[deevious]

I'd say no to that, aside from the reliability and KISS aspects of this, there is one thing cameras won't be able to do properly: parallax. In tight parking spaces or near curbs I will often move around in the car so that I can see obstacles without having to adjust the mirrors.

[OrwellianChild]

I think that parallax aside, the benefit of cameras is that a much wider angle can be represented. Much like current reverse-cameras in vehicles, the camera can capture wide/ultra-wide angles of 120-170 degrees. This lets you see everything without craning for parallax. Guidelines can be overlaid for curb/parking situations on demand. Additionally, many auto companies are already augmenting their backup cameras with 360-degree stitched top-down views, which are excellent for curb-centering, etc.

[bakies]

You can also curve mirrors for a wider angle, see it on trucks all the time.

[interfixus]

I drive buses for a living. Believe me, when reversing some 15 meter monster into a parking slot, I trust and use my mirrors more than I do the very fancy rear-view camera.

A mirror I have a lifetime experience worth of knowing what is, no perceivable extra layer of processing required. A camera, not quite so, although of course it's a nice enough extra to have.

[r00fus]

I recently rented a Peugeot SUV in France and the reverse top-down view was awesome - I had to back out of a 50ft (er, 15m) narrow winding driveway and the top-down helped me to do it in a minute instead of 15 min.

[com2kid]

A fancy enough camera system can give you a wide FOV and accurate distance indicators to everything on screen.

Parallax is one way we estimate distances, technology can do a lot better than "move head side to side to get a rough idea."

Now getting people used to wide FOV, that may be challenging. Find an FPS that lets you set the FOV to anything you want, set it to 180. After a couple of minutes you can get used to it. Beyond 180 it is hard! But even 190 or so is doable after a bit of practice.

Not sure how the general public would do with that though! (At what point has a high enough % of the general public played FPSs that such a UI could be gotten away with?)

[pbhjpbhj]

They could parallax though, so that doesn't seem like the best argument.

They could also use complex optics like "plain lens" with a "fish-eye border", or highlight obstacles by boosting colour contrast or adding in non-visual sensor data.

If cameras are that much better we should be getting vehicles that use both (which we do for rear-view but not side-mirrors AFAIK).

[catalogia]

> They could parallax though, so that doesn't seem like the best argument.

I've never seen parallax emulated with head tracking that didn't have piss-poor latency issues. Not to mention poorly configured kalman filters that seem to always do too little or too much smoothing. These systems are fine for cute tech demos but don't belong in safety-critical applications involving multiple tons of steel moving at 100+km/h.

Before replacing mirrors in cars, why not start with making a TV "window" that actually works. Prove the technology in a real world application that isn't safety critical, then we can talk. If it's ready for use on highways, then it should be easy to mount a TV on a wall and provide a convincing experience of actually looking out a window.

[elFarto]

There's a new Honda 'e', that doesn't have side mirrors at all, and just has two screens inside.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pEKq8jmckz0

[froindt]

>If cameras are that much better we should be getting vehicles that use both (which we do for rear-view but not side-mirrors AFAIK).

The 2015 Honda CR-V has a camera under the right mirror. When you turn your right blinker on, the screen switches to that view with an overlay for car lengths. It's kinda handy, but I probably wouldn't pay much more marginally for that feature.

[pfortuny]

I say it is time for a forward sideways-looking camera for exiting corners or sharp crossings. I do not know if this exists but I have missed it a number of times.

[arethuza]

That reminds me of a small project where the British Army gave a budget to some soldiers to add "accessories" to a main battle tank - one of the things they did was add sideways looking cameras at the end of the main gun so they could use it to see round corners.

[archi42]

My 2013 Volvo can be fitted with exactly these as an original part by the dealer (it seems they were not available with the original order); the module is placed into the Volvo logo, and the driver sees a split image in the infotainment display.

But like the Audi A8 it's not exactly a cheap car; maybe it will be available in more cars in a few years (or once some patent expires?).

Edit: Here is a 52s video/ad for the feature: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkF9Txbeaxg

[xuki]

Audi A8 has it: https://youtu.be/TchqhDUbP8w?t=342

It's gonna be a long time before mainstream car adopt this though.

[pintxo]

Get a BMW, here's a video from 2012: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VfX1plunhAo

[tim_hutton]

Or camera feeds on the road that the car can access, to allow the driver to see around corners ahead of them.

[kazinator]

I would say, what is also lacking are resolution, dynamic range, and latency. Regarding the latter, even if it's a closed circuit analog system with no digital buffering, there is still frame refresh to consider.

At night, if the display isn't dark enough, it will act as a light source, interfering with the driver's night vision. Black has to be black, and dark objects that would be visible with the naked eye via mirror had better be visible with the camera.

[tobtoh]

I'd assume this isn't really a problem these days? Aren't OLED screen capable of high resolution, dynamic range (include true black) and low latency?

The main issue would probably be cost, but at a technical level having a suitable screen for car mirrors shouldn't be a problem.

[darkcha0s]

The point being that a camera could just film the entire surroundings and show you that picture, instead of exactly what you are able to see through the mirror reflection- i.e. you're constantly seeing your entire blind spot, not just the part the mirror is showing you for your head location.

[TylerE]

Most new cars have parking sensors of some kind. Synthetic 360 vision camera systems are starting to become common on luxury cars and even available on some more down-market models...and those provide way more visibility than any mirror ever will.

[randyrand]

which also gives you a much better sense of depth too as you move your head.

[fortran77]

A mirror reflects a 3D image. An LCD screen isn't 3D.

[neuralRiot]

Not only parallax, mirrors reflections are also 3D.