Showstopper at NAB 2016 was the venue and Brother was the company showing its AR headset. It has been for sale in Japan since last November and will now be offered in the U.S. this June for $1,400.
Called the AiRScouter, this is a monocular eyepiece design attached to a pair of safety glasses and was being showcased for use in the broadcast market, where it allows the viewing of camera video. Brother also sees controlling drones as a useful broadcast application. You can use this for low or high shots in broadcast or movie production.
On display was the AiRScouter WD-200B, which features a single 720p resolution LCD with an adjustable virtual focal length of 3cm to 5m. The field of view is 17.8 degrees and it was moderately bright in the ShowStopper room, but one must wonder if it would be bright enough for outdoor use.
The headset is wired to a controller, which can accept content over an HDMI connector. This allows a third-party PC, perhaps in the configuration of a stick PC, to be connected to the headset to stream live video, Internet content or other information. -CC
