Holograms & Volumetric Displays News and Discussions

[Yuli Ban]

This thread is dedicated to holograms and hologram-like technologies, from Pepper's Ghost to volumetric displays.

Augmented reality holograms can be crossposted here too.

[Yuli Ban]

[erowind]

Are volumetric displays something we might expect to see become commonplace in the next few decades? They look like holograms for all intensive purposes and feel very futuristic.

[weatheriscool]

New technology lays groundwork for large-scale, high-resolution 3D displays
https://phys.org/news/2021-08-technolog ... 28ETifLV5Q
by The Optical Society

Researchers have developed a prototype display that uses projection to create large-scale 3D images with ultra-high definition. The new approach helps overcome the limitations of light-field projection, which can create natural-looking 3D images that don't require special 3D glasses for viewing.

"Our optical design could make it practical to replace 2D flat panel displays with 3D images for digital signs, entertainment, education and other applications where 3D images provide a significant enhancement," said research team leader Byoungho Lee from Seoul National University in Korea. "Our design could also be modified to provide immersive experiences in movie theaters, for example."

In The Optical Society (OSA) journal Optics Letters, the researchers describe how they combine two different light-field display technologies to project large-scale 3D images with almost diffraction-limited resolution. The new display is autostereoscopic, which means that it produces different 3D images so that the image can be viewed from various angles.

[Yuli Ban]

Inside the lab making real holograms in midair

[Yuli Ban]

Light Field Lab's SolidLight offers a true holographic video display

The dream of holographic video has long been a staple of science fiction—the image of Princess Leia beamed from R2-D2 in Star Wars, the holodeck in Star Trek: The Next Generation, and the shark that pops out at Marty McFly in Back to the Future II are just three examples. Well, that fantasy is now poised to become reality, but without breaking the laws of physics. A Silicon Valley startup called Light Field Lab has developed the world’s first truly holographic digital-display technology, which I was privileged to see for myself during a visit to the company’s offices this week.

Before I tell you what it is, let me tell you what it isn’t. It’s not the technology used to resurrect Tupac Shakur on the concert stage at Coachella in 2012; that’s a 160-year-old effect called Pepper’s Ghost that literally uses smoke and mirrors to reflect 2D floating images. And it’s certainly not autostereoscopic 3D, which companies such as Samsung, Sony, Looking Glass, and Stream TV have demonstrated for years. That technology presents separate 2D images to each eye—as long as you’re in the right spot—and sometimes causes dizziness and nausea due to something called vergence-accommodation conflict, which can also plague glasses-based stereoscopic images and head-mounted displays.

Founded in 2017, Light Field Lab has developed a technology it calls SolidLight, which replicates exactly how light behaves in the real world. When you look at an object in the real world, light from the sun or other source reflects from the object at many different points in many different directions, some of which enters your eyes (see Fig. 1a). As you move around the object, different light rays—or, more properly, wavefronts—enter your eyes, and you see different perspectives. Also, objects behind it are blocked from view (occluded) differently.

[weatheriscool]

Stackable 'holobricks' can make giant 3D images
https://phys.org/news/2022-03-stackable ... mages.html
by University of Cambridge

Researchers have developed a new method to display highly realistic holographic images using 'holobricks' that can be stacked together to generate large-scale holograms.

The researchers, from the University of Cambridge and Disney Research, developed a holobrick proof-of-concept, which can tile holograms together to form a large seamless 3-D image. This is the first time this technology has been demonstrated and opens the door for scalable holographic 3-D displays. The results are reported in the journal Light: Science & Applications.

As technology develops, people want high-quality visual experiences, from 2-D high resolution TV to 3-D holographic augmented or virtual reality, and large true 3-D displays. These displays need to support a significant amount of data flow: for a 2-D full HD display, the information data rate is about three gigabits per second (Gb/s), but a 3-D display of the same resolution would require a rate of three terabits per second, which is not yet available.

Holographic displays can reconstruct high quality images for a real 3-D visual perception. They are considered the ultimate display technology to connect the real and virtual worlds for immersive experiences.

[Yuli Ban]

[Yuli Ban]

“Holobricks” Enable Large-Scale 3D Projections of Holographic Images and Videos in Cinema Format

Holograms are a technology that has been expected for a long time, but has so far been rather disappointing. A research team from Disney and the University of Cambridge has now developed a technique with which holographic images and videos can also be produced on a large scale. This is made possible by so-called “holobricks” – modular optical devices whose partial projections can be combined to form a seamless image. In the future, holo displays the size of a cinema screen, composed of many smaller holobrick modules, are conceivable.

In science fiction films, holograms have been standard for many decades. Even in reality there are already some technologies that produce holographic videos or free-floating projections. So far, however, all these projections are quite small.

The reason for the scaling problem is the huge amount of data that is needed for a hologram. The larger the hologram viewing angle and area, the finer and higher resolution the holographic interference pattern needs to be. An HD display requires a data rate of around three gigabits per second for a two-dimensional image. With a hologram of the same resolution and size, it would be around three terabits per second, which is far more than is currently possible with current technology.

The holobricks could offer a solution to the problem, because each of these optical modules only has to generate a section of the image, so the resolution of the common hologram generators is sufficient for this.

[wjfox]

Not exactly "holographic" but a similar effect.

Very cool, hi-tech, outdoor display by d'strict, advertising the Expo 2030.

[citali_]

They should replace music videos with holograms.

[weatheriscool]

Sony bumps up size and resolution of immersive glasses-free 3D display
By Paul Ridden
April 05, 2023
https://newatlas.com/technology/sony-el ... y-display/

Back in 2020, Sony unveiled a 15.6-inch display that used eye tracking and a micro-optical lens to deliver 3D visuals without the need for glasses or VR headsets. Now a 27-inch, 4K model has joined the Spatial Reality Display lineup.

The new display works pretty much as before, where the LCD display panel has a micro-optical lens above it to divide the onscreen visuals between a viewer's left and right eyes, while a new generation of vision sensors promises improved facial recognition and tracking. The system can dynamically adapt the image as a user moves around – up to 25 degrees left and right, 20 degrees up and 40 degrees down.

The 3,840 x 2,160-pixel, anti-reflection display sits at a 45-degree angle (though Sony does note that the "actual effective stereoscopic resolution is less than 4K"), has a response time of 14 milliseconds, and manages 400 nits of brightness, 1,000:1 contrast and a color temperature of 6500-K.

[weatheriscool]

This Startup Can Turn Almost Anything Into a Hyper-Realistic Hologram
The company’s 3D displays have successfully ‘holoported’ products, court witnesses, and even Captain Kirk from one place to another.
By Adrianna Nine August 7, 2023
https://www.extremetech.com/electronics ... c-hologram

Proto, a holographic communications startup based in California, has built a system capable of beaming just about anything from one location to another. Okay, maybe not literally—this isn’t Mike Teavee’s unfortunate turn of events at Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory—but visually. If its image can be captured in front of a white backdrop, Proto can teleport it from one location to another, successfully performing what’s now commonly called “holoportation.”

Sometimes seeing a person in 2D simply isn’t enough. To give the telecommunication experience a little extra oomph, organizations from Google and NASA to smaller startups are hard at work developing what they call “holoportation” devices. These devices capture a person’s likeness and cast a hologram of them to another location to create a teleportation effect, hence the amalgamated term.

[wjfox]

Why a 'hologram revolution' could be on the way

11 hours ago

At this zoo visitors dodge stampeding elephants, peer into the gaping jaws of a hippopotamus and pat friendly giraffes.

Such thrills are possible at Australia's Hologram Zoo, which opened earlier this year, and features 50 lifelike displays from dinosaurs to gorillas crafted from lasers.

Its creator says it's the world's most futuristic animal theme park, using technology that has never been used anywhere else.

"There's lots of laughing, lots of screaming… but when the 30-metre whale goes by, for some reason, everyone goes silent like they are in awe and reverence of such a magnificent creature," explains Bruce Dell, the chief executive of Axiom Holographics and creator of Hologram Zoo.

It is digital trickery, hoodwinking the brain into seeing something that isn't really there.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67080941



Credit: Hologram Zoo

[weatheriscool]

[weatheriscool]

Next-gen spatial displays make for headset-free working in 3 dimensions
By Paul Ridden
May 14, 2024
https://newatlas.com/technology/looking ... -displays/

The Looking Glass Factory has launched two new spatial displays for creative professionals "who demand cutting-edge visualization tools for developing, presenting, and interacting with 3D digital images, video and applications in real time."

Where the Brooklyn-based company's Go display launched last year brought headset-free 3D visuals to home users in a compact package, the new 16-inch and 32-inch spatial (holographic) displays are expected to see use in the workplaces of designers, engineers, educators, researchers, medical professionals and so on.

[Yuli Ban]

[Powers]

[weatheriscool]

Looking Glass holographic displays now run videos from your iPhone
By Abhimanyu Ghoshal
January 31, 2025

https://newatlas.com/technology/looking ... os-iphone/
Looking Glass, which makes special screens that display 3D holograms you can see without wearing a headset or glasses, just added iOS support to its tech. That means you can view Cinematic Mode videos, custom apps, and 3D content from your iPhone or iPad on this display, without relying on a powerful desktop to process it first.

Previously, your phone was only really good for turning individual photos into 3D holograms and sending them over to the display via Wi-Fi. This update brings a bunch of new iOS tools into the mix, making the whole experience more accessible.

For starters, the new Hologram Video app – which is currently in beta – transforms Cinematic Mode videos (footage in which you can control the depth of field, or background blur effect, after the fact) that you've shot on your iPhone into life-like holograms that you or a group can view from different angles.
Cinematic Mode video from an iPhone on a Looking Glass display

[weatheriscool]

World's first interactive 3D holographic display
By Joe Salas
April 10, 2025

Remember the scene in Iron Man 2 where Tony Stark rediscovers a new element and is handling virtual 3D holographic elements with his hands, moving them around, pinching, swiping, flicking, and tossing? Pretty cool in 2010. What about 2025?

Well, we're not quite there yet, but this is still pretty innovative: A team of Spanish engineers has created the world's first 3D hologram that can be physically interacted with.

Holograms are generally made using swept volumetric displays, meaning images are projected at different heights nearly three thousand times per second onto a rigid oscillating surface called a diffuser, giving the appearance of a three-dimensional object without the need for special glasses or headsets. The diffuser moves so fast that it's mostly imperceptible to the human eye. The catch is, that the second you try to interact with the hologram, you might lose a finger or just break the machine entirely.

https://newatlas.com/technology/flexivo ... c-display/