Leap Motion AR

Gesture interface company Leap Motion is announcing

an ambitious, but still very early, plan for an augmented

reality platform based on its hand tracking system. The

system is called Project North Star, and it includes a design

for a headset that Leap Motion claims costs less than

$100 at large-scale production. The headset would be

equipped with a Leap Motion sensor, so users could

precisely manipulate objects with their hands — something

the company has previously offered for desktop and VR

Displays.

Project North Star isn’t a new consumer headset, nor will

Leap Motion be selling a version to developers at this point.

Instead, the company is releasing the necessary hardware

specifications and software under an open source license

next week. “We hope that these designs will inspire a new

generation of experimental AR systems that will shift the

conversation from what an AR system should look like, to

what an AR experience should feel like,” the company writes.

The headset design uses two fast-refreshing 3.5-inch LCD

displays with a resolution of 1600x1440 per eye. The displays

reflect their light onto a visor that the user perceives as a

transparent overlay. Leap Motion says this offers a field of

view that’s 95 degrees high and 70 degrees wide, larger than

most AR systems that exist today. The Leap Motion sensor

fits above the eyes and tracks hand motion across a far wider

field of view, around 180 degrees horizontal and vertical.