London's National Theatre is using augmented reality to make its performances more accessible for hard of hearing customers.
Trying to get tickets for a sell-out production at London's National Theatre is difficult enough at the best of times, but if you're hard of hearing, it's trickier still.
Not only must you book tickets for one of a small handful of "captioned" shows, but you must also try to secure the seats in the part of the auditorium that have the best view of the screen.
It's something the theater is hoping to change with the help of Epson's latest smart glasses. This week it launched a trial that will see deaf and hearing-impaired customers supplied with the eyewear, which displays subtitles in their field of vision wherever they're sitting.
"The problem we're aiming to solve is the lack of choice and the customer experience -- it's twofold," Jonathan Suffolk, the theater's technical director, said in an interview. The smart glass tech, he said, "gives customers the chance to come anytime they want, matinee or evening, and sit anywhere they want in any size theater."
Source: c|net