The Daqri Smart Helmet Should Be on Every Industrial Skull Right Now

Albeit, wearables in the workplace are a controversial subject, the inevitability is overwhelming. The Daqri smart helmet, a helmet for industrial workers, not only protects your melon but gives you a safety advantage when worn. It may be the wearable that puts the workplace movement into overdrive.

(Source: daqri.com)

Current workplace helmets, the sort you may find on a construction site or in a warehouse, are just shells. They do a decent job of keeping objects from piercing your flesh.

On the scale of offensive versus defensive actions, they are all defense. By the time something hits your helmet, it’s too late to react. Because of this, they won’t save you from everything. No passive helmet could.

With some augmentations, your basic helmet could make you more aware of your surroundings. Let’s call it active defense.

In an actively defensive position, you aren’t just waiting for the hits to come. You stay ahead of dangers. That’s good for the wearer.

For the contractor employing you, that helmet is not only protecting their most valuable asset (you), it’s also protecting their bottom line. By logging as much of your activities as possible they keep a running log.

That’s double-good; all the more reason contractors should adopt this tech.

Active Defense

(Source: daqri.com)

The power tool held by Daqri augments your reality.

The Microsoft Hololens is one example of augmented reality as are the Shima lenses. Both enhance your normal view, adding in data in an overlay format that you would not see without looking at a display.

Unlike the Skully helmet, which crashed before launch, Daqri is on the market. Daqri does so much more than any of these, at least for now.

Using a thermal camera, Daqri enables you to see thermal heat. This gives those working in environments where heat dispersion is critical for safety the upper hand.

The view can also give you data visualizations, so you can stay on top of data that may require pulling up a monitor.

Onboard cameras and sensors facilitate guided work instruction and remote expert help. You can have help on call, wherever you go.

Daqri Technology

(Source: daqri.com)

Companies can customize this helmet to their particular needs.

Different jobs require different criteria, so Daqri comes outfitted with sensors and processing power like a boss. The onboard Intel processor allows Daqri to run many applications and network the sensors as described above.

What sensors are we talking about, exactly? There is an onboard, high-speed, wide-angled tracking camera with its own processor. This enables that camera to recognize environmental cues, even objects.

The heads-up display (HUD) of Daqri offers a large field of view, which you may view in low-light or bright situations.

They’ve included a stereo infrared camera and light projector, so the helmet can make assumptions about depth. This works somewhat like the Horus wearable for the blind.

Last but not least of all, there is a thermal camera. The data drawn from this camera can overlay on your HUD, giving you the Predator-style view of your world.

Your Workplace Integration

(Source: daqri.com)

This is not plug-and-play technology since every workplace situation is unique.

The team behind Daqri wants to connect with interested companies. They are not outfitting individual skulls yet.

While we couldn’t tell you the cost per helmet, we’re guessing it’s high. Estimates at last check were in the thousands of dollars. All of that cost saves money on the back end for the organization that gets it.

This isn’t just about reducing insurance costs. Multiple helmets in one workspace form a network. They learn from each other. That empowers information to travel between workers without the need to stop for training.

Just the savings in time and money required to cascade information every day has to be worth the cost.

(Source: daqri.com)

It’s irrelevant to any organization, but worth commenting that this helmet looks way cooler than traditional helmets. The workplace that has these bad boys on the heads of their team will look like every sci-fi movie industrial scene.

No only will it look that way, it’ll operate that way; futuristically.

For more information on Daqri, go to their website. Meanwhile, watch this video.