Microsoft gave users its concept on the future of watching sports with a life-size demonstration of an NFL football game.
With the NFL Super Bowl 50 sports event happening on Feb. 7, Sunday, the software tech giant released a clip showing how its smart-glasses headset for augmented reality applications works in a sports setting.
The concept video showcased sports watching as an interactive and futuristic activity, featuring life-size players, instant replays, and tangible stats surrounding a user’s living room, Daily Mail described.
Taking the game from a one-dimensional flat screen TV, the footage displayed how the Microsoft HoloLens could help football fans experience an NFL game in augmented reality.
Running Windows 10, the headset’s natural user interface allows the user to interact with the augmented reality display via sight, voice, and hand gestures, bringing their favorite players to life using 3D displays in high-definition, Gizmodo reported.
The two-minute video also presented the cutting-edge graphics Microsoft says will come part and parcel with its smart-glasses headset, showing the same graphics emerging from the television screen, taking over the coffee table, and crawling up the walls.
Viewers are shown manipulating the interactive graphics by swiping their finger or waving their hand, HoloLens capabilities that Microsoft has shown in past demonstrations.
While the augmented reality demo meant for sports fans acquired a lot of attention, it is still unclear whether Microsoft’s concept will be translated into an actual product, the Sydney Morning Herald said.
There are reportedly a number of software challenges the company needs to hurdle to bring such a product to the market, despite Microsoft targeting the HoloLens within a “Windows 10 timeframe,” with a tentative schedule to begin shipping the smart-glasses headset exclusively for developers within the first quarter of this year.
