Meta's mysterious prototype headset has a 210-degree field of view
Meta's CTO Andrew Bosworth showed a picture of a wide FOV prototype headset last week. Now he has revealed more details about the experimental device.
A few days ago, Bosworth posted pictures from a visit to Meta's research labs in Redmond, where he tried out various prototypes. In one of the pictures, Bosworth is holding a wide FOV prototype headset.
In his most recent AMA on Instagram, Bosworth went into more detail about the device, saying that it offers a 210-degree field of view and supports mixed reality:
"This was the question I got asked the most this week. Keen eyed viewers noticed in my recent post about my visit up to Reality Labs Research in Redmond that one of the prototype headsets they pulled together for me was a particularly wide field of view headset. That was out of Doug Lanman's research group. In fact, it was a wide field of view mixed reality headset. I think it went to 210 degrees, but it was very, very, very low resolution, and with giant gaps in the display where there was no image at all, just to give a sense of what it was like. We had a little dial, so I could play with different widths of field of view."
Bosworth then goes on to discuss the trade-offs involved in building wide FOV headsets:
"I know how much y'all love field of view and want more of it. And I'm with you. I like it. I get it. I do. The trade-offs are so bad. The trade-offs on weight, form factor, compute, thermals, it's all bad. Field of view is one of the most expensive things you can add to a headset. And by definition, all that cost, that quadratic cost is going to the least important pixels. Understand that? It's a really tough trade to embrace. We care about field of view, that's why we do this research. We look at it, think about different ways to approach it and attack it and make it cheaper, make it more affordable, not make it so expensive. But I do want to call out, we look at it, we look at it seriously. That's why we have these research prototypes, and we have teams looking at it from every angle. But I do want to remind you, there is a practical reason that we end up in the space that we do."
Meta's wide FOV headset: not a product prototype
Bosworth once again explains why standalone headsets are more or less stagnating in terms of FOV.
Judging from the image and Bosworth's comments, the Wide FOV prototype is probably in the Pre-Discovery phase, where Meta experiments with the "craziest stuff" and implements them to the point where you can try out the concept and get an idea of the experience they offer. So don't expect the prototype to become a product any time soon.
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