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. Everyone knows it is fake, not because it isn’t possible, but because the guy’s a director, not a scientist or engineer. I don’t have a problem with it being posted here but they should have acknowledged in the OP that it is clearly a joke but an interesting concept. The fact that they didn’t makes us think that they thought it was real. The update doesn’t help either.

  2. I don’t like feeding trolls, but i have explained this twice, and i am starting that people
    I acknowledge that this can be done in theory, it wouldn’t be done exactly as described the effect would be awful, as it is, but his specs as stated are physically impossible

    HERE IS HOW ITS DONE.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icHyFaHg6-s&playnext=1&list=PLB0188AB105C2C87F&index=32

    HERE IS A WOMAN MAGICALLY MAKING THE WORLD RUN BACKWARDS FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE PEOPLE WHO STILL BELIEVE.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDKmFipygWY

  3. Anyone that knows anything about the way that the human body works (Absolute and relative refractory periods, the fact that the average neuron is firing at ~30Hz and the fact that the eyelid cannot physically respond that fast due to the absolute refractory period, etc) knows that this guys is nothing more than a really technical troll. Lol!!!

  4. hehe…
    yeah, the muscle fatigue problem would mean this would only work for minutes at a time.

    However, this did get me thinking.
    Why not make your own LCD flicker glasses using two nokia 3310 screens with the rear display and polariser removed?
    this works because the light from the LCD is already polarised, so passing through the LCD and front polariser imitates a full display.
    (plus they work great for normal light!)

    -ZPM

  5. Try this with a Vegas showgirl with fake ‘lashes.Would she fly?? Also,if the freq. is set fast enuff,could it create a sonic boom?Perhaps create a space/time vortex,where your eyes would be sucked back into your skulls,LMAO!

  6. @Rob Wentworth
    While it might not be possible to close and open/close eyelids more than say 4-6 times per second it is quite possible to overload optical nerve at 20-30Hz. All it takes is a common electrode hooked to the back of the head and separate electrodes below eyes. It will make white flashes in the filed of view, not the best solution but working for sure (flickering, unwanted forcing the brainwave frequency, headache).

  7. I’ve seen similar things to this before, getting it right for each person would be a nightmare, getting such a high controlled response takes a while to map.

    One subject we tested managed to move there fingers over 20times a second causing extreme pain though. looking at the video concept is sound the video isnt.

  8. @space
    Regarding seeing white from electrical stimulation of optic nerves, I know this to be true from personal experience.

    When I was 17, I built a Jacob’s Ladder from 3-foot brass brazing rods mounted on a wooden base, powered by a 15 KiloVolt neon sign transformer. It worked fine until the wooden base carbonized from arcing, at which point I became unconscious on the garage floor. After about 20 minutes, I awoke blinded, seeing a total whiteout, until my sight began to reappear many minutes later through tiny pin-pricks of vision sparkling through the whiteness, looking like a very weak analog TV signal that is mostly snow, slowly coming into full clarity.

    That is one of many life experiences that make me wonder how I ever made it to 56.

    It also proves the point that optic nerve stimulation causes visual whiteness, so I do not think it would word very well for 3D shutter effects. ;-)

  9. Regarding how the (alledgedly) fake video was recorded, there are video editing tutorials on the “interweb” in which dialog is prerecorded, then slowed down and frequency shifted to sound normal, then during timelapse filming the slo-mo dialog is lipsynced. Finally, the new video is sped up to match the original dialog.

    Normal-speed alternating eye blinks would look very fast using timelapse photography, while lipsync is maintained using this method of trick-photography.

  10. Just rotoscope the eyes in mocca cut and past the fast footage onto normal speed abit of motion blur and a bit of smudge tool.

    For a hacking community your knowledge of basic special effects is lacking.

  11. So conclusion from Daitos test is that maximum of 7-9hz flickering is possible
    (perhaps he phase-shifted to open the eyes even quicker?)

    From Daito’s blogg: “やはりジョークビデオですかね、、。”

    ..
    I also assume that this is fake.

  12. You even have to think about this ?
    Well, if you bought into it then get ready the replacements for those slim muscles you are about to burn out. I killed myself laughing though when his eyelids started to flutter. Nice film manipulation, Kudos !

  13. My thought is to use if for musicians to help them play the fast bits. Attach it to fingers and feet so that 1/256 notes are playable. Let the musician reach the limits of the instrument and human perception.

  14. This video is fantastic! I really like how nonchalant the man is while his eyelids are furiously fluttering. Hilarious!

    However, this is not possible for a couple basic reasons:

    1) Anatomy. The evoked muscle activity is only present in the eyelids, while the rest of the face remains still. This would mean that the electrodes placed on the temples are capable of selectively stimulating only the muscles within the eyelid. Although the placement of electrodes on the temples are near the facial nerve (cranial nerve VII), axonal projections from the facial nerve at this point innervate MANY muscles in the face – not just the muscle fibers in the eyelid. Surface electrical stimulation of the facial nerve at the temples will result in a contraction that looks much more like a wince than a blink. It is NOT possible to selectively stimulate only the palpebral portion of the orbicularis oculi (muscles in the eyelid) using this type of stimulation. Interested in learning more: look up The Facial Nerve by May & Schaitkin in your local medical school library to read about facial nerve anatomy, and a series of papers by Giovanni M. Salerno published in the early 90’s about electrical stimulation of eye blink.

    2. Biophysics. To evoke the “3D effect” cited in the video the eyelids flicker one after the other in rapid succession at a rate of at least 60 Hz. That means that every 16.7 milliseconds each eyelid closes and opens. In normal blink, it takes about 80 milliseconds for the eyelid to close and about twice that long for the eyelid to open again (MG Doane, 1980). This means that the “stimulated” blink in the video is about 12 times faster than normal blink. Granted, electrically evoked muscle contractions are a bit faster than normal contractions; however, electrical stimulation of orbicularis oculi produces an evoked eyelid closure only a few tens of milliseconds faster than normal blink (NA Sachs, 2006). The speed of electrical activation of muscles is inherently limited by the biophysics of excitation-contraction coupling, which is much slower than the rate of “contractions” shown in the video.

    Again, I love the brilliant video, but it is NOT REAL.

  15. I think I’ve been in a few classes with this guy quite a few years ago. If not he has a twin brother, accent and everything. He was on a graphic arts and photography track, and I was doing an art minor. His three talents; bullshitting, bragging, and standing very still. He could actually take long exposures with a handheld camera and not get motion blur most of the time. On the other hand, he’d spend most of his time telling you how great he was and making up stories. You just been trolled, folks.

  16. @Gdogg

    I don’t even try to correct your vs. you’re anymore, there literally is no hope for this generation. They are borderline worthless, yet expect the world to be delivered to them with a cherry on top. It’s really going to suck for them when the cold, harsh reality of life and hard work hits them ;)

  17. @Jake, Gdogg

    srsly, lighten up. im one of “this generatoin” and…

    OOPS, I meant: Seriously, lighten up. I’m one of “this generation” and hate bad grammar/typos. Not everyone in this generation is borderline worthless, you know. Some people do care about their grammar.

  18. I thought this quote was extremely suiting “Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.” – Thomas Jefferson

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