Category: Concepts

WestJet Flight Light

Over the last year or so, I have seen more and more brands from different industries actively experimenting with new ways to move beyond selling their products and providing their consumers with “convenience services” that eventually drive repeat usage / purchase of the product.

In this latest example, WestJet wanted to give their business travelers the ability to pursue opportunities, without losing connection with their loved ones at home. So, they created WestJet Flight Light, a nightlight that used live flight data to project a WestJet flight path onto a child’s bedroom ceiling. This simple device made the countdown of the hours and minutes to the parents return even more fun and interactive for the children waiting at home.

The prototype of the Flight Light is going to be in beta-testing throughout this summer. To stay updated visit the Flight Light homepage for more information.

Ford Smart Lane-Keeping Bed

Ford Europe has unveiled a “Lane-Keeping Bed” that ensures partners always have equal amounts of sleeping space. The idea was inspired by the driver-assist technology that prevents unintentional drifting in new models like the 2019 Ford Ranger.

As demonstrated in the video below, pressure sensors detect when an active dreamer strays to the opposite side of the mattress and triggers an integrated conveyor belt that puts them back where they belong.

Like Ford’s noise-cancelling dog kennel, the Lane-Keeping Bed is only a prototype in the company’s “Interventions” series of innovations that extend beyond the car industry.

Ford Noise Cancelling Kennel

An estimated 45% of dogs in the UK show signs of fear when they hear fireworks – causing distress to owners and their families too. So, Ford developed a noise-cancelling kennel concept that applied automotive know-how to help solve this everyday problem.

The idea was inspired by the noise-canceling technology Ford developed and introduced in its Edge SUV to give passengers a quieter ride. It worked so well that it got Ford thinking about how it could be applied to other facets of everyday life. In this case, it applied the tech to dogs and their fear of fireworks.

Feel the View

Ford in Italy along with their agency GTB Rome have teamed up with Aedo, a local start-up that creates devices for people with visual impairments. Together they have designed a new innovative device, that when applied on a car window can decode a landscape seen from the car, allowing visually impaired people to experience it with the tip of their fingers.

The device can transform a flat surface of a car window into a tactile display. The prototype captures and transforms the photos taken by the integrated camera into haptic sensory stimuli, not visible, but perceptible through touch and hearing.

The Gyro Monorail

It is pretty clear that we won’t be zipping around in flying cars anytime soon. So how exactly are modern cities going to solve their problem of public transportation as populations continue to grow? Turkish Engineering firm Dahir Insaat believes it has the answer. The company, and chief inventor Dahir Semenov, believe gyroscope-equipped vehicles are the answer…

Ford Max Motor Dreams

For many new parents, there is only one guaranteed solution to putting their baby down at the end of the day – a night-time drive that soothes, calms and eventually helps the little one nod off.

To help, Ford Spain has developed a cot that could simulate – in the comfort of your own home – the motion, engine noise, and even the street lighting of those night‑time drives. To all appearances a regular cot, the Max Motor Dreams, comes to life using a smartphone app. This enables it to record and then reproduce the comforting movement, lights and sounds of a particular journey.

For now, the Max Motor Dreams is a one-off pilot. But following numerous enquiries, the company is considering putting the unique cot into full‑scale production.

The future of TV viewing

The TV viewing experience has not changed so drastically over the years. But with the development of sophisticated headsets like Microsoft HoloLens that is all set to change.

In a recently released video, Microsoft and NFL have successfully re-imagined how a Super Bowl game could be watched with multiple friends and family members…

While the video shows how immersive TV watching could get, Microsoft is not fast-tracking HoloLens for consumer consumption. For now, only developers can order HoloLens, which will ship this year. No one knows when consumers will get access to HoloLens or when scenarios like this will become a reality.

Volvo HoloLens Showroom

Car companies today are relying more and more on augmented and virtual reality to help visualize their work. And for about six months now, Microsoft and Volvo have been working on a way to incorporate a “mixed reality” into the process of choosing a car. Now with the help of Microsoft’s HoloLens technology they have successfully put together a car showroom straight out of science fiction.

The below video shows how car buyers will be able to check out useful features that are often overlooked because they no longer read car manuals. This detailed mixed reality visualization will also help buyers understand how the respective features work in various scenarios.

Microsoft HoloLens

Last week at Microsoft’s Windows 10 event, the company unveiled a new augmented reality experience for the platform, called HoloLens. Using a special holographic headseat, Windows 10 users will now be able to make holograms appear in real life. 😎

The device is said to use see-through lenses, spatial sound, advanced sensors and a holographic processing unit to provide a state of the art untethered augmented reality experience.

Here is a short demo video of the next step of computing…