Seelinder

(After a looooong period of laziness, I have woken up to post my siggraph experiences)

I spotted this particular exhibit in the Emerging Technologies section. It is a cylindrical display screen which keeps rotating at a high speed. The pixels on the screen show an image/video. But the interesting part is that the image will change depending on the viewpoint. i.e, walking around the cylinder will give you the impression that you are moving around a 3D object. Take a look at the (badly blurred) pictures that I have taken from two different angles while walking around the cylinder.

This technology is a highly suitable candidate for a marriage with image based rendering (one of the hot research areas in CG) A 3D object can be photographed from multiple cameras and displayed onto this cylinder. The final effect would be something similar to the 3D holograms of Starwars.

Siggraph 2005 website says, " The display's most innovative technique reconstructs light rays in all horizontal directions with high density. This is realized with a rotating barrier with slits and high-speed light sources such as LEDs. The system also includes a method of light-ray control that enables representation of lightfields from a set of photos taken from all sides of an object."

The biggest plus for this technology is the non-invasiveness, ease of use (unlike VR helmets and stereoscopic glasses) and the fact that this can be used for multiple audience at the same time. The exhibitors did not mention about the possible costs of the display, but mass production should bring these down. This will have a high impact on the fields of advertising, gaming, entertainment and the like.

Currently, the major drawbacks include the low resolution of the display and the blurrieness that appears as the cylinder rotates.

The people behind this technology are Dr. Tomohiro Yendo and his students from Nagoya University, Japan.