Glasses that can translate menus have been unveiled by a Japanese mobile operator.
The Intelligent Glasses, made by NTT Docomo, can project an image of translated text over foreign languages, claims the company.
The glasses then allow the user to manipulate the virtual images, and their makers claim they could be a useful gadget for tourists after demonstrating them at consumer electronics show Ceatec 2013 in Japan.
The creators also say the glasses can recognise a person’s face, before it "pulls relevant information from the cloud to provide a profile of a person being viewed."
The product is still at the research stage, but the wearable tech can so far translate Japanese, English, Chinese and Korean languages.
A user can also manipulate a virtual image in their field of vision by turning a flat surface into a makeshift touchscreen, using a ring that tracks hand movements on the surface back to the glasses, which alters the image accordingly.
Intelligent Glasses’s translation capability comes three years after Quest Visual’s Word Lens app for Android and iOS.
The smartphone app translates printed text when a user points their smartphone at the image in question, supporting English, German, Italian, French, Spanish and Portuguese.
Google’s own wearable tech, Google Glass, is still in development, but developers are currently making apps for the technical spectacles.
