WatchThis: A Wearable Point-and-Ask Interface Powered by Vision-Language Models and XIAO ESP32S3 Sense

WatchThis is designed to seamlessly integrate natural, gesture-based interaction into daily life. The wearable device consists of a watch with a rotating, flip-up camera attached to the back of a display. When the user points at an object of interest, the camera captures the area, and the device processes contextual queries based on the user’s gesture.

The interaction begins when the user flips up the watch body to reveal the camera, which then captures the area where the finger points at. The watch’s display shows a live feed from the camera, allowing precise aiming. When the user touches the screen, the device captures the image and pauses the camera feed. The captured RGB image is then compressed into JPG format and converted to base64, after which an API request is made to query the image.

The device uses these API calls to interact with OpenAI’s GPT-4o model, which accepts both text and image inputs. This allows the user to ask questions such as “What is this?” or “Translate this,” and receive immediate responses. The text response is displayed on the screen, overlaid on the captured image. After the response is shown for 3 seconds, the screen returns to streaming the camera feed, ready for the next command.

The software driving WatchThis is written in Arduino-compatible C++ and runs directly on the device. It is optimized for quick and efficient performance, with an end-to-end response time of around 3 seconds. Instead of relying on voice recognition or text-to-speech—which can be error-prone and resource-intensive—the system uses direct text input for queries. Users can further personalize their interactions by modifying the default query prompt through an accompanying WebApp served on the device, allowing tailored actions such as identifying objects, translating text, or requesting instructions.