Video Analysis and Eye Tracking

And we're back again, and we're here to talk today about Eye Tracking technology. Surprised?

Well, you might think that that level of sophistication is still decades away but the truth is that Samsung is soon releasing the new S4, which can supposedly scroll and do many other fancy things....just by tracking your eyes. And its not just Samsung. LG is close on Samsung's tail and are working on launching LG Optimus G Pro with eye tracking technology as well. Also, Apple is embedding Eye Tracking technology to the next iPhone.

Here are a couple of links if you are interested in learning more.

http://blog.laptopmag.com/lg-samsungs-galaxy-s4-eye-tracking-tech-infringes-on-patents
http://www.phonesreview.co.uk/2013/03/17/iphone-6-or-5s-eye-tracking-and-keepsafe-possibilities/

This video should demonstrate how exciting and innovative this technology is.....

So how did all start?

Bloomberg BusinessWeek has an article which goes into how Eye Tracking evolved. Like many other great inventions such as radioactivity, and vulcanised rubber, Eye Tracking was also the product of an accident. Here's an excerpt from the article:

"In 1999, John Elvesjö, a 21-year-old Swedish engineering student, was experimenting with an infrared sensor to track movement. He had gotten the device to follow two tossed krona coins when he turned it around to look at it—and noticed something surprising. The sensor began following the movement of his eyes."

If you're interested in reading more, click here to read the full article.

How does Eye Tracking work?

It's quite simple, really. It's based entirely on Video Analytics. What you do is focus a camera on the subject's eye/eyes and using some very clever scientific tools and calculations, for example, you can figure out what the person is looking at and for how long. This is very useful because using this, you can now understand the subject's reactions to external stimuli - which can be used in ingenious ways to develop marketing tools and do psychological analytics.   

All this must be very expensive?

When you consider the sophistication of the technology, the variety of applications this has (more on this later) and the implications of understanding human behaviour, the costs actually are not so high. The reason is quite simple. We already have technology that can track items. Think about military applications - remember the Top Gun pilots "locking in" on their targets? The locks work by tracking the targets they are applied to. 

Our eyes, in reality, are not much different that any other object and hence, in the same way, can be tracked easily. The technology already exists. It just needs to be enhanced to capture the certain nuances of the human eye, like retinal dilation, etc. So, to sum up, Eye Tracking is comparatively cheaper to develop and implement. It also explains why all the phone manufacturers are doing it, right?

 

Tell me more about potential applications....

Sure. There are a lot of interesting and innovative applications for this technology but here are just a few examples:

1) Marketing
Using Video Analytics, Marketing specialists can monitor what attracts a customer's attention. How? Simply by using a camera to trace what you're looking at and for how long. In fact, this isn't even fiction any more. Its already be done and we can see the demonstration here:

2) Gaming Industry
Last week we talked about Kinect. But some firms are taking it a step further. Imagine being able to point and shoot in a video game using only your eyes!  This is still under developmental stage but already in some cases, you can control your virtual armoury with your eyes - specially in classics like World of Warcraft. Here's an example:

3) Communication
This is one field in which Video Analytics in the form of Eye Tracking could make a huge impact and make life a lot simpler for a lot of unfortunate people. We are talking here about people who have lost their ability to communicate verbally, and/or otherwise incapable of using their limbs to communicate. Eye Tracking can step in here and allow these people to communicate in ways which was not thinkable even until a few years ago. Here's an example of how this technology was used by students at the University of Rochester to help people with the Locked-In system to communicate with the world again:

Here are just three examples, and there are many more applications that this could be applied to. In fact, we haven't even covered military usage, security enhancement and more commercial usages like replacing your TV remote, etc. However, we hope this snapshot convinces you of the huge potential that this technology has and how it will change the world in which we live in in the years to come.

You've got me hooked. What next?

Next week, we intend to bring you more Video Analytics awesomeness. Do return next week to find out more applications and usages that we will present to you then! 

Actually, no. Not next week. Next week, we are off for Semana Santa. For those that aren't accustomed to Spanish holidays, its a week off we have here in Spain to celebrate Easter (or just to unwind and take a breath from the hectic pace of MBA life). But do come back in two weeks' time to check on us again! 

Till then, Happy Easters! And Happy Semana Santa!