We have long accepted webcams as a permanent fixture, and our reliance on them keeps growing. In fact, there are even resources that let us create video call interference to avoid webcam meetings, which suggests a deep fatigue. However, Marc Teyssier proposes exploring our relationship with webcams from a very different angle. His Eyecam concept essentially transforms a webcam into a human eye that blinks, looks around... and watches you.
Do you have a webcam? Do you use it often? Have you put tape over it "just in case"? You're not alone, but you also don't represent the majority. In fact, people don't feel so uncomfortable with a webcam nearby... and its potential to observe everything around it. If we think about it for a moment, many users didn't hesitate to incorporate "smart devices" with active microphones that listen without interruption.
With that in mind, we come to the Eyecam project by Marc Teyssier, developed during his time at the Human-Computer Interaction Lab at Saarland University. Teyssier says that so-called "sensing devices" like cameras and microphones are everywhere, to the point that we are no longer aware of their presence. The Eyecam prototype seeks to explore the future of these devices, and it does so in a very particular way: transforming the webcam into a human eye.
Eyecam: The "eye-webcam" that blinks and watches you
Several specialized sites have compared the Eyecam project to "something out of a David Cronenberg movie", and honestly, they are not wrong. Instead of placing a traditional webcam on the monitor, Eyecam is an eye with eyelashes, an eyebrow, blinks, and movements more natural than we expected.
The prototype is completely open source, and Teyssier is working on a video that will show the complete assembly process. The combination of a Raspberry Pi Zero and a Pi Cam handles the optical part, while all mechanical elements are controlled with the help of an Arduino Leonardo Pro Micro.
The eye wakes up on its own, follows all our movements, and can even reproduce certain emotional expressions, but the video suggests that it closes automatically if we place our hand in front of the lens. Needless to say, the profile of a webcam changes radically when it looks like a human eye. If an "eye-webcam" bothers us so much... maybe the tape isn't such a bad idea.
Official site: Click here
