Walk-thru Fog Screen

fluor2 writes "Ever wanted a screen floating in air? Two scientists, Ismo Rakkolainen and Karri Palovuori, both from Tampere University of Technology, Finland have come up with an idea. It is called the Walk-thru Fog Screen. The fog screen, consisting of 'fog' that is blown down from top, and the protective laminar airflow creates a thin and crisp surface, pretty undisturbed by the air in the rest of the room, making it ideal for projector usage. People can walk right through this screen of fog. Their next idea is to use the fog as a touch-screen, making it even more accessible." For a screen one can walk through, the image quality is better than I'd have thought.

Comments

Uuh-oh

[Jason1729]

From the article: The fog screen enables many novel applications indoors. Interesting applications include walk-thru advertisements on shops or malls, or a walk-thru screen in world-class museums, corporate showrooms, trade fairs, theme parks, special events, spas, theatres, science centers, lobbies, etc. We can extend the technology to limited outdoor usage.

Does anyone else find it find it very disturbing that the first application they suggest is advertising?

Jason
ProfQuotes

Re:Uuh-oh

[Timesprout]

Why would it be disturbing that one of the most apparent uses for this technology is advertising ? Its not going to bring peace or solve world hunger. I'm sure the inventors will be looking to make a few dollars for their time and effort. The advertising industry will lap up, and pay top dollar for technology that allows them greater flexibility in advertising. Its probably the market the inventors have intended all along.

Re:repost....

[Ken Broadfoot]

You are right...
However the story was new to me. So I am not too upset.

--ken

Re:Video/mpeg confusions!

[sonicattack]

Yep, using closed, proprietary, non-standards when there is no absolute need to do so is _very_ irritating.

When creating video clips like this, what is so HARD about using an open, well established standard that everyone (including the few % not running M$ media player) can use?

Btw, This is the first wmv I can't play at first attempt in mplayer under Linux. A file called 'wmv9dmod.dll' seems to be missing - can't find it on my Windows 98 installation either... :(

To be at least a bit on topic, this technology seems awesome! I hope there will be an "affordable" consumer version ready.... Real Soon ... For my movie experiences in my living room!

Could this be used to create 'real' holograms?

[sonicattack]

If the fog somehow is shaped as an object we want to recreate, and projected against from all sides, would this make the object look like a 'real' hologram ('real', like from the movies!) ?

I can already see a lot of applications for this. Bring out the mimejuice! And crack some ice!

Re:Could this be used to create 'real' holograms?

[SmallFurryCreature]

Well the fog now is shaped by air being blown down. You could in theory use finely controlled airflows to keep the fog in a certain shape. It would not be totally dissimmilar(?) to how a glass blower shapes glass. Of course glass is a lot more solid then fog :)

For now probably only very simple shapes would be possible, like say a pyramid. Then again maybe with multiple projectors you can create the illusion of something being inside the fog?

Then again you can bet your ass that the engineers at places like disney will be researching this very very thoroughly. So who knows.

Ugh.

[CGP314]

Interesting applications include walk-thru advertisements on shops or malls

Great, just what the human race needs. Another way to display advertisements. I do my best to ignore them, but if I have to walk through an ad, it's going to be hard not to see it.

Re:Great for firearms training

[psavo]

This technology would be very useful for extremely realistic firearms training. Think FPS with real guns ...

Sure! This vapor+projector equipment must be way-way cheaper than cardboard used today..

Re:Open-standards video

[anno1a]

You don't really make any sense... You didn't choose divx because it required additional software, so you chose wmv? Wmv can ONLY be played in windows, and I think it requires a fairly new version at that. And now you're switching to Quicktime?? WMP can't play quicktime, everyone hates the quicktime player, and it's hardly supported anywhere! Now you've gone from a more or less open standard, to a rather closed standard which requires a special player. What was wrong with divx again? Or the open XviD for that matter...

RTFA

[chthonicdaemon]

This is a new prototype, unveiled in July 2003. A revisit instead of a new post.

Now go flame the guys posting dupes of a new Mozilla release.

Re:DivX is the only acceptable format

[falcon5768]

BLECH, I have yet to see a decent DivX player that doenst crash half the time MPG4 thankyou.

Re:OMG

[PSaltyDS]

No mold or mildew involved because there doesn't have to be water vapor involved. The mist does not get things wet, according to the article. That means it is not water. More like the fake smoke used for special effects, probably.

Two posts in one article and I already used my sig, now what...?