EE Times - August 6, 2007 - (Page 16) News analysis <<15 SIGGRAPH ders and projects images at 5,000 frames per second onto a spinning anisotropic reflector with correct geometric, accommodation and vergence cues in a horizontal plane. Motion-tracked vertical parallax is then used to allow unrestricted 3-D movement with correct geometric cues. The innovation was achieved by modifying an off-the-shelf projector to use a new DLP (digital light processing) drive card with custom-programmed FPGAbased circuitry. • JazzMutant shows its latest development in multitouch technology using resistive technology with a particular focus on visual and graphic arts, and some new advanced interaction techniques involving a multitouch display in combination with other input devices. Apple recently made multitouch displays common in its new iPhone. And Microsoft will also demonstrate its multitouch Microsoft Surface, which turns an ordinary tabletop into an interactive surface. • Planar Systems demonstrates its active matrix LCDs with embedded optical sensors in the a-Si backplane of the AMLCD. Researcher Adi Abileah said that the applications will include touchpanel input, hand recognition and image capture. The imaging capability and hard-copy capture features also include a handrecognition algorithm that enables the display to check or confirm identity. The system supports the use of a light pen and a laser pointer and includes full imaging capability. Virtual video sets With the proliferation of digital video on the Web, video authoring and animation are becoming an essential part of the online experience. In a YouTube-empowered world, virtual sets at home or school may become as routine as the HTML editors of the recent past. Ramesh Raskar, a researcher at Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories (MERL), demonstrates a system that uses new methods of flexible scene capture to create a dynamic “virtual record- www.eetimes.com ‘Sound of Touch’ lets users paint with sound on physical textures. ing set.” The system uses tracking tags that are imperceptible under attire, and inserted computer graphics elements can match the lighting on the presenter, making the technique ideal for realtime broadcast. Motion capture no longer requires specially designated spaces, special lighting and a huge investment, according to MERL. The new system can record orientation and incident illumination at the marker tags. For motion capture, it tracks the position of marker tags at a rate of 500 Hz, with 8-bit location precision, and with self-identifying tags. For the orientation, it strategically configures a set of modulated light transmitters and uses light modulation and demodulation techniques to estimate individual attributes at the locations of the receiving photosensors. In a virtual-set application, the recording system not only captures motion and lighting conditions in their actual setting, but also the tags worn by an actor are easily hidden by theatrical wardrobe so they are invisible in the video recording, and they do not interfere with performance. Raskar said a key advantage of this approach is that it is based on components developed by the rapidly advancing fields of optical communication and solid-state lighting, which allows the system to capture photometric quantities without added software or hardware overhead. Marker-based techniques that use other physical media cannot capture photometric properties, Raskar said. ■ 16 Electronic Engineering Times | August 6, 2007 http://www.eetimes.com http://www.atmel.com/AVRman http://www.atmel.com/AVRman
For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.