I recently came across a neat youtube video showcasing what looks to be a red dot sight right out of a futuristic video game. The sight apparently doesn’t have any glass lenses for the dot to project off of and the frames on either side of it are more or less there for show. So what exactly is going on here and is this design a harbinger for more glass-less dot sights?

New Dot Sight With No Glass? Is This The Future Of Optics?

Upon first glance it appears like the three rear white dots and single forward red dot are hovering in the air like some sort of futuristic holographic projector. I was extremely curious about how this was accomplished and upon further investigation discovered the mechanism for this (and hence the reason why no glass is needed) is similar to those alarm clocks that make use of a swinging arm with LEDs attached to display the time as if it were hovering in the air. So this is not some sort of new technology but instead a clever use of an existing concept.

The sight is made from some simple 3D printed components and custom-made software to allow the lights to project at the right time. The semi-circle-shaped projecting arms spin at a high speed and only emit light at certain intervals based off of the program the guy has written for the sight. If you look at the video you’ll notice that there is a slight wiggle to each of the dots as the control software isn’t quite precise enough to display a solid dot in the same place each time. What kind of condemns this design from being viable on firearms at the moment is the fragility of the display mechanism.

At one point in the video, he runs his finger into the projector arm and it changes the position of the dot. I’d imagine something even as light as a .22LR rifle would bump the projector arms out of timing meaning you’d have your point of aim all over the place with any amount of sustained firing. However, I still think this concept is cool and with some refinement, the design might work on some lighter recoiling guns. What do you think about this glass-less dot sight concept?