Display

This Physorg.com article takes a look at the displays of the future. From the article: "Talk about gazing into the future. Imagine ultra high-definition TVs not much thicker than a millimeter. How about electronic books made with plastic screens that flex like a magazine? Or perhaps a display that lets you touch a virtual version of yourself on the other side of the glass?

The technology to build these crazy new gadgets is being shown in Seattle this week during Display Week, the Society for Information Display conference.

A combination science fair and industry bazaar, the event is drawing 6,000 people from most of the companies developing TVs, monitors, touch screens , electronic books and cell phone screens.

Inventors and component manufacturers will be showing their latest creations to consumer-electronics companies, looking for technology and materials to build the next iPad or wafer-thin 3-D TV.

This Physorg.com article reports "NEC and Brother are both developing wearable prototype devices that use Retinal Imaging Display (RID) technology to project images directly on the wearer's retina. NEC's gadget is designed to interpret foreign languages and project a translation onto the retina, making it possible to have a conversation without an interpreter. Brother's device will project images of documents, allowing the wearer to read them in complete privacy.

This Telepresence Options article talks about a new way to mass-produce flexible OLED displays that could mean affordable commercial products. From the article: "Flexible, full-color video displays could be closer to market because of a new advance by researchers at Arizona State University's Flexible Display Center (FDC) and at Universal Display, in Ewing, NJ. The researchers have made bendy organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays employing processes and tools that are used to make today's flat-panel LCD screens. They demonstrated a new 4.1-inch video-quality display at the 2009 Society for Information Display conference last week.

This ScienceDaily article talks about a UC San Diego computer science and engineering graduate student who has found a way to optimize virtual reality environments for high resolution video. From the article : "With their immersive 3D capabilities, virtual-reality environments (VEs) provide the kind of intense visual experience that two-dimensional digital televisions could never to live up to. But digital TVs outperform VEs in one important way: They can play high-resolution video in real-time without a hitch, while VEs have trouble rendering the data-heavy video clips at a constant frame rate.

This MacRumors.com article reports Apple's latest patent application reveals that they're continuing to look into personal virtual reality headsets. From the article: "The February 2008 application is titled "Automatically adjusting media display in a personal display system" and details a "personal display system" which can give "the impression of being in the theater."

Apple suggests that by detecting the user's movements, the image could be adjusted accordingly:

"For example, the device may detect a user's head movement and cause the portion of media displayed to reflect the head movement."

This Emerging Tech Roland Piquepaille article reports the University of Illinois at Chicago’s (UIC) Electronic Visualization Laboratory (EVL) will develop the OmegaTable, a multi-sensory touch tabletop for interactive, visual data exploration in 2D and autostereoscopic 3D. From the article: "After the LambdaTable unveiled in 2007, the University of Illinois at Chicago’s (UIC) Electronic Visualization Laboratory (EVL) will develop the OmegaTable, a new virtual reality display. It will be a modular, multi-sensory touch tabletop for interactive, visual data exploration in 2D and autostereoscopic 3D (3D without special glasses). EVL received a $450K grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to develop the device. The project will start in September 2008 for a 3-year duration.

A stereoscopy.com press release reports Alioscopy will introduce its new 3DHD-40 autostereoscopic 3D LCD display technology at SIGGRAPH 2008. From the press release: "The 3DHD-40, developed and manufactured by Alioscopy, features a highly specialized Lenticular lens that boasts unmatched quality, clarity and depth. The system also supports real-time capabilities that enable viewers to interact with content for a truly immersive experience. Artists can easily create 3D content with leading 3D software applications such as Autodesk(R) 3ds Max(R), Autodesk(R) Maya(R), Softimage(R) XSI(R), MAXON CINEMA 4D and NewTek Lightwave 3D(R) and render it out for display on the 3DHD-40.

This Technology Review article takes a look at the WAVEscape system developed by Reactrix. From the article: "There could be a revolution brewing in billboard advertising. Instead of simply presenting a static image, why not let people interact with the advertisement? This is the vision of electronics giant Samsung and interactive advertising company Reactrix Systems. The two companies have partnered to bring 57-inch interactive displays to Hilton hotel lobbies by the end of the year. These displays can "see" people standing up to 15 feet away from the screen as they wave their hands to play games, navigate menus, and use maps.

This Telepresence Options article reports JVC have released a video projector capable of showing 35 megapixels at once. It also talks about the release of a new 3D TV prototype by Philips. From the article: "1080p high definition might be well and good for your average lounge room TV screen, but cinema projectors need to offer something vastly more impressive if the movies are going to continue to offer a bigger, clearer and more impressive viewing experience than your average cashed-up punter can now get at home. The new ultra-high res standard would now appear to be set with Super Hi-Vision: 7,680 pixels across by 4,320 pixels high (approximately 32-megapixel images) - and JVC have now released a video projector capable of showing 35 megapixels at once.

This New Scientist Technology Blog post reports Christian Moore have developed an open-source framework (so-called Lux) which brings full multitouch interaction to Apple's OSX operating system. From the article: "Here's a video that's been doing the rounds on the web recently. Lux is an open-source framework developed by Christian Moore that brings full multitouch interaction to Apple's OSX operating system.