidosis if the activity is continued for extended periods. This causes PAIN. Try twitching your foot as fast as possible continuously for two hours. Perhaps if this device actually interrupted the nerve pathways from the eye to the brain and “blanked” one eye this would work, but this isn’t claimed. Polarized contact lenses would be a better alternative, with the plus that there is no HV within sticking distance of your brain.

  10. @mrasmus Close one eye… does it seem half as bright? No. Although you are right about polarized 3D, your logic doesn’t carry over to this. So what Mr. Blinker says is true, there would be no reduction in brightness. Besides the damage this might cause(most likely), it seems like a solid concept. And I’ve actually played around with several different muscle stimulators… they all ran off 3v coin cells.

  11. as an addendum to my previous comment-

    My frustration with trolls is not limited to HaD. It is becoming increasingly apparent that there is an entire… ?generation? of internet users that think that this is simply the way to /be/ while commenting on the internet. Spill over from the YouTube culture I suppose. I just wish admins (not just at HaD) would be more active about this problem. Show them that actions have consequences- even in the anonymous playground that is the internet.

  12. Chill out, people… was this not amusing? Why is everyone crying out against this? I lol’d good and hard on this one, so I’m glad HAD posted it… real or not, thanks for the lol’s.

  13. Apparently, HaD adheres to the modern (and sadly all-too-popular) “We are supposed to report stuff, whether it’s true or not (and don’t even try to look it up a bit, you know, see if it sounds legit or fishy…), simply because others reported it” school of journalism – as opposed to the classic one (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Journalism_ethics_and_standards#Accuracy_and_standards_for_factual_reporting)

    …A sad, sad day for HaD.

  14. Do any of the fake callers have proof against this? Please post something solid to dispute this.

    Eye lids have incredible response time to protect your eyes from damage. It takes very little current to stimulate muscles, which a button cell could easily provide. This is definitely PLAUSIBLE. Even if it is a joke (because it is funny), the concept can still work… it doesn’t have to be just one or the other.

    @Max Get off whatever pitiful horse you’re riding. This is a sad, sad day for you. Post a link to something disputing this concept, instead of a Wikipedia article that has nothing to do with this.

  15. I’m sure this is an achievable, yet painful feat.

    For the naysayers, I’d suggest a session with their chiropractor’s TENS unit :)

    Since muscles are essentially (dare i say, designed?) to return to their normal positions, very much like springs, their contraction can be caused with an electrical pulse and the release would essentially return the muscle to its resting state.

    However, i would agree that after a few hours, the eyelids would develop biceps … or something to that effect :)

  16. I thought this was a Joke the first time I saw it. a little research onto stereoscopy imagery (thank Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger for Wikipedia!) and it had been verified. wow. wtF! It looks one hell of a workout for the muscles in the eyelids. people of the future will be conditioned to blink like that anytime.

  17. i feel like i just walked into a hotel that’s hosting star trek and star wars or firefly conventions across the halls from each other. and i bet the nay sayers prob believe one of those shows will become a reality so y cant this mans work help as a POC. and the high pitch can be a radio frequency syncing the two stimulants to the image. Like kevin garnett anything is possible.

    and no im not trolling. just open ur eyes there might be a truth in front of you.

  18. Perhaps a pair of these could be synchronized to the video and stuck beside your eyes:
    http://www.uxsight.com/product/9683/electric-shock-shocking-hand-buzzer-funny-gag-gift-prank-joke.html

    When I was a kid I attached high-voltage pulsating electrodes to my temples. Instead of blinking eyelids, I saw rainbow-colored sparkles (phosphenes).

    I used was a speaker voicecoil transformer from a vacuum tube radio, wired in reverse to act as a step-up transformer, with the primary coil in series with a buzzer and a flashlight battery. Instead of a buzzer you could use a small relay with the coil in series with its normally-closed contact.

    Of course, the current flowed between the electrodes, so it was probably stimulating the optic nerve.

    A similar technique is used to give vision to some blind people, which was good enough for one blind man to drive a car in a controlled environment:
    http://www.springerlink.com/content/v4x3814350047543/

  19. Or this is real and we all got doubletrolled. (It isn’t but still, wouldn’t it be hilarious :P)

    I think muscle wise we could possibly pull something like this off but it will hurt our eyes for longer periods and definitely not be more comfortable than glasses !
    this guy pulls something quit fast off with his mind instead of digital assistance: http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/Search/Details/Fastestguitar-player/111980.htm
    http://namesty.multiply.com/video/item/46

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