The AR Show: David Bonelli (Pulsar) on Building AR Hardware that Actually Works: Otter Voice Meeting Notes

The AR Show: David Bonelli (Pulsar) on Building AR Hardware that Actually Works

Jason McDowall1h 15min

Jason McDowall

00:03

Welcome to the AR show where I dive deep into augmented reality with a focus on the technology, the use cases and the people behind them. I'm your host Jason McDowall. Today's conversation is with David Bonelli. David is the founder and CEO of Pulsar, a company of mechanical and optical experts dedicated to solving the hard problems of AR hardware. David is a US Army veteran who went on to spend several years at the once venerable Osterhout Design Group, ODG. After creating cutting edge AR glasses at ODG. He spent time at Rokid and KFs industries, his experience across these companies to design manage and bring to manufacture a range of products bending optical engineering and augmented reality hardware motivated the creation of Pulsar. There, he's worked with companies such as Red Six, Qwake, Microsoft and others, on AR hardware solutions to meet the needs of everyone from fighter pilots, to firefighters to space explorers. In this conversation, we chat about those projects, as well as his experience at odg building devices such as the AR eight, he still uses an ODG R8 to educate customers on what's been done. And what's possible.

David Bonelli

01:06

I think people tend to overestimate how much FOV they need or want. I've had customers be like, oh, we need 100 degrees FOV. And then I'll show him a pair of our eights and they put it on like, This is amazing. This is exactly what I need. Like, how big is it like 38 degrees? You know, it really depends on how you're engaging, right? Yeah, humans have this huge FOV. But when we're actually focused, that gets a lot smaller, really fast.

Jason McDowall

01:29

We want to talk about the current state of AR hardware and his highlights from the recent SPIE AR VR conference at Photonics West. David also shares his opinions about which display an optics technologies have the best chance of winning over the long term. Let's dive in.

Jason McDowall

01:45

David, tell me about how it is you landed in the military at the age of 17.

David Bonelli

01:50

So you know, growing up in Daytona Beach, I had a, let's just say an interesting childhood that some people can identify with 15 years old, I felt it was time for me to leave to go out on my own and make my own way. And so that's what I did. I ended up dropping out of school, I was working two jobs to make ends meet. I ended up getting emancipated sometime later. And then I got my GED. And you know, just to hungry. And I was like, you know, this is a path. And my original plan was to go counter Intel into the army. But because I was 17, I couldn't carry couldn't have a concealed permit in DC, it'd be 19. At least that's what the recruiters told me. They're good at this. So I end up going artillery. And it just so happens, I went in three weeks after I turned 17, which happened to be about a half hour for the towers fell is when I swore in Jacksonville. I look back and I think it's interesting. But when you're living through it in real time, it's just kind of like, well, this is life, this has happened and move forward.

Jason McDowall

02:47

Now we have to deal with it. Now it sounds like you had a lot of those moments in your early childhood. This is life, get it figured out and move forward.

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