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Staring at a screen

Staring at a screen won’t make you go blind!

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We are not doctors so do not take our advice! Then mess up your eyes and then sue us. Please take this and use the information about staring at screens damaging or not damaging your eyes at your own risk.

So allegedly according to a report by some scientists staring at a screen all day doesn’t damage your eyes. With the Verge reporting that, Nielsen reports that we spending up to 10 hours a day in front of a screen. So we can all sigh a collective sigh of relief that we all won’t go blind! Yay! However, there is a chance that you may feel uncomfortable after a period of time. That’s due to the backlight. There is also a chance that you will experience symptoms of eye strain and discomfort. Scientists call that Computer Vision Syndrome.

With Dr Rebecca Taylor stating in their video report that “The devices that we use, do not appear to cause any long term eye damage”

The reason we feel some discomfort is due to our eyes blinking less when we look at a screen. Dr Bozung reporting in their video report. That we can blink up to 67% less or slower than we would without looking at a screen.

Staring at a screen: Discomfort

If you are experiencing discomfort, the guys over at the Verge suggest that you can adjust the height of your monitor and/or desk setup to help ease the pain. Could even use moistening eye drops. The Vege also suggest a 20-20-20 rule. (Which we’ve never heard of before here at the How To Kill An Hour office!)

The rule is, for every 20 minutes you stare at a screen, you should stare at something 20ft away for a total of 20 seconds. The Verge also report about some special blue light filtering glasses that can help, but scientists don’t believe in those claims at all!

Our screen’s refresh rate can also affect our eyes, so for example a 60hz refresh rate monitor will cause your eyes to focus more often. Therefore causing you to tire quicker. The faster the refresh rate, the less often your eyes will need to refocus. The Verge are also reporting that positioning of your monitor also can affect your eyes discomfort. A 20degree angle at an arms length away is a good distance to eye health ratio. Brightness and contrast can also have an affect. Also fonts that you use can cause a problem! (Size most often) Lighting and the environment your in also has an affect. So staring at a screen isn’t so simple after all!

Apple have gone someway to combat discomfort in recent years with things such as Night Shift and Truetone, designed to lessen the blue hue in your phone’s screen!

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NHS Offering Cinema Tickets

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The NHS are tempting people to get healthier with the lure of free cinema tickets (and they are getting expensive) amongst other incentives such as discounts on shopping and fitness gear.

A user would use a mobile app to track exercise and encourage them to hit targets to earn the goodies, thus reducing pressure on the NHS.

The NHS is working with 10 new housing developments with the aim to put “great health at the heart of urban design and planning” the scheme is over several ideas by city planning researchers at Citiesmode for the Halton Lea Site in Cheshire. Even going as far as implementing public gym equipment, running tracks drawn on to the pavement, cooking lessons, free bikes and even an outdoor cinema.

It’s all very much a concept scheme at the moment, but we think that this idea sounds absolutely incredible! The final proposal and implementation strategy for the Halton Lea site is expected to be published in January 2018, so we’ll see how this unfolds!

Nike: Race yourself

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Nike has built an LED Running track which allows you to race yourself!

Based in the Philippines it takes up an entire block, thanks to a shoe sensor which tracks a runner, the first lap is recorded and then on the second lap appears on the wall as the runners very own ‘avatar’, with up to 30 runners allowed to race at one time.

Check the video of it in action below:

To listen to the guys chatting about this please click here!

Withings Steel HR

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We tried out some amazing smartwatches this past week, the Withings Steel HR!

  • HR Monitor with automatic exercise detection.
  • Activity Tracker
  • Design First, Substance hidden.
  • Battery up to 25 days
  • Water resistant to 50m
  • Smart wake up w/vibrating alarm

 

To buy your own Withings Steel HR please click here!

To listen to the guys chatting about this please click here!

Smart Recipes

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The FREE Smart Recipe app from Change4Life is an easy way of helping you and your family eat tasty, healthier meals the whole family will love.

We all love tasty food but it’s not always easy to cook for the family if you’re short on time and the kids are picky.

Remembering ingredients and keeping track of portion sizes can be a hassle. But don’t worry, our Meal Mixer will take care of that for you!

To download Sugar Smart please click here Apple / Android

To listen to Marcus Bronzy chatting about Sugar Smart please click here!

Sugar Smart

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We checked out this super cool sugar app to see how much sugar that’s in our foods!

The Sugar Smart app highlights how much total sugar is in your everyday food and drink. The Change4Life Sugar Smart app is designed to show quickly and easily how much total sugar is in the things you’re buying, eating and drinking, to help you spot it more easily so you can make healthier choices and cut your sugar intake.

Without us realising it, we’re all eating and drinking too much sugar!

To download Sugar Smart please click here Apple / Android

To listen to Marcus Bronzy chatting about Sugar Smart please click here!

Step O Meter

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Walking is one of the easiest ways to fit some low-impact activity into your day but we all need a little extra nudge to take those extra steps. That’s where the Smart Step-O-Meter app comes in. As well as counting your steps like a pedometer, it can tell you how far you’ve walked and how many calories you’ve burned. Need some extra motivation? The app lets you set daily targets and you can even pick from one of three week-long plans which give you daily step targets to aim for.

 

To download Sugar Smart please click here Apple

To listen to Marcus Bronzy chatting about Sugar Smart please click here!

Food Smart

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Without realising it we’re all eating too much sugar, saturated fat and salt.

That’s why the brand new Be Food Smart app is here to help you and your family make healthier food and drink choices.

Simply scan the barcode of your food and drink to find out what’s inside.

You’ll also get loads of simple hints and tips to help you make healthier choices, plus food detective activities for the kids and fun mini-mission ideas for the whole family.

 

To download Food Smart please click here Apple / Android

To listen to Marcus Bronzy chatting about Food Smart please click here!

VR Models!

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An incredibly detailed piece of art was created recently entirely in VR and printed out via a 3D printer and the results are incredible.

Oculus Character artist Giovanni Nakpil posted an image of an amazingly detailed 3d printed model of an ogre that was modelled entirely in Oculus Medium, a VR Sculpting App. The model had exquisite detail and subtle colur graduations that left people stunned and some questioning if it had indeed been made entirely in VR on an app.

Nakpil said to Mashable:

“I did not do any sanding or any post-print work whatsoever,” says Nakpil, when asked if there were any post-3D printing touch-ups or sanding. “The smooth nature of the print comes from the resolution of the Medium model as well as the high-resolution settings from the 3D printer.”

To achieve such incredible detail Giovanni had to use a state of the art 3D printer, the Stratasys J750,  that is described as being one of the best in the world. It produces up to 350,000 colours and the company Stratasys have stated that it is “the world’s first full-color, multi-material 3D printer”

Smartwatch will tell you when you’re getting ill!

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That smartwatch on your wrist may have just got a little bit smarter – they’ll be able to tell you when you’re getting ill before you actually do, according to US scientists.

Researchers made an app called “Change of Heart” which tracked health data, such as your heart rate, then used 60 people to conduct a study for up to two years and found that the stats changed from the baseline, when they were falling ill.

These stats are very important as the researchers say that with this data they could potentially help to develop an app which will detect things such as type 2 diabetes and in the study the app detected very early signs of Lyme disease in one of the scientists behind the study.

As the devices are constantly measuring our vitals they can often give a quick up to date information and your doctor (we presume) would have access to these stats they could detect not only things like the common cold but the onset of diseases due to small undetectable changes in your physiology. 

If this comes to fruition a combination of a smartwatch to detect the changes and a smartphone to act as a health dashboard could save plenty of lives in years to come!

To listen to the guys talking about this please click here!