HUUG Focals Journal

Wednesday March 4th My presentation on Imagetext and composite art still lingers in my head. I wear the glasses for the first time. Image-Words that's the first little thought that lit my brain up. Where do these images come from? Information-images but only light. Do these images have tiny little pixels? I can never tell. I open the app, have a hard time connecting the little ring with the spectacle. The left eye sees but the right eye is empty. Is there something wrong with my glasses? Google tells me it's all good. I got to call my dad and show him my glasses. I toggle a little. The game seems interesting. It goes left then up. Great I leap over one log! I try it again for 6 times. Still only one log! I'm looking for directions. Can Alexa understand my accent? Very cool, the weather feature comes in handy. The app has little awards for progress. Great! I like the clicks. They are very cool, I feel rewarded somehow. Yes! Call my dad! My phone, whatsapp and I see a tin

Opening the box all wrapped up in a package where one might expect a cake of sorts. The little box with a nice note inside leading us to a link was unexpected to say the least. I thought about the relationship between the glasses and the ring. The longer I think about it the stranger it seems. I wore glasses of all sorts, to correct my vision mostly and rings in my culture are tokens (and are mostly made out of gold). It all seemed plastic to the naked eye, plastic glasses and rings. The ring of power that bonds with glasses for my eyes. Two disconnected objects brought together by "design". It was an interesting experience to say the least. Objects that make you want to think about outer pieces of jewellery, maybe bangles that can somehow connect to me to the instrument that measures the moisture in my garden bed. The box itself that holds the spectacle and the ring must be connected to electricity. The experience was not-so-intuitive because I for one looked at my spect

Thursday February 27th: My Focals arrived without an accessory kit so I had to borrow someone else's charger for a few hours. The case had three white LEDs inside - one for the glasses, one for the ring/loop and one for the case; that's neat and intuitive. Activation wasn't very intuitive - having a card or a foldout 'getting started' guide would be nice. Getting the image tuned was fidgety at first, but in the end it resolved well. Soon I had a crisp image in my right eye!  The laser creates the illusion of a little monitor hovering a few inches from my nose on the right. To perceive the image I 'look at it' in that point of space with both eyes. The 'placement' of that image is strange - not a natural place to read in my field of view; I would never hold my phone or a watch up in that position. I had expected the image to seem farther away and more centred. Nevertheless, I was impressed by the resolution and the different colours - it&

Feb 27: The first day using wearable tech was equal parts exciting and underwhelming. Most of my excitement came from unboxing the items with other users, imagining the possibilities for a device like this (augmented reality? being able to take photographs without using a handheld camera? livestreaming or viewing livefeeds in front of your eyes? real time directions without having to pay equal attention to Google Maps and the road ahead?), and the reactions from my roommates when they saw them for the first time (although one roommate asked me when I started wearing prescription glasses and why I didn't buy frames that suited my face better -- ouch). However, as much as I appreciate the modern inclination towards minimalism, the lack of clear directions definitely hindered my experience. It was initially challenging to figure out how to get started and to determine whether or not the batteries were charged. I still cannot connect the Loop to the Focals, and I'm left wond

Feb 27th Today was the first day with the Focals! Initial thoughts on the product: The unboxing experience was satisfying with a few brand specific text elements. I appreciated the “made in Canada” on the side of the box. Overall, I found the process of setting up the glasses pretty frustrating. There was an overall lack of user feedback, which made it quite difficult to understand why the glasses were not responding. After reading the FAQ page and finding no useful information, I did a quick google to learn that the glasses need to be charged for 2 hours in their case. This was slightly disappointing as the first experience with the glasses was delayed. First experiences with the glasses: The glasses themselves are quite heavy and have a desire to fall down the bridge of my nose. I like that it comes with clip on sunglasses. Not particularly my style, but I like that it makes the glasses more versatile. First reactions to the glasses: Below is a sequential list of quotes fr

Thank you for agreeing to participate in this study. Your contributions to the blog are a central component of the research. You are asked to spend about 5-10 minutes per day writing in the blog. The following prompts are designed to help guide your blog entries and keep you focused. As noted in the Consent Letter you signed, your identity as a blog writer will be known to the researchers and other study participants, but you will remain anonymous in any publication material resulting from this study. Daily Prompts: Feel free to use these prompts as a template for each blog post or just write more freely while keeping in mind the general focus of these prompts. ·        Did you use the glasses today? If not, why not? ·        For approximately how long did you wear the glasses today? ·        Where did you use the glasses today? ·        What did you use the glasses for today? ·        Did you use any functions of the glasses that you have not used on other days? ·