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Sharp Develops Triple Directional Viewing LCD
morpheus83 writes "Sharp Corporation and Sharp Laboratories of Europe, Ltd. (SLE) have developed the Triple Directional Viewing LCD, a display that controls the viewing angle so that the display can show different images from the left, right, and center simultaneously. Using proprietary parallax barrier on a standard TFT LCD, the screen splits light in three directions — left, right, and center — and displays three separate images on the same screen at the same time. So connect three computers to the LCD and from the center you see Windows, Linux from the left and MacOS from the right."
Forget the privacy filter, Goatse on the left, Goatse on the right, and that commercial would be far more interesting!
up and down?
This is all very fancy, but wont viewing from sides reduce the surface amount you are watching? A 1024x768 from front wont be the same at 45 degree angle - loss of resolution - and compressed faces/picture etc.? How is that solved?
This is the same principle the moving cards work on.
View from the left and you see a truck, in the middle its bits, on the right its a robot *SHOCK*
actually sounds quite nice for computers, but fail to see usage really.
liqbase
...I only have two eyes!
EEExxxccceeellleeennnttt!!!
I thought everyone wanted to have a system with multiple screens supporting the same desktop, not one screen supporting multiple desktops. I don't see the advantage of this over a nice KVM.
Is a user with three sets of eyes.
Outstanding technology that still needs two wooden mirrors to work (for teh lazy necks among us).
Show spreadsheet on both sides, whatever you really want in the center
That's definitely a tech breakthrough!
Development apps when viewed from the left, debugging processes when viewed from the right, and Slashdot in the middle. You'd appear like the hardest working employee ever.
This is great, but unless you want to have your computer emulate three, you're using three computers/other video sources to display the image. do you really want three people crowding around an LCD, each with their own keyboard, mouse, etc.? And what about brightness, contrast, color, etc.? Does it display different versions of that?
All in all, it's not going to be useful for interactive use.
I could think of some interesting psychology experiments using this screen with three test users debating what they see on the LCD screen but beyond that, please tell me what this technology does for me?
Is leaning right and left to get another desktop useful? Isn't this just like those animating stickers that show two or three pictures? Please, give me applicable technology, not just technology that looks neat.
This obliviously uses video card cycles to generate the 3 views, if I can't conceivably use them in tandem its just a waste.
I guess you could watch porn while your giving a PowerPoint presentation to your client?!?
-- Disclaimer: I can't really back up anything I post on
I played with a Sharp 3D laptop last summer (http://www.sharp3d.com/), and it was cool but it caused a lot of eyestrain, not to mention halving the usable resolution. This sounds like almost the same technology, and I imagine it won't be any easier on the eyes.
Having different computers for each image was the submitters idea. It does not have to be the whole point of it.
I can think of several uses:
1) If you use only 2 of the images and change the angles, each eye could be getting a different image. Instant 3D. Nice.
2) This could be a first step if in later generations you can get more images. Imagine actually being able to look around things on your screen without having to manipulate the object with a mouse and keyboard.
I would point out- you all missed the OBVIOUS application
my car has a rear dvd player, with wireless headphones for the kids
imagine if they could watch their own programs-- their angle of view/location in the back seat
is vey quantifiable (if they aren't killing each other)
and if there is a third person in the middle-- voila!
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
As I only have two hands and two eyes, I prefere to be able to see the Microsoft BSOD from three different perspectives.
Maybe Computers will never be as intelligent as Humans.
For sure they won't ever become so stupid. [VR-1988]
Companies across the globe increase the number of workers per cubicle to three.
Oh sure, put MacOS on the right. This is a blatant attack on Mac users by Windows users to associate them with politics that many aren't familiar with. Come on everyone knows Mac users are liberal emo hippies. This is just insulting!
I'm shocked no-one has mentioned this yet. It's useful for ads. As you walk past an LCD your angle changes, thus exposing you to three distinct moving pictures. People are drawn to moving pictures - we're psychologically hard-wired for it. I suspect we will see these in the entrance to stores, at eye-level, because as we walk past the store, we will be drawn to the changing images and moving patterns. It's 10 seconds of attention that wasn't there before.
Imagine walking past a video-game store. As you walk past an LCD advertisement you see three different video games depending on your angle. Two of which may not be interesting. But that third, may. All done with one screen, saving money.
The compactness of one video-screen emphasizes the efficiency. Instead of having to avert our eyes to see another image we focus on the single screen, thus avoiding a clutter of LCD's, which has the school-of-fish impact, where we can't focus on any of them.
And, of course, everyone if fascinated with optical effects.
Rotate it from landscape to portrait.
Picture this technology on a screen that's wrapped around the outside of a cylinder. You could have an information kiosk that has a different image for every person that's standing around it. If the images were that of a virtual tour guide, the guide could point things out in 360 degrees, yet it would still be tailored for each person looking at the screen.
Three different inputs on the same screen? I'd rather have a button (or CTRL key sequence) to switch between them rather than having to move my head or the screen. Hell, I'd rather just have three screens, then I wouldn't have to do a damn thing other than shift my eyes. I don't really see any practical use in this, other than the whole "make people beside you think you're doing something else" thing, which really isn't all that useful.
Also, someone else mentioned the "bleed" factor. If the side images bleed onto the center image, it's going to be painful to look at. Look at a monitor that has an image burned into the screen. It'd be something like that, only it'd be two images burned into it, and they could possibly be constantly changing. It's a headache/siezure waiting to happen.
I don't think this will catch on at all, other than with people who constantly feel the need to show off their latest gadget.
Everything I say is a lie. Except that... and that... and that, and that, and that, and that... and that.
Hang on .. the lay out is all wrong. I thought that Linux was ultra left wing (bunch of no good commies trying to subvert the place), OS-X was just plain ol' left wing (long haired weirdos, but at least they *sell* their software) and Windows was Right Wing (Where do you want your goverment to go to today?)
So how do you get at least a four view version of the screen?
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
Of course, it won't be long before a researcher uses this technology to create a *miniscule* parallax of a few degrees, each displaying the information your eyes would need to form a three-dimensional image.
The monitor could be calibrated for the distance you typically sit away from the monitor, and replicate what your eyes already do: glean 3D information from the difference in each eye's POV.
Think: Fully 3D FPS games.
Think: fully-immersive desktop UIs which can take advantage of that "z" dimension.
Just use desktop multiplier
I'd think that it would be Windows on the right, MacOS in the center, and Linux on the left. :>
So connect three computers to the LCD and from the center you see Windows, Linux from the left and MacOS from the right.
I've got a KVM switch that does the same thing. Cost $20, if I remember correctly. :)
"So connect three computers to the LCD and from the center you see Windows, Linux from the left and MacOS from the right."
That should read Linux on the center.
This already exists; the predecessor to this technology in TFA was a display that showed two images, one to each eye. I've never used it but according to some other comments from people who have, it was rather low resolution and caused a lot of eyestrain.
Makes sense, seeing as how with that kind of parallax, you'd need to keep your nose basically right along the midline axis of the screen; if you got even a few degrees off, you'd be seeing just the image designed for one eye (and at half the normal resolution).
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
A friend showed me a laptop using (I think) identical technology. This technology is wonderful because with just dual-pictures using their method, you get stereoscopic (3D) vision without the glasses. Instead of showing from different angles, the system (using the parallax method) striates the field of vision. Effectively if you move your face over a few inches it will reverse which image is delivered to which eye.
What bites is that you only see half the pixels (thus you need double the pixels for the same amount of resolution). In addition, when you enable the 2d mode the screen becomes considerably dimmer (because you have half the light coming out per eye.
So while you might not benefit from the tri-screen, you can see (har har) the benefits of this kind of technology.
Next: a location chip implanted in your head so your personal desktop can follow you around.
Ahh, now I finally understand this headline: Linux thrives in left-leaning Kerala
You'll have 1 desk, one 13" monitor, with three programmers crowded around it.
An the PHB will have a 36" monitor to himself for freecell.
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
This will certainly breathe new life into multi-angle porn DVD's.
Can this technology be used to display the SAME image on all three sides, to greatly enhance the viewing angle? -Matt
It's clearly intended for ultra extreme programming: one wide desk and three keyboards. The programmers on the left and right write the code and the person in the center works on continous merges of the best ideas. A fourth back seat drivers continuously runs from left to right giving directions and asking why they aren't just checking the UML.
Programmers in mirror are brighter than they appear
why not have a camera that tracks say, a sticker on your forehead, and adjusts the monitor's angles so that the parallax shift between your eyes can be used to emulate 3D via tricking the eye into seeing depth? VR without a headset!
I want my left eye to see one image and my right eye to see another, with my brain merging the views for a true 3D effect.
Work on the left side to throw off your boss, goat porn on the right side to throw off your co-workers, and alt.fan.star-trek.wesley-crusher.furry.erotica on the centre where nobody else will ever see it.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Imagine the breathtaking possibilities this opens! Is the world truly ready for technology that can present an entire Burma Shave ad...in one sign?
Maybe this have some similarities with Perlins' autoStereo Display. (Warning: java applet). Also check out the other great applets from Mr.Perlin: http://mrl.nyu.edu/~perlin/
Is this
I think alot of people are missing the point. You won't use this for three seperate systems. You can use mirrors on the left and right to make 1 LCD panel become a three monitor system. This could lower the cost of multi monitor systems.
Ad eundum quo nemo ante iit!
I think everyone has missed it. How annoying is playing halo or any other multiplayer game on a console when the screen splits into 3 or 4 sections too small to see? If a console develops the ability to show each person's screen at a different angle, everyone gets to have their cake and eat it to. Personally I'm excited.
Probably no where near there yet, but this is a step toward a 'no glasses required' three dimensional display.
You're mean. I couldn't find that on google groups.
Me: Wow! Imagine! With this thing, you could... errrm... Well, it's ALMOST useful.
Yet another breakout innovative ground-breaking breakthrough? (YABIGBB is a terrible acronym, though)
Please stop stalking me, bro.
Besides, I think everyone would prefer to have huge display for a single computer rather than three computer with a single display. And with an intel Mac, you already can run OS X, Linux and Windows on the same computer.
I can imagine that some people might be able to come up with real good uses for such a display (ATMs, etc) but for the desktop I don't see the point.
Great, I thought we had space problems at work before - now they're going to crowd three of us around one monitor.
5 for use of the word Hogwash - which really needs to make a comeback. and 5 for thinking of glass mirrors *after* those made of metal. In all, a very satisfying post. Will you stay with us for the bonus round?
this
So, could this be the first step towards 3D screens? Like lenticular printing, your left eye sees an image from one angle and the right eye sees another.
"So while driving you can see the GPS navigation your kid at the backseat can enjoy Ace Combat on his PS2 while your wife in the passenger seat checks out tourist sites and restaurants all in full-screen view."
In that specific circumstance, it makes a great deal of sense as you have limited space, predictable viewing locations and a fairly small number of reasonable applications, few of which require full UXGA resolution and practically none of which require the full refresh available. When gfx hardware routinely spits out 80+fps, cutting it down to 24fps/view wouldn't drop any perceptible quality in a small-screen in-car context. Hell, fps for GPS might as well be measured in spf. It also makes sense that you could force the left-hand view to never display the television/dvd/game source while moving, but allow it for the right-hand view (or vice-versa depending on location). As for resolution, on a small in-car screen, cutting a 1920x1200 line output into 640x1200...that's plenty for a damned dashboard display. It's more than sufficient for GPS and better than NTSC, so for the purposes intended, it's just being more efficient with available resources in an environment where space and power are precious.
As if cubicles aren't small enough, now PHB's can gather six workers on a hex shaped table (three to a side) where each user shares the screen with two others. The only perceivable wall dividing anything now would be the one splitting the two halves of the hexagon.
What's next, pizza slice shaped post-it notes to fit comfortably within the confines of the hexlet table?
Wow, just think what might have happened if Sharp had used this in their other 'no glasses required' 3D displays (http://www.sharp3d.com/), wait a minute... (sorry about the sarcasm, try following the link)
Presentations: Your audience (on left and center) sees a full screen Keynote presentation. Your angle shows you the presenter notes, slide navigation, and a thumbnail of the "full screen" that they are seeing. Not great, but for audiences in a boardroom or cubicle, it'd be an improvement.
Differing subtitles: A German presentation offers viewers who may benefit from French subtitles to sit to the left, and English subtitles to sit on the right. Perhaps a marketing presentation gets a similar treatment with technical information on the left, and financial information on the right.
The device doesn't sound like it'd be a cost effective substitute for a KVM switch, but there are some areas three different, synchronized views would be beneficial. Of course increasing size and resolution would help even more, but that will certainly come.
A great use for this would be 3 players all playing the same game (say, GoldenEye). Rather than split the main screen into almost useless subscreens, sit around this and all play together. Now what game console manufacturer will be clever enough to support this with their console first?
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
No, it's a step away from 3D displays: this is 3D display technology modified for a wider angle.
Furthermore, this approach to 3D is not holographic; it doesn't give you correct motion parallax.
I think this would be a perfect display to watch Rashomon :)
How about using that technology to extend the viewing angle of ONE image? How useful could it be, let me stand up and move to the left and now i see another image... woo!
This would be great to use for the upcoming elections in the US. One could actually see out of which side of their mouths the politicians are really speaking! Of course, it wouldn't cover the times when they're talking out their asses.
Left - Visual studio
;)
Right - Word, writing something important
Center - World of Warcraft
Nothing like reaching lv60 and get paid for it boys...
One potential application for this that I think could be exciting would be having providing different input to each eye (using a screen that displayed only two images). This would allow people to see 3-d images without having to train their eyes to stare straight ahead into different screens, which is difficult for lazy-eyed people like me.
This should read:
Linux on the left, Mac OS X in the center, and Windows on the right.
It only costs FOUR times as much a single monitor....
That's what I meant about Seconds-Per-Frame as opposed to Frames-Per-Second with GPS. If that refreshed once ever three seconds, it would probably go without notice. Hell, most of the OEM installs flip to a static screensaver after a 15s or so while driving, since even watching a moving map is of questionable safety, thus effectively dropping the necessary refresh on that panel to zero.
Combine this triple-monitor with the three-button keyboard from the other post, and you use them for some kind of über You Don't Know Jack .
Generating text with a Markov process and posting it to a forum was first done 20 years ago. You're not doing anything new and you're not impressing anyone. Please stop it.
I think its safe to postulate that a good portion of Mac users are liberal hippy emo types (myself included). Given this, shouldn't OSX belong on the left side, and Windows on the right? :)
So connect three computers to the LCD and from the center you see Windows, Linux from the left and MacOS from the right.
Three computers? What a waste. We have virtualization these days.
Hang a mirror off each side and mirror views 1 and 3 and you get a wraparound 3 screen perspective for the price of one monitor and two mirrors. This would be great for immersive games where you want to look out your left or right window.
When I read about this, my assumption was that it would correct the viewing angle problem. Everyone keeps talking about three different sources, why not have the same source in all three angles. This would be really nice for TV systems and would solve viewing angle brightness issues.
Too bad that picture they show is CG/Photoshoped. The give-away are the reflections on the table. While the wooden frame reflects the color on the table, notice how the dog on the center screen just shows up black in its reflection, which means that was just a black screen when the picture was taken, and they added afterwards three images. Actually the dog should have shown up even brighter in its reflection in the table than the wood as the screen is emissive.
This pic is misleading and implies this screen is vaporware. Any profesional article should have indicated it's an artist's rendering. I'll believe that screen exists when I see it.
Wouldn't that be MS Windows on the right, Mac OSX on the left, and Linux in the middle? :-p
Mike Scanlon
Sorry but I had to bust your balls on this one for the not-so-original idea.
from the center you see Windows, Linux from the left and MacOS from the right.
Personally I think Linux belongs on the center, and MacOS on the left. Let those on the right express their love of big business via Windows.
Here's another use: Pass out the bluetooth earphones. The whole family is sitting on the couch. All of a sudden, fighting for the remote is no longer a problem. No one has to move to different rooms to catch their shows. Who knows, people might even interact with each other again!
Jon
The Philips displays released last year October have 9 views and those are used to create 3D as explained here: http://www.business-sites.philips.com/3dsolutions/ 3dtechnology/multiviewlenticulardisplay/index.html
Windows on the RIGHT. Mac on the LEFT. Linux in the middle.
So here's the idea I had since first hearing about their bi-directional screens. I probably should have patented it, but I've no money and I'd get torn to bits in court anyways, so if Sharp's reading this, just cut me a nice fat check and we're even! Anyhoo, this is what you do with this tech: 1. Make a box 1/3 the size of a widescreen T.V. horizontally. 2. Stick one of these bad boys of said size into it. 3. Stick it into a corner, slap mirrors on the walls that come right up to the edge of the screen, and hey presto! It's a massive single wide-screen T.V. that fits into any room, as it's 1/3 smaller than a T.V. of equivalent screen size. 4. Profit. 5. Where's my check??? Made a /. account finally, just for this post, so y'all better give up some karma love for this, or else you won't get any of my fat check.
Probably not, government workers aren't that smart.
Mod me down too, you bastards!
They have an image on them which animates when you view it at different angles.
The latest incarnation I have seen on this is the "sublimonal"(sic) ads on mall kiosks for Sprite.
And how about that "monster house" movie poster, where a house appears to eat a child when one walks by the display?
There was another movie before that which showed a house flying through interstellar space - darned if I can t remember the name of the movie - but the poster was quite attention-getting.
This is a simple plastic lenticular screen overlaying a photo which has vertical strips of three images side by side, and which strip gets refracted to the viewer is determined by what angle the viewer sees it from.
Just seeing this article, and knowing how a LCD display does have a precise vertical pixel alignment and spacing - leads me to believe this whole thing is nothing more than placing a lenticular plastic lens of appropriate interstripe spacing on top of the LCD, thus yielding three low-resolution displays instead of one higher resolution displays.
The ones I have seen have always had a lot of "bleeding" from one image to another if you did not view it at one of the exact angles that refracted one particular vertical strip... which didn't make much difference when viewing an animated sequence.
Ihe idea of multilingual subtitles ( already suggested ) appears to me to be one of the best uses, as one could merely change his angle of viewing to get the language of choice.
If you know someone who works at a movie theater, they might be able to give you one of the old posters ( upon which you quickly remove the useful lenticular film to play with, and look at the actual poster to see how the lens array would refract the strips printed on the poster to the viewer.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
I remember a Popular Science article about a similar invention many years ago. I believe it was Toshiba that patented lenticular lenses for allowing a monitor to project different images in different directions. It was for a 3d display - one image per eye. It was in a popular science article way back, in the late 80's/early 90's.
Welcome our hideously disfigured three-eyed multi-tasking overlords!
This thing would be great for multiplayer gaming on consoles. The days of sitting 4 inches from the TV so you can make out what's happening in your quarter of the split-screen would be well and truly over. This seems like the most useful application to me (now maybe we can convince Rare to finally do a decent sequel to Goldeneye)
Read Pynchon.
If the difference in angle is such that each eye could receive a different image, than this technology could be used to implement a simple 3D display. I've heard that there are already some simple 3d displays. Does anyone know if this technology would be better or worse than that that already exists.
I guess I'm the only person that noticed this was a first real step towards truly digital camouflage.
Combine this with the flexible screens coming out add a couple cameras and project from behind you in front and vice versa then switch left to right.
From above and below you are perfectly visible. Lateral viewing would have anomalies but would be magnitudes better than current static imagery.
Think of it as the difference between static shadows painted on textures in first person shooters compared to using shaders.
Remember the eye sees motion first, shape second, color third. A flexible, multi-axis viewable screen would play total havok with the eye's ability to focus and identify.
Disclaimer: I worked at SLE, but no longer work there.
I worked opposite these guys for a year, and saw some of the early tech demos (mid-2005). The technology is not as simple as you describe, and the boundaries where you can see both images were very narrow, even in the rudimentary prototypes I saw.
Pirate Party UK
After seeing the description, and recalling the disassembly of my childhood toys, I put two and two together to form my best guess on how this thing worked.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
In the 90s I saw a demo of a single-pane eyeglass-free steroscopic display, made by Dimension Technologies in Rochester NY. Here's one of their patents: http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/6040807.html
At the time, CRTs with LCD shutter glasses were cheaper, and better for screen size and resolution. But the eyeglass-free feature was remarkable.
I see the company is still around and still markets 2D/3D displays. http://www.dti3d.com/content/view/22/89/