WHEN Canadian filmmaker Rob Spence decided to have his badly damaged eye removed from its socket, he chose to replace it not with a prosthetic, but with a wireless camera. The decision, he says, was easy.

''Every person I know who's lost an eye immediately thinks, 'I should think about getting a camera,' '' he says. Although so far, Spence is the only person who has actually acted on the notion.

Rob Spence has a camera in place of his right eye. Credit:Justin McManus

In a world first, Spence and a team of engineers and eye specialists developed an eye-camera, a miniature camera and wireless transmitter fitted into his eye.

Spence damaged his eye as a child after mishandling a gun, and had been legally blind in his right eye for years. After several operations, doctors eventually advised him to remove it.