Star Wars-like Holograms

jeffy124 writes: "Business 2.0 has an article up about Ford's use of holograms during vehicle development. It's almost exactly like that scene in the original Star Wars where R2D2 ran a movie of Princess Leia saying 'Help me Obi Wan.' Basically, Ford uses the system during development to get a look at the car and various parts without needing to construct a full prototype. The image is a 3-D projection and hovers just above the floor, allowing the user to walk around the 'vehicle,' getting a look at it from all angles. I can picture the pr0n jokes now!"

Comments

fp?

[Anonymous Coward]

first god damn post you fucking niggers

Book on background of holographic development

[Anonymous Coward]

I read the first part of the article and realized I knew next to nothing about holograms, so I checked out Amazon.com and fountthis excellent book. I just ordered it a couple minutes ago, but from what I can tell it looks like it will be really informative.

Goatse

[Anonymous Coward]

Imagine, A full 3d version of goatse! Projected outside VA Software's HeadQuaters. Oh wait, VA Software is ran by some teenager from his basement. Well we can always use

cat ascii-goatse.txt

to show the ascii goatse on a UNIX terminal

A screen made of fog

[CmdrTaco (editor)]

Rather than using holographs, Ismo Rakkolainen has created a screen in the air using a low-cost air-blower, drinking straws, plastic tubing, cardboard boxes, and some liquid nitrogen. It may not be 3D, but I think it could be just as useful and much less expensive to create than a true hologram.

Anwyay, before we try to make 3D representations of objects in the air we should try to make them in 2D reliably. We had to learn to walk before we ran, now didn't we?

Sure, its cool, but.....why bother?

[Bowie J. Poag]

Of course i'd like to have one..And development of visualization technologies like these are important. However, I have to ask myself...if I were the President of Ford, why bother with such a thing?

The scenario they relate in the article is one where automotive designers and engineers can "walk around" a theorhetical car, as opposed to fabricating a prototype. Sure, prototypes are expensive, but on the other hand, I'd be hard pressed to justify spending what probably amounts to millions of dollars on a holographic setup that could be duplicated with a handful of $100 pairs of polarized stereo LCD goggles. The crux of the problem seems to me to be more of a software one, rather than a hardware one. Do you really need to have a room-sized holographic projection system? Couldn't you accomplish the same effect with a sufficiently advanced pair of goggles with the right software?

The article fails to adequately address why its a necessary technology... only that its whiz-bang neato and reminds the author of R2D2. :(

international court of law

[Anonymous Coward]

The international court of law has been founded to presecute people who perform terrible acts against humanity, who will otherwise escape justice, is that unlawfull, unjust, a danger to democracy or a threat to the soverrenity of a nation ? no it is NOT. It is a danger ot people with power who want to act freely without any danger of prosecution. AND WHY IS THE USA OPPOSED ? EXACTLY. QED.

testetst

[Anonymous Coward]

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Re:3d images

[Anonymous Coward]

Suicide.