What is it?

Who?

 Have you ever wanted to control something just by looking at it? Buy something without saying a word? A company called Tobii is the leading company when it comes to eye tracking innovative technology helping the world advance with retinal scanning technology to create a more interactive and innovating world. 

What?

 The Tobii EyeX is an eye-tracking device used to enhance various aspects of your daily life. This technology is not only a huge stepping-stone for gaming but also for a number of different industries such as the restaurant business. Tobii EyeX was created to assist with application software and gaming, where retinal eye tracking would allow a more efficient and an entirely new experience for users. 

Why?

Tobii isn’t just a company that develops this software for gaming and applications, but it also has separate divisions that focus on different perspectives. For example, Tobii has created a pair of eye tracking glasses that allows users to “capture spontaneous responses that are unfiltered from the conscious mind”. This is ideal for: shoppers looking for different products, driving assistance, restaurant menus, navigation, sports research, and many more uses. This allows researchers to capture the true objectives and insights of how humans behave

Products and Partner Companies that are using EyeX

Tobii provides portable and desk-standing eye trackers which are mostly utilized with their leading eye tracking analysis and visualization software called Tobii Studio.  Their products are used for three main purposes:  1)To test usability of online websites, games, softwares, mobile devices, and other physical objects, 2)For quantitative research of behavior in various fields and 3)Further developing and customizing their eye tracking technology to enhance users’ experience from particular services or products. 



Tobii Glasses 2

Their off-the-shelf eye trackers are the Tobii Glasses, X60, X120, X2-30, X2-60, TX300, T60, T120 and T60XL.  The Tobii Glasses 2 is a wearable eye tracking tool that shows exactly what a person is looking at in real time as she or he moves freely in a shop, a restaurant or any real-world environment, therefore it is suitable for studies of social interaction and behavior in natural settings.  It is ideal for in-store shopper research that may improve store planning and package design, driving and vehicle usability studies, mobile device testing, out-of-home advertising, TV advertising,  menu boards at restaurants, sports research, sports psychology, simulators, control panels and training evaluation.  Tobii X2-60 and X2-30 are small snap on tools  used for screen-based research that eye track websites and ads directly on computers or screens such as ATMs and ticket machines.  The other products are stand-alone units that allow large head movements and offer higher tracking frequency for studies that require finer-gaze detail data of real-world flat surfaces or scenes.

 

Morae TechSmith

     Morae is using Tobii Eyex as a plug-in to enhance one of their services, which is the Software& Web Users Experience Testing system.  By combining actions of the user, which will be recorded by the software Morae Recorder, with the gaze trail of the user, which will be captured by the Tobii eye tracker, researchers will gather more data that will lead to further insights about user behavior and usability.

 

To know more about Morae TechSmith, click here: http://www.techsmith.com/morae.html

 

 Pizza Hut

     Pizza Hut and Tobii Technology have been developing an eye-tracking menu for which they call the "world's first subconscious menu" in the past 6 months.  This new digital menu will be implemented in the U.K. Customers will be ordering their pizzas with a tablet installed with the eye tracking application.  No speaking is required when making your order, all you have to do is follow the Pizza Hut logo with your eyes so the menu can recognize your eye movement.  From there, you'll see a grid of 20 potential toppings on the screen.  "In exactly 2.5 seconds, the subconscious menu knows which ingredients your mind and eyes have been looking at longest".  However, if you are not satisfied with the selection, you can simply glance at the re-start button to start the process again.

    

Ubisoft

     Ubisoft has just released their PC version of Assassin's Creed Rogue in March, 2015. The new game will have support for the Tobii EyeX Controller and SteelSeries Sentry, wich means that the games support eye-tracking inputs.  Tobii Technology said that this will be the world's first AAA games to integrate eye tracking as a component of gameplay.  Although eye tracking may sound similar to the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset, the two technologies offer very different experiences. The Oculus Rift lets players step into virtual worlds and it tracks head movements so that they can look around seamlessly as they would in real life. Eye tracking can be considered another add-on to games like rumbling in controllers or programmable buttons in a mouse.  The eye-tracking device would have to be attached to your monitor. You will be able to easily switch back-and-forth between the eye-tracker and the mouse to look around the open world. When the player looks left or right, the Sentry detects the eye movements and pans the scene camera in that direction. The screen automatically centers based on what you are looking at. And the game pauses when you look away from the screen and resumes when you return.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Business Advantage

Getting and Upper Hand

 

Tobii EyeX device

In a growing country new technology always leads to new ways of doing business, the trick is to figure out how to apply it. The Tobii EyeX initially released a software development kit to allow businesses the opportunity to find those applications. Fast forward two years and the Tobii system can be found across a handful of industries, the system is now being used to create a competitive advantage within those industries.

Service Industry

The service industry is applying it to enhance services and lock-in customers by allowing people to more efficiently place and confirm their orders. A process that would normally take upwards of five minutes can now complete a customers order in as little as thirty seconds. Applying this software will lead to easy decisions and increase in customer satisfaction. Along with this customers have less time to consider alternative options and they are locked in because of the convenience of the service. The only disadvantage to this application is that the software does not work for a small customer base. If a customer is dieting for example they are restricting what they actually want and he or she may be less inclined to use the service to avoid temptation. Assuming that both enhancing the product and locking in customers has gone as planned the business choosing this path can also look towards raising barriers to market entry in their industry. The new technology would differentiate them from other businesses and eventually cause the technology to be a table stake.

Computing and Gaming

With the same technology it can be used a completely different way in a new industry. The gaming industry is beginning to apply it to differentiate their products. The eye tracking system can be used to navigate and control interfaces; menu systems can be streamlined to a visual display and simply looking at what you want to select. This makes the ability to experience video games available to those with limited dexterous abilities. Video games will become severely more intuitive and open up gaming to a new audience whether it be someone with bodily impairment or is simply on the wrong side of the technological divide. Thankfully this software is not limited to those currently outside of the market for video games, it also applies benefits for existing customers. Eye tracking technology can be used to create more immerse worlds to experience. Playing a video game is a lot like reading a book, but instead of reading about the protagonist you are the protagonist. Just like a book the author wants you to care for and relate to the characters inside, essentially creating the most immerse experience possible. The eye tracking system adds to this by recording where you are looking and activating events based on that information. To simplify this a little bit more say there is a dark corridor on the edge of your screen you’ve neglected to notice, as you gaze over at it before you are allowed to cognitively process it, CRASH a spider jumps out at you. On the other hand say there is a man across the room you met earlier, you look at him and he gives you a wave. These are just a couple of examples of how video games can be changed to create an engaging experience that will keep costumers coming back for more. Even though there are a multitude of uses for the software there is one major disadvantage, the cost of implementation. Thousands of lines of code have to be rendered unusable or required to be converted to the new system. There are however an abundance of uses for the software as stated earlier and it is up to the managers to decide whether or not it is worth it.

Additional links

If you are interested in purchasing or finding out more about Tobii EyeX, here is their official website:
http://www.tobii.com/en/eye-experience/eyex/

Where gamers and streamers fit into the eye-tracking device scene:
http://steelseries.com/products/controllers/steelseries-sentry-gaming-eye-tracker

Barriers to Adoption

  Not available for all platforms

   Currently only available for Windows. Tobii is looking into developing for Linux and Android to tackle this barrier, but it is unknown if they will be developing for Apple operating systems.

  Unnecessary 

   Input hardware is sustaining technology, improves efficiency to improve performance but does not change procedure dramatically. Everything can still be done without the need of Tobii EyeX. It does not improve experience in a way where it is life-changing, although some gamers may choose to think so.

  Expensive for what it is

   $139 USD may not be expensive for some, but adding it on top of a PC can make the technology quite pricey. It is worth noting that since it is not available for all platforms and not necessary for functionality of the PC, consumers may find a better opportunity for its cost. 

   What if I didn't want to look there?
    There is a high learning curve which users may be turned off by. Users will have to learn the optimal ways of using the eye-tracking device where they will minimize the mistakes they make. Also, many gamers have a particular gaming style in which they are accustomed to the way they approach the game. Implementing Tobii EyeX may result in hindrance of their abilities before realizing its full potential.

Opportunities

 Use in gaming technology

   Tobii EyeX has recently been featured in Assassin's Creed® Rogue, where players will be able to implement eye-tracking along with normal game functionalities. 

     An exclusive interview with Corneliu Versiliu, producer of the game at Ubisoft, can be found through this link: https://youtu.be/Bwfc03vm97o

  Tobii EyeX believes that:

       "Games can also respond to the player in a fundamentally different way. Characters’ behavior is influenced by eye contact just like in real life. A shy person might look away. Or someone might become upset if you stare at him too long. The possibilities are unlimited. Hide. Be seen. Look around corners. Aim your weapon where you look. All made possible with eye tracking. Games become deeply immersive, faster and more intense."

         

     Such possibilities will include first person shooters such as Assassin's Creed Rouge, and real time strategy games, for example, Starcraft II: Heart of the Swarm. 

 Use in apps

   Development of apps that utilize eye-tracking are in the works, including action adventure game Son of Nor,  a gallery-shooter game called BeatShot, and interactive movies which will include selective hearing/vision according to where your eyes are looking. Moving forward, there will be more apps that enhance the user's experience to a new level.

 Use in daily lives

   Efficiency will be enhanced significantly with use in daily life. It will decrease the amount of time it takes to move cursors by taking out steps in the process. For example, rather than finding where one wants to move the cursor, then one's brain telling the hand to move and click, Tobii EyeX will sense where it is needed.