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Realtime ASCII Goggles

Posted by kdawson on from the through-crt-colored-spectacles dept.

jabjoe writes "Russian artists from Moscow have created goggles with realtime image filtering. Among the Photoshop-like filters that can be applied is, interestingly, ASCII: you can view the world in real time as ASCII. Pointless but cool."

13 of 331 comments (clear)

  1. How long until... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    someone shoots an ASCII art porno using these things? The Internet is for porn, after all.

  2. more obscure reference by Alzheimers · · Score: 2, Interesting

    But will they show you recreations of the death scenes of famous celebrities based on GPS coordinates?

  3. What happens if.... by Hanners1979 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    What happens if you watch ASCII Star Wars through the ASCII goggles?

  4. Stereo by badfringe · · Score: 2, Interesting

    It would be better if there were stereo cameras, and different video going to each eye. I can only guess at the sort of eye strain you'd get with this and ascii mode. Better still, different processing modes in each eye!

  5. Synthetic Reality Interface Device Prototype. by TheLazySci-FiAuthor · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Its current configuration may be somewhat useless, but there is a point to goggles which allow overlay. This is essentially synthetic reality. It is my thoughts that soon "goggles" like these will be as common as bluetooth headsets are now - though they will probably be glasses rather than goggles (or perhaps even contacts, eventually).

    I don't need to list the plethora of uses for synthetic reality, but even in this nascent stage I could see the ability to increase and decrease contrast as useful - perhaps in searching around for something lost.

    This is simply algorithms being applied to a video - with object recognition the potential is large.

    --
    Read my Very Short "Stories"
    1. Re:Synthetic Reality Interface Device Prototype. by filterban · · Score: 2, Interesting
      Vernor Vinge's book "Rainbow's End" exists in the near future, and the use of contacts in the method you describe has become ubiquitous.

      In fact, he discusses how without the special contacts, most of the world is very plain and drab - lots of whites and greys, not much art - but when you use contacts, it becomes a fantasy world full of color, art, and beauty.

      --
      rm -rf /
  6. Videolan has ascii output by DrXym · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Sad but true - you can watch movies in Videolan as rendered into ASCII. You'll find the option by opening the Preferences dialog, checking the "Advanced Options" checkbox, clicking on Output Modules, and selecting "Color ASCII art video output".

    Cool but rather useless.

    BTW for me at least, the OpenGL driver delivers a far better image under Vista than DirectX. Don't know if this is DRM related or not but the quality is far better.

  7. No computer or OS? by Dan+East · · Score: 2, Interesting

    In the video the guy says there is no computer or operating system. Maybe its all embedded, but obviously it has a CPU running their software.

    As far as being just a toy, this thing could actually be quite useful. It could be used to enhance vision, sort of like Geordi's visor in Star Trek. It could display things outside of human vision, or amplify small differences to make them more apparent. Of course it could be used for night vision too. Personally, I would be interested in the hardware if I write my own software / filters for it. The point is, with this type of augmented vision, the sky's pretty much the limit. Imagine if it was OCRing what you look at real-time, so that you could look at something, and the system could display additional information about uncommon words (nouns like place names, product names, etc).

    How about the Photosynth demo Microsoft did, where they would take many 2D images of buildings, and reconstruct them in 3D, allowing the user to zoom in in massive detail (if someone had taken photos of that particular place). If that type of image recognition could be done real-time to match what you are currently looking at, then you could look at the inside of a building without entering it. Or zoom in or out, or pan or change your POV entirely, without actually moving your body.

    Dan East

    --
    Better known as 318230.
  8. Pointless? Useless? I Think Not by eldavojohn · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Pointless but cool. Whoever wrote that doesn't have much imagination for application.

    The thing that impressed me was I believe I saw a standard Sobel operator filter that extracts lines based on the derivatives of a pixel and its neighbors. Now in computer vision oftentimes this is used to simplify complex scenes so that region/structural analysis can be done.

    You know when you're developing computer vision applications for robots, it sure would help to be able to code an algorithm & take it outside to test it against different light sources and scenarios so you get an idea of what needs to be tweaked.

    Plus if your robots have hardware restrictions, this system can enforce them to give you an idea of realtime lag.

    I could see this being a very valuable tool in the realms of academia & robotics. I realize the original idea is for ACII art, as mentioned, but there are some real applications here.
    --
    My work here is dung.
  9. Anyone watch Serial Experiments Lain? by GammaKitsune · · Score: 2, Interesting

    There's a moderately batty man who wanders through the streets with a setup that looks exactly like this. He's trying to remain permanently connected to cyberspace, or something to that effect. Not sure if anyone will know what I'm talking about, though. :)

    --
    Gamertag: WyleType
  10. Re:One camera only... by ShinmaWa · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Try spending a day wearing an eyepatch or something, and it'll quickly become apparent why two eyes are better than one. While you are almost certainly right, you'd be amazed how well the mind adapts in such situations. I have no depth perception at all. Zip, zero, none. I can't throw or catch with any semblance of accuracy at all. You'll never find me in the NBA or the NFL. However, for every day activities such as opening doors, driving a car, maneuvering a staircase, and even playing pool/billiards, I'm just fine. I don't find it a hindrance at all for every day activities because my mind has adapted to compensate for my lack of depth perception.
    --
    The /. Effect: Thousands of users simultaneously accessing a site to not read its content.
  11. Re:ASCII and thou shalt receive by sYkSh0n3 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I would like to take this time to apologize for my previous post. I think I may have over medicated this morning.

    As for the goggles, real time ASCII could be interesting. I remember seeing a website a while back that had the entire movie Debbie Does Dallas in ASCII. I can't imagine looking around and seeing the whole world like that.

    I do have to wonder if it would be like looking at an image of what was in front of you, or if it would look more 3d like in the end of the matrix movie... either way, it would be interesting to get to play with them.

  12. Re:Pointless? Useless? I Think Not by loftwyr · · Score: 2, Interesting

    More interesting is the application of networked versions of the goggles, it would be then possible to have the field of vision wireframed and allow for many different kinds of detection techniques.

    It would also make playing lasertag or paintball much easier...