Shadow Creator Halomini
More actions
| Shadow Creator Halomini | |
|---|---|
| |
| Basic Info | |
| VR/AR | Augmented Reality |
| Type | Head-mounted display |
| Subtype | AR Glasses |
| Developer | Shadow Creator |
| Manufacturer | Shadow Creator |
| Release Date | 2017 |
| Price | CN¥7,500 (official pre-order price, January 2017) |
| System | |
| Operating System | Halo UI (customized Android 5.1) |
| CPU | MediaTek 64-bit quad-core |
| Display | |
| Display | 2 x OLED binocular |
| Image | |
| Field of View | 40° diagonal |
| Optics | |
| Optics | Resin aspheric eyepiece group with acrylic beam-splitting reflective lens |
| Ocularity | Binocular |
| Audio | |
| Audio | Two speakers, stereo |
| Camera | 8 MP / 13 MP, Sony image sensor |
| Connectivity | |
| Connectivity | Wi-Fi, GPS, Bluetooth, micro USB 2.0 |
| Power | Fast charging, 5 V 2 A |
| Battery Capacity | 3200 mAh |
| Device | |
| Weight | 370 g (manufacturer figure) |
| Sensors | Bosch nine-axis gyroscope, gravity sensor, proximity sensor |
| Input | Capacitive touchpad, gestures |
Shadow Creator Halomini (also written Halo Mini) is an augmented reality head-mounted display released in 2017 by the Shanghai company Shadow Creator.[1] It is a self-contained headset with binocular OLED displays, a 40-degree field of view, a MediaTek processor and a built-in battery, and it runs a customized version of Android.[2][3]
By January 2017 it was on official pre-order at a price of 7,500 yuan.[4] The headset won the audience-voted Last Gadget Standing Asia competition at CES Asia 2017 and received an iF Design Award in 2018.[5][1] Shadow Creator marketed it for industrial and educational use as well as for consumers.[1]
History
Shadow Creator was founded in 2014. Its CEO, Sun Li, and co-founder Hu Jinxin had been university classmates.[6] Before the Halomini, the company had released the Air binocular AR glasses, the AirNano monocular smart glasses, AirVR and the Halo holographic headset.[4]
In a review published on 12 January 2017, the Chinese games site 17173 reported that the Halomini had gone on official pre-order at 7,500 yuan, compared with more than 20,000 yuan for Microsoft HoloLens.[4] Shadow Creator's own product page listed the same price in archived copies from April and December 2017.[2][7] By July 2018 the purchase link on that page showed a price of 2999.[8] By September 2021 the page no longer showed a price and asked buyers to contact customer service.[9]
Shadow Creator exhibited the Halomini at CES Asia 2017 in Shanghai, where a report on the consumer site SMZDM described it as already on sale.[10] At the same show it won Last Gadget Standing Asia 2017, a competition run by Living in Digital Times. Journalists narrowed 50 entries to 10 finalists, and the live audience picked the winner through a WeChat poll.[5]
The Halomini received a 2018 iF Design Award in the Product Design discipline, category Gaming/VR/AR. The iF entry credits the design to IMAGINATION DESIGN CO., Ltd. of Shenzhen, gives 2017 as the date of launch and a development time of up to 12 months, and lists Asia, Europe and North America as target regions.[1] The company's later headsets included the Shadow Creator Action One, which appeared alongside the Halomini in the product menu of the 2018 website.[8]
Design and hardware
Optics and display
According to Shadow Creator, the imaging system combines high-brightness OLED chips, a resin aspheric eyepiece group designed for high definition, low distortion and a wide field of view, and a high-strength organic glass (acrylic) beam-splitting reflective lens. The company said the wearer looks through a 2 mm thick lens and sees a virtual screen of nearly 140 inches at a distance of 5 meters. Its specification list gives the field of view as 40 degrees and describes an HD virtual screen of about 80 inches projected at 2 to 3 meters, with binocular 3D display.[2] The page compared the 40-degree figure with 23 degrees for "other similar products"; the 2021 version of the page gave 28 degrees for the comparison instead.[2][9] Shadow Creator also said a proprietary light-path correction algorithm keeps the magnified image free of distortion.[2]
The stated resolution differs between versions of the official page. The 2017 and 2018 copies describe a "superimposed resolution" (叠加分辨率) of 1080p, while the 2021 copy gives 1024*768.[2][8][9]
Headset design
17173 described a dual-ring headband with a black and gray nano coating. The outer band connects to the front through a rotating axis so the viewing angle can be adjusted, and the inner band has a knob for sizing.[4] A semi-transparent, curved plastic visor covers the front and has two rows of ventilation holes. The lower part of the visor has a one-piece recess for the nose, shaped for East Asian nose bridges.[11] The same review gave an official weight of 370 g, while the reviewer's own measurement was about 450 g.[4]
The left side holds the charging and data port and the volume buttons. On the right are the power button, a headphone jack, a back button and a capacitive touchpad; the wearer swipes the touchpad to move through menus and taps its center to confirm. Two speakers sit at the ends of the headband, and a proximity sensor turns the display on or off depending on whether the headset is being worn.[11]
Specifications
| Component | Specification |
|---|---|
| Processor | MediaTek 64-bit quad-core[2] |
| Display | 2 x OLED binocular; binocular 3D display[2] |
| Field of view | 40°[2] |
| Resolution | "Superimposed" 1080p (2017-2018 listing); 1024*768 (2021 listing)[2][9] |
| Camera | 8 MP / 13 MP, Sony image sensor[2] |
| Motion sensors | Bosch nine-axis gyroscope and gravity sensor[2] |
| Other sensors | Infrared wear-mode sensor to cut abnormal power drain[2]; proximity sensor[11] |
| Battery | 3200 mAh, fast charging at 5 V 2 A[2] |
| Connectivity | Wi-Fi, GPS, Bluetooth, micro USB 2.0[2] |
| Input | Capacitive touchpad; combined gamepad and touch panel supporting Bluetooth 4.2[2] |
| Audio | Dual stereo speakers[2] |
| Weight | 370 g (official figure); about 450 g (17173 measurement)[4] |
| Price | CN¥7,500 (official pre-order price, January 2017)[4] |
17173 identified the camera fitted to its review unit as a 13-megapixel model with a Sony sensor.[11]
Software and features
The Halomini runs Halo UI, which Shadow Creator describes as a deeply customized interface.[2] 17173 reported that Halo UI is based on Android 5.1 and that the headset could use Shadow Creator's own apps and standard Android app stores, although some apps had compatibility problems.[3] The official page also describes a control that works both as a gamepad and as a touch panel and supports Bluetooth 4.2.[2] The 2017 page also listed accurate gesture recognition among the headset's features,[2] and the Last Gadget Standing announcement described the glasses as powered by gesture interaction, computer vision identification, holographic display and augmented reality technology.[5]
The camera app offers photo and video modes.[3] Among the AR demonstrations tested by 17173 was an app that scans printed pictures of landscapes and buildings and shows three-dimensional holographic images over them.[12]
Applications
iF Design's entry describes the Halomini as a smart portable device and also as an auxiliary device for logistics, medicine, education and design, and lists consumers, trade and industry, and education as target groups.[1] SMZDM's CES Asia report said Shadow Creator's AR products were aimed mainly at industrial use in tourism, maintenance, logistics, design and education, with less focus on consumers.[10] 17173 named exhibition display, education and training, and tourism training as areas of development.[12]
In August 2017, Yijun Xie, an operations manager at Shadow Creator, wrote a guest post on the Microsoft Education blog about augmented reality in education. The post described Shadow Creator as a Microsoft Azure partner and said its AR tools had been used in open classes at Peking University, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Chongqing Real Estate College audio-visual classroom, the IFLYTEK virtual classroom and the Net Dragon virtual classroom. According to the post, educators needed a Halo Mini and apps such as "component" and "solar system", downloaded from the "Shadow Creator Store" on the device.[13]
Reception
17173 gave the Halomini a score of 8.0 and called it a sincere AR product for both entertainment and commercial use.[12] The reviewer praised its styling and the comfort of its dual headband, and called the price very reasonable compared with that of HoloLens. The main complaint was weight, which the reviewer said made long sessions less comfortable.[4] After 30 minutes of use the reviewer noticed no obvious heat.[11] A 720p test video looked very clear, without the graininess of standalone VR headsets of the time, but the field of view made the picture feel small to someone used to headsets with a field of view over 100 degrees. The camera app had no way to choose a focus point or adjust focus, and taking pictures through the touchpad was cumbersome.[3] The reviewer also noted that the field of view, while wider than that of HoloLens, remained below the 110 degrees of mainstream VR headsets.[14]
SMZDM's writer at CES Asia 2017 compared its appearance to HoloLens but noted that it had no soft padding at the nose bridge and that its comfort fell short of higher-end products.[10]
See Also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 "Halomini smart glasses". iF Design. iF International Forum Design. 2018. https://ifdesign.com/en/winner-ranking/project/halomini-smart-glasses/223173. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ 2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 2.10 2.11 2.12 2.13 2.14 2.15 2.16 2.17 2.18 2.19 "Halo Mini (archived 21 April 2017)". Shadow Creator official website. Shadow Creator Information Technology. https://web.archive.org/web/20170421165522/http://www.shadowcreator.com/halomini/halomini.html. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Jamin (2017-01-12). "影创HaloMini评测: 国产AR眼镜媲美Hololens (page 4)". 17173. http://news.17173.com/content/01122017/001238935_4.shtml. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 Jamin (2017-01-12). "影创HaloMini评测: 国产AR眼镜媲美Hololens". 17173. http://news.17173.com/content/01122017/001238935_1.shtml. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 "Last Gadget Standing Asia Votes for Halomini AR Display". PR Newswire. Living in Digital Times. 2017-06-08. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/last-gadget-standing-asia-votes-for-halomini-ar-display-300471268.html. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ 案山子 (2016-07-08). "影创科技：影创Air AR眼镜非公开出售就收到12万台订单！". VR陀螺 (VR Tuoluo). https://www.vrtuoluo.cn/6600.html. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ "Halo Mini (archived 29 December 2017)". Shadow Creator official website. Shadow Creator Information Technology. https://web.archive.org/web/20171229101108/http://www.shadowcreator.com/halomini/halomini.html. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 "影创Halomini-影创科技官方网站 (archived 6 July 2018)". Shadow Creator official website. Shadow Creator Information Technology. https://web.archive.org/web/20180706073505/http://www.shadowcreator.com/halomini/halomini.html. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 9.3 "影创科技-Halo Mini (archived 27 September 2021)". Shadow Creator official website. Shadow Creator Information Technology. https://web.archive.org/web/20210927192212/https://www.shadowcreator.com/halomini/halomini.html. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 "拥有40度视场角度：shadowcreator 影创科技 展示 Halo Mini AR智能眼镜". 什么值得买 (SMZDM). 2017-06-08. https://post.smzdm.com/p/arme0gz/. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3 11.4 Jamin (2017-01-12). "影创HaloMini评测: 国产AR眼镜媲美Hololens (page 2)". 17173. http://news.17173.com/content/01122017/001238935_2.shtml. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ 12.0 12.1 12.2 Jamin (2017-01-12). "影创HaloMini评测: 国产AR眼镜媲美Hololens (page 5)". 17173. http://news.17173.com/content/01122017/001238935_5.shtml. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ Yijun Xie (2017-08-08). "3 ways augmented reality opens new worlds for students". Microsoft Education Blog. Microsoft. https://web.archive.org/web/20190924185109/https://educationblog.microsoft.com/en-us/2017/08/halo-mini-augmented-reality-students/. Retrieved 2026-09-27.
- ↑ Jamin (2017-01-12). "影创HaloMini评测: 国产AR眼镜媲美Hololens (page 3)". 17173. http://news.17173.com/content/01122017/001238935_3.shtml. Retrieved 2026-09-27.