New Tech
Wii Headtracking Creates 3D Window Display
Feb 22nd
Johnny Chung Lee is the PhD student from Carnegie Mellon University who has been rocking Nintendo fanboy hearts pretty hard by making the Wiimote do some spectacular feats. We first saw him track his fingertips on the screen for a "Minority Report" type of interface. Then he created an interactive whiteboard. Now, he’s managed to create a headtracking simulation through the Wiimote, creating an amazing 3D window on the world.
The mod requires you to wear the sensor bar (or any IR-emitting headband, Lee makes some sweet goggles) and place the Wiimote by the screen (it’s hooked up to a laptop with a TV-out for this demonstration). Essentially, your head becomes the mouse peeking through a 3D room, and the gameplay implications would be incredible.
Anyone else thinking that Nintendo should pay this guy whatever he wants to make some awesome games? Or, you know, Sony and Microsoft could always grab him up, too. These ideas just use the Wiimote’s IR—technology that isn’t exactly cutting edge stuff.
See the original article at Gizmodo.
Barbie Video Girl Features A Built-In Camcorder
Feb 16th
Besides pursuing a career as a computer engineer, it seems Barbie is also considering espionage as a side gig. The Barbie Video Girl Doll, which was just unveiled at Toy Fair, features a video camera ‘hidden’ in Barbie’s necklace that can capture up to 30 minutes of footage. But what’s more disturbing is the LCD display fused to her back that allows you to play back those videos.
Now I know Mattel has never been that concerned with anatomical correctness in the Barbie line, but I’m pretty sure they’re taking some real creative licenses here. There’s also a USB port hidden somewhere on the doll, not exactly sure where, that allows the videos to be downloaded to a PC and/or uploaded and edited on Barbie.com. The whole idea just seems kind of creepy to me, probably even more so if there was a Ken version, but don’t let me stop you from picking one up in July when they’ll be available for about $50.
See the original article at OhGizmo!.
Avatar: yes, it changed everything after all
Jan 4th
A review from Gizmodo…
Put simply, Avatar is the most visually fantastic film I’ve ever seen. It will be hailed as the groundbreaking 3D release of its time while setting a new standard by which all blockbusters are measured. Yes, it’s that good.
I’m not going to talk about plot (or that I thought to myself, Dances with Wolves in space more than once). I’m not going to talk about dialog or pacing (or that the limited narration was totally unnecessary). There are other reviews, more reviewy type reviews, that have all that covered. I’m not going to spoil anything, either. Heck, I’m not even going to talk about Avatar…not just yet.
Japanese researchers develop see-through goldfish
Dec 29th
TOKYO (AFP) – First came see-through frogs. Now Japanese researchers have succeeded in producing goldfish whose beating hearts can be seen through translucent scales and skin.
The transparent creatures are part of efforts to reduce the need for dissections, which have become increasingly controversial, particularly in schools.
“You can see a live heart and other organs because the scales and skin have no pigments,” said Yutaka Tamaru, an associate professor in the department of life science at Mie University.
“You don’t have to cut it open. You can see a tiny brain above the goldfish’s black eyes.”
The joint team of researchers at Mie University and Nagoya University in central Japan produced the “ryukin” goldfish by picking mutant hatchery goldfish with pale skin and breeding them together.
“Having a pale colour is a disadvantage for goldfish in an aquarium but it’s good to see how organs sit in a body three-dimensionally,” Tamaru told AFP.
The fish are expected to live up to roughly 20 years and could grow as long as 25 centimetres (10 inches) and weigh more than two kilograms (five pounds), much bigger than other fish used in experiments, such as zebrafish and Japanese medaka, Tamaru said.
“As this goldfish grows bigger, you can watch its whole life,” he said.
Meanwhile another group of researchers who announced in 2007 they had developed see-through frogs said they planned to start selling the four-legged creatures, whose skin is transparent from the tadpole stage.
“We are making progress in their mass-production. They are likely to be put on the market next year,” said Masayuki Sumida, professor at the Institute for Amphibian Biology of Hiroshima University.
Sumida said see-through tadpoles and adult frogs would be available in the first half of next year in Japan for laboratories and schools and as pets, with a price tag expected to be below 10,000 yen (110 dollars) each.
He also wants to sell the creature abroad.
Animal rights activists have pressed for humane alternatives to dissections, such as using computer simulations.
Sumida’s team produced the creature from rare mutants of the Japanese brown frog, or Rena japonica, whose backs are usually ochre or brown. Two kinds of recessive genes have been known to cause the frog to be pale.
While goldfish are easier to keep, frogs are higher forms of life and therefore preferable for experiments, Sumida said.
See the original article at Yahoo! News
5 reasons 3-D video will come to our living rooms
Oct 5th
Let’s face it, there are some skeptics out there when it comes to 3-D. Some point to competing standards, others to the kitsch factor, and almost all point to the glasses. But not everyone’s a hater. In fact, Sony and Panasonic see the technology as a savior for their living room business. So will 3-D make it in the home? Chances are it will, and here are five reasons why:
1. 3-D will become a standard feature. TV makers will put a premium price on anything 3-D in the next few years (much as they did with HD), as Alfred Poor points out in his new 3DTV report at GigaOM Pro (subscription required); but over time, the technology will become just another standard feature. Chances are in five years we’ll see $799 50-inch 3-D TVs from Vizio at Costco.
2. Invasion of the 3-D movie theaters. 3-D movies are bringing in higher per-screen revenues than their 2-D counterparts, and by the end of this year there should be 7,000 3-D screens worldwide. Hollywood has caught 3-D fever, and it’s logical to think the big focus on 3-D in the theater will migrate over time to the living room.
3. Those crazy gamers. Gamers have been enjoying crude 3-D effects since Wolfenstein 3-D, and more and more are being pulled into a new dimension with the latest 3-D technology. Sony has stated that existing game catalogs will be 3-D upgradeable through software, which could build the library of content quickly and justify the cost of accessories such as glasses.
4. Cheap glasses. While active shutter glasses would set you back at least 50 bones today, prices will fall through the floor once they’re manufactured at scale. Think four-packs at Wal-Mart for $25 in about five years.
5. Kids. 3-D’s secret weapon, really. I have to wonder how many 3-D skeptics are child-less. Just as tens of millions of parents came down with Wii tennis elbow in recent years, so will they be donning 3-D glasses in the future.
3-D in the home will continue to be a source of both skepticism and excitement in the coming years. But make no mistake, as both the DVD and HDTV gravy trains continue to slow to a crawl, TV makers and Hollywood are seeing an extra dimension.
See the original article at GigaOm.
Play some classic Nintendo (NES) games in Javascript
Oct 2nd
The idea that somebody could program a Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) emulator completely in Javascript just blows my mind.
For those that don’t know, Javascript is a language of sorts that’s built into your browser. It’s usually used for doing such mundane tasks as button roll-overs, making simple screen transitions, verifying that you entered a valid e-mail address, etc. I don’t think that using it as a full-blown processor environment was ever part of the original conception.
You’ll want to use Google Chrome for this – competitor browsers aren’t quite fast enough to play this yet.
Yeah, there’s no sound on this emulator but for a quick arcade fix it’s pretty good. There are lots of other ways to play games like this, just use Google or Bing to find them.
Try the emulator here.
3-D glasses a sticking point for movie industry
May 13th
More than a dozen 3-D films will hit multiplexes this year, and theaters are installing thousands of digital 3-D systems amid fervid public approval of the fledgling technology.
If the industry could only figure out how to pay for the 3-D glasses.
Complicated virtual-print-fee (VPF) agreements are in place to fund the rollout of digital hardware, enabling theaters to add the 3-D systems. But until reusable 3-D glasses come into greater use or the $1-per-pair cost for disposables is cut substantially, squabbling will continue over millions of dollars in costs tied to the extra-dimensional eyewear.
With an installed base of fewer than 1,400 domestic 3-D screens, distribution has been limited, keeping the cost of outfitting customers in the low- to mid-single-digits. But once 3-D movies start playing in 2,000 or more theaters at a time, that expense is expected to swell quickly to $10 million or more per release.
Such outlays come on top of about $15 million per picture in extra production costs tied to 3-D, as well as multimillion-dollar VPF payments. 20th Century Fox executives quietly spread the word a couple months ago that they intended to rein in their payments on glasses, but details of a new arrangement have yet to emerge. Read the rest of this entry »
Wind turbines could more than meet U.S. electricity needs, report says
Apr 7th
Wind turbines off U.S. coastlines could potentially supply more than enough electricity to meet the nation’s current demand, the Interior Department reported Thursday.
Simply harnessing the wind in relatively shallow waters — the most accessible and technically feasible sites for offshore turbines — could produce at least 20% of the power demand for most coastal states, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said, unveiling a report by the Minerals Management Service that details the potential for oil, gas and renewable development on the outer continental shelf.
The biggest wind potential lies off the nation’s Atlantic coast, which the Interior report estimates could produce 1,000 gigawatts of electricity — enough to meet a quarter of the national demand.
The report also notes large potential in the Pacific, including off the California coast, but said the area presented technical challenges.
The Interior Department released an executive summary of the report on Thursday.
It noted that "strong wind resources also exist offshore California, Oregon, Washington and Hawaii, but it appears that the majority of this resource lies in deep waters where technology constraints are potentially significant" — a sentiment Salazar echoed when asked about Pacific wind potential.
Read the full article at the LA Times.
Virus-built Battery Could Power Cars, Electronic Devices
Apr 4th
For the first time, MIT researchers have shown they can genetically engineer viruses to build both the positively and negatively charged ends of a lithium-ion battery.
The new virus-produced batteries have the same energy capacity and power performance as state-of-the-art rechargeable batteries being considered to power plug-in hybrid cars, and they could also be used to power a range of personal electronic devices, said Angela Belcher, the MIT materials scientist who led the research team.
The new batteries, described in the April 2 online edition of Science, could be manufactured with a cheap and environmentally benign process: The synthesis takes place at and below room temperature and requires no harmful organic solvents, and the materials that go into the battery are non-toxic.
In a traditional lithium-ion battery, lithium ions flow between a negatively charged anode, usually graphite, and the positively charged cathode, usually cobalt oxide or lithium iron phosphate. Three years ago, an MIT team led by Belcher reported that it had engineered viruses that could build an anode by coating themselves with cobalt oxide and gold and self-assembling to form a nanowire.
The viruses are a common bacteriophage, which infect bacteria but are harmless to humans.
The team found that incorporating carbon nanotubes increases the cathode’s conductivity without adding too much weight to the battery. In lab tests, batteries with the new cathode material could be charged and discharged at least 100 times without losing any capacitance. That is fewer charge cycles than currently available lithium-ion batteries, but "we expect them to be able to go much longer," Belcher said.
The prototype is packaged as a typical coin cell battery, but the technology allows for the assembly of very lightweight, flexible and conformable batteries that can take the shape of their container.
Last week, MIT President Susan Hockfield took the prototype battery to a press briefing at the White House where she and U.S. President Barack Obama spoke about the need for federal funding to advance new clean-energy technologies. [ed]Let me see if I understand this: they took a virus to the White House?[/ed]
See the full article at Science Daily.
NIF scientists set the controls for nuclear fusion
Apr 1st
Among the flurry of experiments going down worldwide, significant work will start rolling at the US National Ignition Facility sometime this June. Under construction for twelve years, the lab will focus 192 giant laser beams on two forms of hydrogen, deuterium and tritium. Combining these isotopes at high temperatures generates a colossal amount of energy, recreating conditions "at the heart of the sun." The goal is to find a way to achieve controlled, sustained nuclear fusion and energy gain in a lab. According to the director of the facility, Dr. Ed Moses, "When all NIF lasers are fired at full energy, they will deliver 1.8 megajoules of ultraviolet energy to the target." Lasting just a few nanoseconds, the system is capable of generation 500 trillion watts of power — more than the peak electrical generating power of the entire United States. Significant results are expected sometime between 2010 and 2012.
[ed]Nuclear fusion is the world game-changer we’ve been waiting for…[/ed]
