SummitPost.org

Hello all,

I am Pascal, 3rd year crossmedia student at the AKI (Art Academy in Enschede, the Netherlands). I have got a school assignment where I need to find a group hobbyists / enthusiasts and together find a way to improve the way they enjoy and partake in their hobbies.

Product Design:
The idea is to design a watch/smart computer for mountaineers and climbers. This watch will provide specific information about the mountain you want to climb, upcoming weather conditions and will help being more safe.

The Product:
It is a watch, with digital display and camera build- in.

The watch will display
- Multiple routes;
- Difficulty per route;
- Additional information about the route

- Compass;
- Altimeter;
- Weather and upcoming weather conditions

Technical challenges
- Let GPS, 3D map data, compass and camera work together to create virtual vision when there is no vision (night, snow etc).

Later on I will post visual support.

I am very interested in hear your opinions, so we can co-create.

Thanks in advance,
Pascal

pacsal, i'm sorry my friend , but what exactly you require?

I think the bigger technical challenge, considering all the features you're looking at, is to make the watch light weight, durable, and low profile. The screen will be unreadable and scratched to all hell within months.

Unless of course this is more of a modified and improved pocket or pack GPS unit rather than a wristwatch.

Reminds me of all the fancy watches that pale in comparison to my Casio. And not been surprised to meet anyone from firefighters to biologists or military guys having a laugh at the 400 dollar watch crowd.

Well, you would be looking at a sapphire screen (the type they use in military helicopters) the entire thing would be titanium, and would need some sort of HUB for that kind of processing power and all those gadget so if u created a light weight hub which i could put into my pack and then just use the watch as a screen u could do it then. Ever heard of a game called fallout, on it there's this device on your arm called a pip boy you might want to look at that. X3

Thanks for all the replys! Very useful, exactly what I needed.
I´m going to look into this, I'll post updates here

Any wrist watch will have get scratched to the point that the face is no longer readable. When climbing I attach the watch to a pack strap and I've seen other climbers do the same. Some type of attachment system that allows this might be useful.

The form factor will be a problem from a user interface perspective.

What kind of useful information about multiple routes can you fit on a wristwatch-sized display? If the user has to tab/scroll/switch modes, how will that be accomplished?

A camera built in to a watch? Image quality would be very poor, and as said above, the lens would get scratched.

Take the design of this: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0082A ... PDKIKX0DER


and make it smaller, with a lanyard to tie around your neck, and a very loud alarm. That would be a good mountain watch.

GPS is great, but screen size on a watch limits its usefulness.

A little thread drift, but I'm waiting for the combination avy beacon/ GPS/ cell phone.
And put a clock in it.