You expect that digital representation of 3-D space and objects is still rapidly evolving, but when I see a demo like this simulation by Thiago Costa done using Lagoa Multiphysics solver, it’s hard not to be astounded!
This is cool: imagine using a mouse that is not physically present. It’s another step on the path to making input devices more transparent, or in this case, actually invisible.
It takes a lot to make us sit up and really be impressed by technology anymore, right?
Check out the video below (expand it to full screen) by Keiichi Matsuda for his Master’s project in Architecture. In it he creates the most amazing, immersive representation of Augmented Reality that I’ve yet seen. Look at how objects become pixellated when ‘you’ are pouring hot water for your tea. A virtual keyboard for a recipe check. While the water boils there’s the quick check of cyberspace, as you’ve never seen it before! As you might expect, the commercial realm is never far away….
When we all look at the world this way, that morning freeway commute is gonna be complicated.
Augmented (hyper)Reality: Domestic Robocop from Keiichi Matsuda on Vimeo.
I do believe this qualifies as pertaining to “digital media”. As cool as the technology in this story is, much cooler by a mile of course is Roger Ebert showing us how in the face of bad news, not every step has to be a step backward.
Wow have you seen Samsung’s new OLED see-through display? It’s not ready yet for actual release but it looks very damn impressive anyway. I don’t know that I want a laptop with this screen, but the applications for this are endless. Note how thin the surface is when the video zooms in. Can I put this tech into my sunglasses and surf at the beach? You know what I mean.
So smartphones are everywhere, the mobile internet is taken for granted, yet using credit cards is still often a problem for one reason or another, whether on the buyer’s side or the seller’s. Can you say 2010?
Innovation is sometimes the combination of existing elements into exhilarating synergy, and I don’t just mean peanut butter on a banana. With technology today, so many ‘existing elements’ are out there to be combined that one senses pregnant possibilities before they actually happen. You knew that there had to be better ways of doing things like paying people on the spot with large amounts of cash, or using Paypal on a mobile device, didn’t you?
But let’s review: mobile device+software+connectivity has basically dissolved the concept of dedicated devices, or at least that of producing dedicated devices as a profit-making venture, which is the same thing. I know that some people will still be using a GPS device that does nothing but navigation in five years, although the prospect looks a lot less interesting now that I have Maps Navigation from Google. You tell me something that platforms-in-your-pocket can’t do today and I’ll toss you a calendar. Time, Moore’s Law and the profit motive will transform these little gadgets into what used to be known as supercomputers soon enough, but in the meantime a whole lot of mundane little daily hiccups will be exorcised from your life. It will be less about sheer computing power than the power of the new model, comprised of the three things I mentioned at the start of this paragraph.
Which brings us to Square.
Swiping my credit card usually works, except when it doesn’t because the vintage 1980’s card-swipe behemoth is dying a slow death behind the counter. Also it becomes more and more of a pain in the neck to actually have to sign something and be handed a paper receipt after a transaction, in places where I’m still asked to do so. And between typing and captchas and data entry, trying to use credit cards for online transactions becomes an unholy tedium circus. I can only imagine the frustration of merchants who lose sales for reasons totally unrelated to their customers’ ability to pay. Well what if there was a way to add something that you can carry on a key chain to the process? A little square thing that would greatly simplify the process of taking payments if you’re a merchant, and would help you square with your buddy without going to an ATM. Just a little link between existing tech that changes everything and shows a few dinosaurs the door. Om Malik did a great review of Square (launched by Jack Dorsey of Twitter fame) and its disruptive potential.
I have been thinking about cleaning up the area around my HDTV for quite a while. Over the weekend I decided to look for a HDMI booster that would allow me to put my high definition cable receiver and DVD player in a nearby closet, and run a longer cable to the monitor.
Naturally I am worried about picture degradation or digital noise like sparkles if I run a cable that is too long between my HDTV monitor and the source devices. Actually that’s probably why I haven’t shopped around for a video booster before.
I see plenty of options online, but if any Digital Media Minute readers have specific recommendations for a video signal booster that will extend an HDMI cable to around 30 feet without giving me a picture that looks like it’s out of the 1970s, I would love to hear them. Ideally I would want one that requires no additional AC adapter.
From some real smart folks at Cambridge University’s Engineering Department, check out this so-called ‘on-line rapid model acquisition system’, called ProFORMA, that quickly regenerates digital 3-D copies/models of real objects in very near real time, using a video camera as the data collection device.
The technology that will enable heads-up displays, or HUDs, to be embedded in contact lenses is progressing rapidly. That’s not to say that laws that will enable you to wear them are right around the corner.
Still, less than two years after he conducted successful tests on rabbits fitted with contacts powered by radio waves, Dr. Babak Parviz of the University of Washington foresees contact lenses as the basis for viable platforms, ‘like the iPhone is today,’ with LED displays and biosensors to display body chemistry. As many tech challenges as these LED contact lenses seem to have surmounted, I’m wondering just how much info can be assimilated by people who aren’t fighter pilots. On the other hand, your great-grandfather probably wouldn’t have been able to drive and text message at the same time.
Apparently the good doctor is a bit of a poet too:
As far as we’re concerned, the possibilities extend as far as the eye can see, and beyond.
