Rebecca Allen
Allen created MyoPhone in 2003 whilst at Media Lab Europe.
MyoPhone is an ‘intimate interface,’ in which the user wears a pair of eyeglasses with a display embedded in the eyeglass lens and a LED in each corner of the frame. A wireless electromyographic EMG sensor on a bicep serves as the interface. When the computer detects an incoming call from the user's mobile phone it illuminates an LED in the user's peripheral vision. If the user would like more information about the caller, the bicep is subtly contracted, which brings the caller ID information into the main field of vision (through the eyeglass display). The user may dismiss the call with another muscle contraction and additionally send an SMS message to the caller. This work intentionally utilizes muscles to engage the body directly as an interface.
Pictured in the photograph are Larry Page and Sergey Brin (founders of Google), with Brin wearing the eyeglass display during Allen’s demonstration in 2003. It was this demonstration that sparked their interest in thinking about eyeglass displays which later led to the invention of ‘Google Glass.’
Reference: Costanza, Enrico, Samuel A. Inverso, and Rebecca Allen. "Toward subtle intimate interfaces for mobile devices using an EMG controller." In Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems, pp. 481-489. 2005.
8a. MyoPhone Augmented Reality eyewear prototype
8b. Photograph of MyoPhone Augmented Reality eyewear prototype
8c. Photograph of MyoPhone Augmented Reality eyewear prototype
8d. Photograph of MyoPhone demonstration
