Google wants film students from five colleges to help explore how they can use its wearable computing device to make movies. It's only a matter of time before marketing and advertising departments
get some samples of their own.
American Film Institute, California Institute of the Arts, Rhode Island School of Design, University of California, Los Angeles, and University of Southern
California are the participating schools. About 10,000 consumers -- or as Google calls them, explorers -- already use the $1,500 Google Glass headset, which looks like a pair of glasses. The device
allows wearers to search the Internet, write emails, check schedules, take pictures and shoot video through voice commands.
That feature that enables film and marketing students to take
pictures and shoot video remains the key to creativity. The device shoots video in 720p high-definition quality. As part of its moviemaking experiment, Google will lend each school three pairs of
Google Glass, and plans to share an update in the fall of how students progress.
Students are not the only ones experimenting with Glass. Mercedes-Benz Research & Development North
America (MBRDNA), a division of Daimler AG, wants to integrate Glass into its cars to give consumers a "door-to-door transition between pedestrian directions and in-car GPS," reports Silicon Valley
Business Journal.
The same technology used in Google Glass could end up in windows on commuter trains in Europe. A special transmitter attached to the window sends inaudible high-frequency
vibrations that the brain translates into sound. Only the person near the window can hear it.
The German firm Audiva created the app tested
by Sky Deutschland with help from BBDO Germany. The proposal for train windows relies on bone conduction technology used in hearing aids and headphones and Google's Glass to pass sound to the
inner ear via vibrations.