Mirror cameras: The pros and cons

15 April 2022
Do mirror cameras increase range? Are they better than regular mirrors?

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  • Anonymous

if here in my country they already steal and the break the mirrors, now with camera will be a nightmare

  • American

I'm 456lbs American and I drive everywhere so this is helpful.

  • T800

Where can I buy this model digital camera side view mirror please let me know bmw328.1195@gmail.com

  • Anonymous

It's only useful for large vans and HGVs where mirrors can't be used and guess what, it's the central, inside mirror, not the wingmirrors!
Range? That's the problem with electricity only. None had to think of this with IC engines. Electric motor's only proper place is inside a hybrid, not by itself.
These oems need to be taught what constitutes proper and im up proper application of technology.

  • Anonymous

These futuristic cars will be taking people to a trip to their "painless" deaths while they sleep and dream in them, hence reducing human activity and saving environment! What an idea!

  • Anonymous

Now they're playing with people's lives.

The image in a traditional mirror is formed exactly where the light reflected/emitted of an object hits it, which gives a fairly accurate idea of traffic position.

However, in these "mirror" cameras like this, the light is "captured" at the camera, which is at a significantly different position than the display where image is shown. This is counterintuitive and unnatural as our brains expect the image to be formed exactly where light hits (i.e. where the camera is, or where a traditional wingmirror is). This is recipe for misjudgments during lane changes etc which will cost lives and limbs and money.

Range? That's the problem these OEMs created by remvong IC engine and pushing electric only propulsion! Just like those OEMs created problems by removing headphone jacks, microSD slots, removable batteries etc.

Just like smartphone counterparts, they're now pushing gimmicky "futuristic look" even if it puts your lives at risk. Oh how do we also forget that critical functions such as transmission are now being added into one single touchscreen display which once was only used for navigation, cameras and multimedia? What is that screen breaks? What about those touch indicator which you can't even feel that you activated?

Instead of sensible solution, which is giving back what they stole, they're now creating further problems which cost consumers money, time, effort to limbs to even lives!

Just like our slogan of "No headphone jack no buy" over there, here we adopt "No IC engine no buy". Hybrids are the best of both worlds for now and for distant future. And yes, we won't buckle down to an agenda that puts environment before people's lives.

  • xavi2

Anonymous, 13 Jul 2022if your iq is higher than 90, there's not an issue judging distance within a matter of a ... moreIf your IQ is more than 90 you should know that humans and most animals evolved with at least two eys so that thay can judge distance and speed of approaching predators. Using camera mirror is like looking with one eye closed. (Of course in familiar surroundings brain will make up for the missing second image) Test for yourself - get somone to take you blindfolded to unfamiliar forest, ten take blindfold of one eye only and try to run for 100m. (I would recomend wearing head peotection as hitting a tree head on hurts).

  • NormalDriver250

I think all countries should demand the road drivers re-taking their driving exam every 2-3 yrs to re-build their on-road awareness as this would be more efficient & cost effective way to guarantee road safety.
Instead of simply re-taking exams we development tech that checks blind spots.
How difficult is it to turn the head and check the blind spot?

  • Samunosuke

Another benefit not highlighted is also the option of recording from the side mirrors. Might be a bit of an edge case in most situations but the capability exists. Could also be combined or used for the 360 degree view, I guess.

  • Anonymous

xavi2, 10 May 2022The biggest problem with screen replacing mirror is the inability to judge distance and speed ... moreif your iq is higher than 90, there's not an issue judging distance within a matter of a millisecond, practice makes perfect nonetheless. It's good to be open-minded, try it.

  • JoeS

Because of the complexity of electric side mirror adjustment mechanisms (now standard on many cars) the cost to the manufacturers of side cameras is likely to be less. The cameras do not have to be adjusted for different drivers and their cost (along with the cost of the attendant displays) continues to slide.

While EVs may be the first to adapt them other vehicles may see greater benefits with reduced drag. For example, by themselves, Ford's F-150 side mirrors have more aerodynamic drag than the entire Tesla Model 3 car. Reduced drag translates to higher gas milage.

However, the issue of focus is significant. For a left-hand sideview it would be minimal since it would have the same eyelevel and distance as the instrument cluster. Right-hand is a slightly longer focal length but may be within tolerances for older drivers and those with bi or tri-focals.

The rear-view camera/mirror is a bigger problem since the display higher. I am a tri-focal glasses wearer and my experience with a rear-view camera/mirror Escalade was not as pleasant as I'd expected. The display was wonderfully crystal clear, smooth, and wider than a mirror the focal length was shorter. Partially because my glasses have a long distance focal length at the top it was harder to use. I believe the manufacturers could help solve this by placing the camera screen at the level of the cluster instead of replicating the traditional mirror placement at the top of the cabin.

Mirrors are good. Do nott ry to fix what isn't broken.
We can buy cheap small mirrors for the blindspots and most new cars have a blindspot warining built in. Even my 2014 Malibu has them, and it is over 7 years old.
Cameras are cool but still not ready.

  • xavi2

The biggest problem with screen replacing mirror is the inability to judge distance and speed of the object. The brain gets confusing signals. The eyes tell the brain that object is close at constant distance as this is what the focusing and paralax indicates and this doesnt agree with the context of the road situation, the brain nees to figure out whats going on and resolve the conflict and this requires time, so a quick glace in the mirrors suddenly changes into long stare to figure out whats going on. As this is especially noticable on motorway driving, the exta fractions of a second needed to look at the screen instead of looking ahead can be disasterous. Cameras instead of mirrors is a dangerous gimmick. I'm surprised it is legal. Of course im not talking about reversing cameras as these are usful addon especialy for large vehicles.

The more options you have the less efficient the production line is and the more expensive the cost of the product.

  • Guy

It's good

  • Rotciv Ikias

Yeah the options make sense not everybody is the same

  • Anonymous

it fells nice to have all the state of the art electronics in the car, but, for the sake of electric comsumption, it is better to go oldschool, as manual as possible, use needles for the meters, use just mirrors, lets all the available battery energy are transfered to the main motor, not for the eye pleasing electronics ... unless ... there are some revolutions in the battery tech that can power up all fancy electronics and non stop drive for 1 full week, 7 x 24 hours, without charging ... that is totally something else ... let those batteries be oversized to power empire state building for full 1 month with maximum load

  • Anonymous

Gw

  • olddude

Anonymous, 15 Apr 2022yes, totally agree, give the customer choice, custom build cars and accessories - mirrors ... moreProper mirrors and all info in a giant HUD, if you ask me.
But it will never happen, because HUDs are invisible in the marketing materials.

  • Anonymous

yes, totally agree, give the customer choice, custom build cars and accessories

- mirrors
full multimedia 8k screens, flat or curved ... or ... simple oldschool mirrors
- meters
needle or multimedia
needle is cheaper and easily replaced
- lights
full array led smart headligts, tailliaghts, turning lights, interior lights ... or ... simple oldschool light
- battery size
- car entertainment
better provides with universal docking size
- seats
fabric, leather, ventilated, massage
- privacy glass
full multimedia ... or ... oldschool installation ... or ... none
- powered windows
only some people prefers ... window by power ... manually turn by human power

... and many more ...

please, dont be like smartphones, where users dont have choices
- non user removable battery
- 3.5 mm plug removed
- no microsd card
- no sim card ... back to old amps/cdma era, providers injected the subscriber number directly in the mobile phones

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