Product: Binoculars
Binocular-sharing clip on cameras   (+2)  [vote for, against]
Greater value from existing tech

Good binoculars are expensive. If a group of watchers want to look at the same object, either the binoculars need to be passed round, or everyone needs their own pair.

With BorgCo binocular sharing cameras, the problem is solved. A pair of high gain, high quality cameras clip onto the existing eyepieces, and a digital feed is passed to any number of participants using VR headsets, locally or remotely. There's an optical pass-through to allow the operator to aim and focus the binoculars locally.

The DeLuxe version transmits audio, and has night vision capabilities.
-- 8th of 7, Nov 10 2019

Hmm. Baked for microscopes and telescopes. I'd imagine that the same hardware could be adapted for binoculars. But put the sensor on only one eyepiece - there's no advantage to having sensors on both.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Nov 10 2019


How do you get stereo vision with only one sensor?
-- pocmloc, Nov 10 2019


What [poc] said. Yes there is, otherwise why do binoculars exist instead of just telescopes ?

Your species has, on average, two eyes per individual*. Google Cardboard is a Thing: this could be easily" fed to an app and remote users could then have true 3D vision through the "binoculars".

*We're pretty sure your Aunt Suvatiwartha's third eye is just drawn on.
-- 8th of 7, Nov 10 2019


I would be surprised if binoculars give useful stereo perception, at least over long distances. The parallax available from two objectives situated not much further apart than the human eyes, when looking at a distant scene, will be very small.

At a rough estimate, if the objectives are six inches apart and you're looking at something 200 yards away, the parallax (relative to the infinitely far background) will be about the same as if your own eyes were 0.06 inches apart and you were looking at something 6 feet away - i.e. negligible.

The reason for having two eyepieces is the same as for having two eyepieces on a binocular microscope - despite the fact that it has only a single objective (and hence both eyes see the same image): it's more comfortable than squinting with one eye shut.

I'm also surprised you know about Aunty Suvie's third eye - it's normally covered by her chest hair.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Nov 10 2019


Bigger binoculars have the objectives further apart.

Maybe there is a placebo thingy going on.
-- pocmloc, Nov 11 2019


//two eyes per individual//... actually, the mean is very slightly less than two. Same for legs etc.
-- Frankx, Nov 11 2019


That is probably correct; the number of specimens with fewer than two is likely to outnumber those with more than two.
-- 8th of 7, Nov 11 2019


Order of magnitude, [frank]
-- pocmloc, Nov 11 2019



random, halfbakery