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Evolution of visual experience provides opportunities for optometry
ODs must take a proactive role in prescribing and fitting wearable technology.
Optometry is being challenged to contribute to the transforming world of visual experience.
The first monumental change in visual experience was ushered in about 1450 when Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press. Prior to that, almost all visual experiences were fully natural, save the viewing of painstaking handwritten documents and handcrafted art.
The next big step came with advances in optics, with the first compound microscope appearing in The Netherlands in the late 1500s, and the first working telescope in 1608 credited to Hans Lippershey. The first partially successful photograph from a camera image was made in 1816 by Nicéphore Niépce.
Just think that we are within 200 years of the first photographic image. Since the first photograph, visual experience evolved to silent movies, then movies with sound and color a little more than 100 years ago. The evolution of visual experience has accelerated with quantum leaps of new perceptual opportunity ever since.
The next quantum leap
We are about to embark on the next quantum leap with the launch of the present generation of virtual and augmented reality eye wear. These multisensory stimuli present the human sensory systems with rich perceptual experiences that are amazing and powerful. Simply stated, these eye wear are expanding vision. They are called the “rocket ship of the mind” and are fully acknowledged for their capacity to change human physiology. Optometry, the art and science of vision care, must reconcile its role in the evolution of visual experience.
Jerome A. Legerton
Micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS), micro-optics, photonics, computational power, application software and electronic middle wear are advancing near the speed of light. The confluence of these will bring visual-perceptual stimuli to a new level.
Sensors and imagers are making the invisible visible. They are providing images at a speed a thousand times faster than our vision alone. At the same time, consumer appetite for more information and more entertainment appears to be moving even faster. The visual experiences offered will enrich life and substantially increase human performance. Is optometry ready to participate in the evolution of visual experience?
Investment in virtual reality eye wear
The opportunity to have millions of early adopters using new virtual reality eye wear is apparent with the Facebook acquisition of Oculus Rift for $2 billion along with an investment by Google in Magic Leap on an equivalent company valuation. These are large bets and likely sure bets on technology that will be used by millions of consumers. The foundation of these investments is resident in phrases such as: “just like being there,” “personalized ultimate reality,” “a lot more of everything” and “endorphin-dripping visual experiences.”
Michael Abrash, the chief scientist at Facebook’s Oculus, says that “graphics will be the Wild West again,” as he does not see the end in sight with regard to what the virtual reality experiences will deliver. He, his co-workers and counterparts with a score of other companies are well versed in the roles of accommodation, convergence, fixation disparity and disparity budgets, eye tracking latency and refresh rates for like-real visual experiences. They understand the importance of pixel pitch and angular resolution along with positioning sensors for pixel perfect registration of virtual images with the real world and how the eye wear will provide rich, fast, three-dimensional visual experiences.
The developers of the virtual and augmented reality systems understand well that vision is the dominant sensory process and find meaning and opportunity in phenomena such as the McGurk effect, in which vision alters auditory perception. The systems will have powerful audio and will ultimately incorporate stimuli or cues for the other senses to make beyond-real virtual reality.
It is fair to extrapolate the high number of hours that personal computers, tablets, televisions, game players and mobile phones are currently used to estimate the hours of use of virtual reality and augmented reality systems for stationary and mobile information and entertainment.
Challenge to the binocular system
It is one thing to be concerned for the challenge to the eyes from a health perspective and the binocular system from a comfort and functional performance perspective. It is another to participate in aiding the users as they adapt to the vision and visual perceptual demands of these systems. Will optometry take the human factors role in assisting the developers and ministering to the users, or will this role be taken by human factor experts in other fields? It is one thing to appreciate the challenge to human adaptation and another to be proactive in optometry adapting to the evolution of visual experiences.
It is fair to say that optometry evolved contemporaneously with the advent of printed and photographic media, higher education for the masses and the operation of the automobile. Whether the advance of optometry was caused by the increase in demanding visual experiences or only correlates with the advances may need further study. It is my take that vision care was a response to the evolution of visual experience and the related demands on vision in the last century, while medical eye care grew as a result of incremental learning and understanding in diagnostic and therapeutic pharmaceuticals and surgical intervention.
Opportunity for optometry
The next decade will be marked with an exponential increase in the use of head-mounted display technology. In some cases, the eye wear will include eye-borne optics as in the Innovega iOptik contact lens-enabled wearable display.
Will optometry seek a role in prescribing, fitting and consulting on the use of these systems? Will doctors of optometry expand their knowledge base into visual perception and visual performance so they can work with those whose relative individual deficiencies detract from their performance when using the systems in the same manner that we deliver care to those who perform at lower levels in reading or sports today?
Make no mistake, the magnitude of the enjoyment and the power of the information from wearable technology will rapidly drive the use of these systems to millions of consumers and derive billions of dollars. It will be an opportunity for optometry to take a proactive role in understanding the demands of the systems and how to prescribe and fit them. There is also opportunity to train those with performance deficiencies and apply the systems to vision therapy and low vision.