Glasses, the real leap forward is the ease of use and the ability to aggregate eye tracking data which enables you to conduct quantitative eye tracking studies which is really unique for a wearable eye tracker.  To be able to do this Tobii has developed a new technology called AOA-Track with small markers that emits infrared light. By placing these IR-markers around objects and/or areas you want to study in depth, Tobii Glasses automatically knows when a person is looking within these areas and will automatically aggregate the data from all the participants in an eye tracking study. This is truly amazing! Previously when doing this kind of research it has required a lot of manual coding work to be able to do this, now it all happens automatically and you are able to use the analysis software Tobii Studio to analyze the data just as if it was recorded with a stationary eye tracker. In other words you can create visualizations like heat maps and gaze plots, calculate statistics etc automatically with data from a Tobii Glasses recording.

The device also includes a microphone and of course a camera filming everything the participant is looking at so it can also be used for qualitative studies (you just watch the recording as a video with the gaze point overlaid) and might even enable new research methodologies, what do you say about “Concurrent Think Aloud Walking” in usability research for example!

To learn more about the Tobii Glass please visit these resources online:

Video about how to use Tobii Glasses for Market Research:
http://www.tobiiglasses.com/marketresearch/

Video about how to use Tobii Glasses in Scientific Research:

http://www.tobiiglasses.com/scientificresearch/

Tobii Glasses Product Leaflet (pdf)

Tobii Glasses product page on Tobii.com here

Examples

These are some examples from Tobii Glasses recordings we did in a Supermarket.

Watch a shopper in a supermarket being eye tracked in the YouTube video below

This is a Gaze Plot showing how a person is searching for a product on the shampoo shelf. IR-markers have been placed on the shelf to enable us to collect the data.

This is another shelf, the heat map shows the aggregated data from 30 recordings and reveals where people look when deciding which product to buy. IR-markers have been placed on the shelf (try to find them!) to enable us to aggregate the data and make this heat map.

YouTube video describing Tobii Glasses

Additionally I’m happy to announce that we have a confirmed speaker from Google at EyeTrackUX 2010: Anne Aula,  Senior User Experience Researcher. She will talk about:

How and why Google uses eyetracking in user experience research.
By Anne Aula, Senior User Experience Researcher, Google Inc.

“In this talk, I will talk about the various ways in which we use eyetracking at Google. I will highlight the reasoning behind key methodological decisions – such as using eyetracking as a qualitative supplement to think aloud studies or running more controlled experiments where eyetracking is the main source of data. I will also give examples of more controlled experiments we’ve run to explore how changes in pupil size predict the relevance of search results and how eye and mouse movements are coordinated when users are scanning search results. Throughout the talk, I will focus on the main question: in a fast paced product development environment, when is eyetracking worth the trouble?”

In other words, block June 2-3 in your calendar for EyeTrackUX 2010!

Or by clicking on one of the categories below:

• Cognitive & Behavioural Psychology

• Developmental Research

• Eye Tracking Technology

• General Eye Tracking

• HCI & Usability

• Linguistics

• Marketing & Media research

• Medical research

• Neuropsychology

• Ophthalmology & Vision science

• Tobii White Papers

Course: Designing behavioral experiments with Tobii eye trackers and eye tracking software
Date and time: Wednesday, May 26th 2010, 9:00am – 5:00pm
Place: Tobii Technology office, Danderyd, Stockholm, Sweden
Registration and more information here

Conference: Emotions – Arousal – Pupil Dilation
Date and time: Thursday, May 27th 2010 09:00 – Friday, May 28th 2010 1:00pm
Place: Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
Registration and more information here

Course: Baking with Tobii: 7 delicious recipes for successful eye tracking use in web usability studies
Date and time: Tuesday June 1th 2010
Place: Leuven, Belgium
Registration and more information here

Conference: EyeTrackUX 2010 – Tobii’s Eye tracking conference on User Experience
Date and time: Wednesday June 2nd 2010 – Thursday June 3rd
Place: K.U. Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
Registration and more information here

You can read and download the white paper Using eye tracking to test mobile devices on Scribd here

Recently another video clip was released on YouTube by Herbstwerbung showing how a Tobii x120 eye tracker was used to track the eye movements when using an iPhone. Watch the clip below:

Another part of the EyeTrackAwards is a stipend that supports unique and outstanding academic research projects with free eye tracking equipment from Tobii.

Read more about the competition and the stipend on http://www.eyetrackawards.com

Yesterday Tobii released a new white paper on eye tracking and eye tracking technology. The aim of the paper is to give a brief introduction to the human visual system, and to explain how eye movements are recorded and processed by Tobii Eye Trackers. Some basic concepts and issues related to remote eye tracking and eye movement data interpretation are also briefly discussed.

It is a good document for beginners to read to gain more knowledge on eye movements and eye tracking, but also experienced eye tracking users can find the paper interesting as it explains more about how Tobii’s technology works.

• The paper can be read and downloaded HERE.

Rob’s main arguments for using eye tracking in web usability studies is that eye tracking enables:

1. Better user tests by using retrospective think aloud instead of concurrent think aloud

2. Optimize designs by doing mass user testing (quantitative eye tracking tests)

3. Helps non specialist stake holder engage with usability – and take actions based on the usability findings

Watch the two YouTube clips below:

UPDATE
Kara Pernice’s speech from the Great Eye Tracking Debate has now been made available on YouTube. Watch it below: