MAXIM: Being a bunch of nerds on the internet has its advantages, such as having heard of you before, but for anyone out there who hasn't, give us a quick rundown on who you are and how you came to have a spare eyesocket to become EYEBORG?
ROB: When I was a kid I was visiting my grandfather who lives just outside of Belfast, both of my parents are from Northern Ireland, at nine years old I grabbed a 12-gauge shotgun with the plan being to shoot a pile of cow shit. I accomplished that, but I was holding the gun completely incorrectly, my frame of reference being Cowboy and Indian movies, with the gun placed up close to your eye for sharp-shooting, and just kinda blew my eye out. I didn't lose the eye at that time because the surgeons in Belfast were very good at patching it back up. But that was the beginning of the end for my eye. I lost it about 6 years ago. By that time I was a documentary film-maker, who still had and has a Bionic Man figure where you can look through the back of his head and through his eye, so it wasn't a huge leap for me to think about getting a camera in there.
MAXIM: Obviously you made the best of an unfortunate situation, but have you ever wished you could go back and prevent the accident from happening?
ROB: I wouldn't. I'm quite pleased. It's what you call 'Irish Luck'. I lost the eye, but it's been a bit of a blessing. I'm a very unique filmmaker now, and for me that's a good thing.
MAXIM: Would you say it's ever prevented you from doing anything? Apart from experiencing all these amazingly over-rated 3D experiences being flung at us at the minute?
ROB: Yeah, those 3D movies! Went to see Avatar in 3D with this other one-eyed girl and we ended up asking for our money back afterwards, which was a bit of a laugh. We said we weren't satisfied with our 3D experience. My squash game is slightly off, but your brain adapts very quickly to any kind of variation you might have. For example, there's a guy who did this experiment, where he created some goggles that were two monitors and there's one video camera that would create the image in the goggles. His only view of the world were these goggles, and he put everything upside down. After two weeks, his brain flipped the image the right way up. The brain is a very flexible tool, and in my case it was a very gradual loss of vision so I just adapted as time went on. I can drive and all that, so it's not big deal.
MAXIM: Where did you get the idea to bung a camera in your eyeball anyway?
ROB: It's such a prevalent idea, it's just as prevalent as when people lose a hand and they make a joke about getting a hook. Every single person that loses an eye at least makes the joke that they should get a camera in there. It's an idea that's been around for a while! Adam Jensen from Deus Ex: Human Revolution is just the latest in a very popular science fiction notion.
MAXIM: Can you give us a little explanation as to how it works and what you've got in there?
ROB: It's the exact same technology as a wireless microphone. You'll have seen them on reality TV shows, you have the transmitter on your belt and the microphone will be on your shirt somewhere, but that uses RF to send that signal to a receiver. That receiver you can plug into any kind of audio recording device. In my case I have a battery in my eye, a video camera and a transmitter. Just like the wireless sound transmitter except I'm transmitting video. That goes through the air to a video receiver which I can then in turn plug into any video recording device.
MAXIM: Sounds quite universal!
ROB: Yeah! It's actually analogue. We looked at digital, like Bluetooth, but it's such a power-hog. The battery technology just isn't there yet. The guy who made the camera and transmitter combo does video work for the military, he makes the video drones. When Obama is watching his guys doing whatever they're doing in the War Room, they're probably using RF video.
MAXIM: What's been the best thing you've filmed?
ROB: I've only done one film with it so far, and it's a 12 minute flick in conjunction with Deus Ex: Human Revolution, where I was given free reign to travel the world and visit the top cyborgs. It makes sense for the guy with the bionic eye to go and film other bionic people. Adam Jensen has a bionic eye, and he's a great notion and a great visual to cut to with the question "Where is this technology going to go in the future?". I've got what is pretty feasable footage and notions of where we might be by the year 2027 (when DE:HR is set), so I went out and filmed the top cyborg technology now and do a compare and contrast with Adam Jensen. It's pretty cool. (CLICK HERE TO WATCH IT!)
MAXIM: Does your missus (if applicable!) ever think you're recording her when you've told her you're not?
ROB: No girlfriend right now, but it does come up when you are dating and they find out you have a camera eye. There's generally a little discussion, and what we call in Ireland, 'the narrow eyes'. The eyes narrow and there's a few questions they want answered and the rammifications thereof!
MAXIM: Do you see the augmentation way of life featured in Deus Ex becoming a reality at any point in the near future?
ROB: I asked a guy who is missing a leg and is an engineer, what he said was "it's completely technically feasible, what it's contingent on is the demand and the imagination". The stuff is there on the top shelf to make it, we just need the people to want it and the engineers to be motivated enough to do that. I think Deus Ex is a part of a canon of work – be it Star Trek, Bionic Man or whatever – that actually has a very direct relationship to the kinds of projects that engineers work very hard on. In my case it was a bunch of engineers very inspired by Sci-Fi and Pop Culture and we were just having fun.
Don't get me wrong, it wasn't always fun, there were alot of shenanigans going on and stuff like that, but essentially I had a lot of young engineers help me build this eye with almost no budget at all, just because it was fun. The thing about Adam Jensen's prosthetics is that they're neuroprosthetics, whereas the ones that exist now are kinetic sensor types of prosthetics. If you think the human arm equals 100 points in terms of functionality, the current prosthetics score maybe about 20. When an arm opens you're using existing pectoral muscles that you learn to flex and unflex in such a way to control the arm. It's quite natural and you stop thinking about it, so it's almost like the thought is moving the arm, but it's not literally the thought doing it, so jacking directly into the nervous system wouldn't work.
The challenge with the brain is that, unlike a kinetic sensor that would open a hand by flexing the top of your forearm, that's very predictable from human to human. Thoughts are not, because each brain grows out in different directions depending on our experiences and personality. It's called Brain to Machine Interface (BMI). The challenge is surmountable, people thought you can't fly, you can't make a bomb and blow up a city, but they all happened, even though it didn't seem very feasible at the time.
MAXIM: Good point. If you could choose one part of yourself to be augmented/upgraded, what would it be and why?
ROB: *laughing* No not that. Obviously I'm going to continue to increase the quality of the eye, but probably the brain. Adam Jensen has this cool augmentation that is a bit like an emotional intelligence enhancer. It helps to read peoples' reactions and the like. The most important part of our bodies is our brain, if I could augment that then I would. Maybe get it upgraded so I wouldn't lose my wallet all the time.
MAXIM: That would be handy. You've been through quite a bit in your life, is there a quote or a saying that has helped you to get by?
ROB: Never say die... heh. I'd have to think about that! I don't think I'd have a quote, more like an attitude. It's an obvious observation to say I made lemonade out of lemons but that's not necessarily how I feel about it. I feel like the fact there's something like this that no one else has done before is quite satisfying but it's because of what my engineers taught me that you should just try it. Kosta Grammatis (pictured below) was amazing, he said "I'm sick of these other guys telling you it can't be done for whatever reason", so we just went ahead and did it on the coffee table. That's not a crisp quote, but it's a crisp idea maybe!
You can keep up to date with Rob by going to www.eyeborgproject.com
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