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Re:Motorbike helmet with navigation by jameshart on Wednesday September 25, 2013 @05:23PM (#6447378)
This concern does not seem to have deterred air forces from putting head-up-displays in front of pilots. The primary goal of a HUD in a cockpit is to keep you from needing to go head-down and lose any chance of seeing something important happening outside the cockpit. Better to have something small momentarily obscured than have you looking away completely. That said, I'm not sure motorcyclists have a constant need to perform instrument scans that take them head-down in the first place. I'd be wary of the urge to put too much information up on the display just because it looks cool, or because you can...
Re:Motorbike helmet with navigation by ChuckMcM on Wednesday September 25, 2013 @07:22PM (#6447991)
Actually, I've talked quite a bit with folks who were at NASA an building next generation heads up displays that were 'constant field of view', their conclusion (and they design stuff for Attack Helicopter pilots) was that the display has to put things into the environment rather than having it display static things, this allows the pilot to look at the environment rather than look at the display.

An example of how that worked in the military sense, the eye piece would put a targeting diamond over a target while you were looking at it and would be either clear, or light up a single pixel on the edge of the screen where you would have to look to see the diamond(s).

On fighter yets the hud is fixed over the cockpit 'dash' and doesn't move relative to your head, so when you look out of the cockpit it isn't in front of your eyes.

The conclusions NASA came to was that locating stuff and anchoring it in space around the pilot was essential in keeping the pilot from losing situational awareness and instead looking at the display on the glass.

In the Russian helmet, they would need some way to combine your GPS location, and head orientation, to perhaps put virtual cones in the road in front of you showing you where to go.

Re:Motorbike helmet with navigation by bentcorner on Wednesday September 25, 2013 @07:22PM (#6447993)
Some anecdotes from a military pilot friend: Pilots transitioning back to civilian life sometimes get into accidents on the road because they're so used to being "heads down" on their instruments. When you're flying a jet in the sky, there's not really anything you can run into, so you get used to that sort of behavior.
Re:Motorbike helmet with navigation by loup-vaillant on Wednesday September 25, 2013 @05:31PM (#6447411)
Air force pilots are trained to use a HUD. Motorcycle pilots aren't. A HUD is probably ideal if you are used to it, but I fear the first hours.

Ideally, this should be tested.

Re:Motorbike helmet with navigation by dcesiel on Wednesday September 25, 2013 @05:39PM (#6447464)
This technology has been available in Cadillacs for years. Go drive an ATS if you want to see it in action. Not distracting at all.

ATS HUD: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpXYwoZ6zWw

For a while they even had a radar overlay so you could see deer in the road on your HUD before your eyes could in the dark.

Re:Motorbike helmet with navigation by jeroen on Wednesday September 25, 2013 @05:48PM (#6447504)
Looks like the Cadillac HUD is fairly low on the windshield:

http://cdn0.mos.techradar.futurecdn.net//art/car%20tech/Head...