On Wednesday, Patently Apple posted a report titled "Meta Rolls out their new Quest 3 headset in time for Christmas with higher specifications & matching Apple Vision Pro's EyeSight feature" Many Apple fans were saying that Meta copied Apple Vision Pro's EyeSight feature. While that's a normal knee-jerk reaction, it would be false. Meta filed for their "Pass-Through" feature patent back in August 2021 when there wasn't even a rumor of such a feature coming to Apple's future headset.  For those interested, a basic overview of Meta's patent application is presented below.

Reverse Pass-Through Feature for Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality Devices

In the field of AR and VR devices and uses thereof, there exists a disconnection between the user and the environment that may be annoying to people surrounding the user, if not hazardous for the user and others nearby. In some scenarios, it may be desirable for the user to engage one or more onlookers for conversation, or attention. Current AR and VR devices lack the ability for onlookers to engage and to verify the focus of attention of the user.

Typically, display applications trying to match a wide-angle field of view or three-dimensional displays with a deep focal distance need to compromise on spatial resolution of the display. One approach is to reduce the size of the pixels in the display to increase the resolution; however, the pixel size in current state-of-the-art technology is reaching the diffraction limit of visible and near infrared light, which imposes a limit to the ultimate resolution that can be achieved. In the case of AR and VR devices, this compromise between spatial resolution and angular resolution is less constringent, given the limited ranges associated with the form factor and angular dimensions involved in these devices.

A desirable feature of an AR/VR device is to have a small form factor. Accordingly, thinner devices are desirable. To achieve this, multi-lenslet array (MLA) light field displays, having a shorter working distance, provide a thin cross section of a VR headset with limited resolution loss by using convenient designs of holographic pancake lenses.

Another desirable feature of an AR/VR device is to provide high resolution. Although this imposes a limit on the depth of focus, this limitation, common in optical systems used to capture complex scenery, is less stringent for an external display disclosed herein because the depth of field is limited by the relative location between the external display and the user's face, which varies little.

Embodiments as disclosed herein improve the quality of in-person interaction using VR headsets for a wide variety of applications wherein one or more people wearing a VR headset interact with one or more people not wearing a VR headset. Embodiments as discussed herein remove the friction between VR users and onlookers or other VR users, and bridge the gap between VR and AR: co-presence benefits of see-through AR with more finesse and higher immersion capacity of VR systems. Accordingly, embodiments as disclosed herein provide a compelling and more natural VR experience.

Meta's patent FIG. 1B below  illustrates a user of an AR or VR device as viewed by a forward onlooker; FIG. 2 illustrates a detailed view of an eyepiece for an AR or VR device configured to provide a reverse pass-through view of the user's face to a forward onlooker.

Facebook's patent FIG. 9 above . illustrates a flowchart in a method for providing an autostereoscopic view of a face of a VR/AR headset user.

For finer details, review Meta's patent application 20220239893. While the patent doesn't list any company as the owner of the patent, all three engineers listed on the paten work at Meta and a Meta document on this invention lists the 3 Meta research engineers here. The document dates back to August 2021, the date listed on the patent filing as well.

Patently Apple briefly touched on this Facebook/Meta's patent regarding this feature in an IP report back in August 2022.