Is it possible to make an app that would adjust my phone screen so I could read it without my prescription glasses? Not just magnifying, but altering the image till I could see it clearly.
Edit because details. I am in the tub and it is steamy. I am reading a pdf and I can see the tiny words just fine with my specs but if I take them off I have to magnify it so big that it impedes comprehension. So by alter I mean could a tiny font word be fuzzed so that it looks clear to my eyes?
Posted May 13, 2019, 7:51 PM UTC · edited
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I assume the problem your prescription corrects is that your eye isn't properly focussing rays of light as they enter the eye (if you're either short-sighted or long-sighted). As they leave your phone those rays of light start to diverge, and the lens of your eye needs to deflect them by a very specific amount so that the image won't end up blurry.
Unfortunately there's really no way to fix that by changing the image itself. Whatever effect you apply, it will still be the case that rays cast from each point on the surface of the screen end up making small circles on your retina instead of sharp defined points, which will always be blurry.
It can be fixed by putting another lens between the image and your eye - like the one in your glasses. In theory a lens could instead be attached to the screen, but it would be very difficult to calculate exactly the right strength of lens to use, and it would only work with your phone at a specific single position and distance relative to your eye.
Bummer. Thank you! That was fascinating. I'm getting old and new to glasses and I hate them so I was hoping!