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Displays Technology

Future of Visual Gadgets Rolled Out 69

unassimilatible writes "A television sewn into your shirt sleeve. A dashboard screen to monitor the kids in the back seat. A 3-D computer monitor sharp enough to make a hardcore gamer's heart stop - or help a surgeon start one. The gizmo-packed exhibition hall at the Society for Information Display's international symposium offers a tantalizing vision of what's to come, AP reports (with some cool pics)."
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Future of Visual Gadgets Rolled Out

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  • by jwcorder ( 776512 ) on Monday May 31, 2004 @08:35AM (#9295845)
    "Dashboard screen to monitor kids in the back seat"....

    Whatever happened to just looking in the rear view mirror and trying to beat your kids with one arm while driving with the other...jeez...take all the fun out of it why don't ya...

    • by Anonymous Coward
      Just wait until they start putting tasers in the back seats and make the monitor a touchscreen. Now there is inivation.
    • and getting car sick? No thanks! I rather be starring at something that's not travelling at 100km/hour.
    • why doesnt Slashdot have a +1 Scary mod?

      Just yesterday I was riding with a friend in his car when we catch up to another car driving erratically in front of us...

      We both thought the driver was drunk, but when we got a chance to pass him, we saw a couple of kids bouncing on the back seat and the driver was doing just what you described.

    • I remeber the revelation that occured when I realised that if i sat in the very back seat as opposed to the regular back seat (in an old ford econovan) the old feller couldn't reach me with the possum stick from up front when my brother and I were fucking around in the back.

      When I think about it, that was probably my first real hack :)
    • "Don't make me come back there!"
  • Sounds Good (Score:4, Interesting)

    by lachlan76 ( 770870 ) on Monday May 31, 2004 @08:41AM (#9295872)
    But what would you use a tv on your jeans for?
    In any case I can't wait to get one of those 3D screens.
    One thing I would like to know is what would happen when you use the screen without the eye-tracking? Wouldn't it go out of focus or have an unnatural appearance when your head moves.
    Hopefully these obstacles will be overcome soon.
    • by Eccles ( 932 ) on Monday May 31, 2004 @09:12AM (#9296044) Journal
      But what would you use a tv on your jeans for?

      Flashers might use one when it's really cold...
    • Re:Sounds Good (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      One thing I would like to know is what would happen when you use the screen without the eye-tracking?

      If it includes headtracking then it would be possible to have holograms fixed at thier location. You could have a virtual objects (including TVs!) in your room positioned anywhere you want!
    • But what would you use a tv on your jeans for?

      And /. geeks modded this "Interesting?" Maybe they just had to use that one rather than the "Hey, I've got a notebook full of uses for this" mod choice.
  • by Anonymous Coward
    "In perhaps a year, SeeReal hopes it can offer a consumer version - ideal for video game enthusiasts - for about $500."

    translation: we need VCs to give us lots of money because all of the executives' Porsches are at least a year old
  • by t_allardyce ( 48447 ) on Monday May 31, 2004 @08:48AM (#9295910) Journal
    Ah this explains why all sci-fi space-ships have CRT monitors - around 2020 when lifting things into orbit cost almost nothing, new ships were built using ultra-cheap CRTs that everyone was throwing out to replace with all this new stuff. But that still doesnt explain why spock had to look down that blue screen-scope thing...

  • One of the sublinks from the article is for Wireless Monitors [sid.org]. While I didn't immediately see a practical use for such, it occurred to me that it would be an awesome way to reduce clutter on the desk. I'm there, where do I pay?

    • Re:I want one... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      This is a really bad idea! It uses 802.11a? Snoopers are going to have a field day with these. Tempest, eat your heart out.
  • Dashboard screens (Score:5, Insightful)

    by earthforce_1 ( 454968 ) <earthforce_1@yaho[ ]om ['o.c' in gap]> on Monday May 31, 2004 @09:01AM (#9295989) Journal

    You need a very long arm to reach the kids in the back of a minivan. Trust me, I know. Instead, I just shut off the power to their video game/DVD player when they start yelling at each other. Warn once, second time the power goes off.

    • by Speare ( 84249 )
      Instead, I just shut off the power to their video game/DVD player when they start yelling at each other.

      Of course, we don't need to remind you that your kids are growing up with video tubes mounted in front of them, instead of books or the passing scenery. How many hours of NTSC do your kids consume, anyway?


      • Great, another self professed expert (probably single) telling me how to handle my kids. No doubt you have never had to deal with three very bored young boys on a long trip. Games of I spy don't work very long, (especially if the oldest thinks it is something for little kids) and they certainly have no appreciation for scenery at that age, even if there was any. Reading makes them (and me) carsick, and stopping on the side of the road to clean up somebody' vomit certainly isn't fun. (Done that several t
    • by HarveyBirdman ( 627248 ) on Monday May 31, 2004 @10:57AM (#9296681) Journal
      Instead, I just shut off the power to their video game/DVD player when they start yelling at each other.

      Even better, install an airtight parition so you can cut off the oxygen when they act up. They'll either start to behave in exchange for a precious breath of life, or anoixa will eventually shut them up anyway.

  • If the eMagin gadget is sold cheap enough, it would be a great solution for portable media devices...

    Combine the eMagin with a video iPod, and I'll certainly use one during long trips on planes, trains and automobiles. Or even in bed.
  • by vijaya_chandra ( 618284 ) on Monday May 31, 2004 @09:49AM (#9296252)
    The best mode to read, as anyone would agree is paper-based, be it a book or a newspaper.

    The cheap displays that can be inserted into the newspapers with short clips for the different news items or some illustration (in case of a book) that start getting played as you flip through different sheets would be ultra-cool.

    (some spielberg movie already had a newspaper like this i guess)

    When would I (/can expect to) get a copy of such books/newspapers?
  • Only $75,000. I wonder if these plasmas and flat screens in general ever come down do a reasonable price? They don't seem to have fallen in price like most tech.

    • I know nothing about it, but it's my understanding that the high price of plasma displays is in large part caused by the fact that the manufacturing process is pretty hit and miss. For every one that comes out right, there's a couple that don't, so there is room for the price to come down eventually, provided they manage refine the process. But again, I don't have any source on this, I just seem to remember hearing it...
    • No. Plasma tvs are a horrible technology that degrades fairly rapidly with time (pixels dying off), and at best a stop-gap solution until OLEDs become mainstream, and Sony et al know this. Plasma is basically a "hey, look how much money I have" badge, and they will remain rediclously priced until OLEDs are big enough and reliable enough to replace them at the same prices. Then plasmas will be worth spit. OLEDs will drop in price though, as they'll be used for smaller tvs and pc monitors as well.
      • Actually, TV-sized plasma panels are expected to drop in price by a factor of 2 or 3 in the next year, as the low-end consumer electronics manufacturers get into volume production.

        The fabrication problem is tough. Plasma panels have a back part, with the electrodes and drive lines, and a front part, with the phosphors. These have to align within a fraction of a pixel. But, as is typical with manufacturing processes, slowly the problems are solved and the process becomes routine and reliable.

  • I really think we're asking for trouble if we start introducing these so-called 3D screens into common use.

    A childhood peppered with 3D glasses and stereoscopic dot images has done some exceedingly funny things with my eyes -- I often find myself looking at shelves in bookshops and chemists' and see the items on the shelves popping out at me.

    The reason? My brain has been trained to ignore the naturally-trained link between the focussing distance of the eyes' lenses and the angle my eyes are pointing at

    • If you are that concerned, consider seeing an opthamologist or something - but likely there is nothing wrong with your eyes.

      I was not raised on a steady diet of 3D - yeah, I played around with it - still do. My first computer, at age 10, was a TRS-80 Color Computer 2 with 16K - so that gives you a hint at my age, and where I was with dot stereographs, etc.

      That doesn't mean I didn't play around with such things, I did. I have seen the same effects as you have (ie, repeating patterns of items, like wallpaper

  • The military is looking into using BDUs that adapt to the invironment to better conceal the soldiers. Sort of James Bondish.
  • I've been seeing announcements of the next hot
    display thing coming out of SID for 15 years.
    I think people were starting to tout OLED
    and flexible displays and electronic ink
    about 10 years ago, and they're just now
    really gaining any momentum. Anybody remember
    FEDs?

    For some reason it takes an incredibly long time
    for these technologies to reach what I'd call
    mainstream volumes - maybe because CRT and
    TFT LCD have such a head start.
  • So what do I do when it's wrinkled? My wife still won't iron my clothes and I'm a helpless male when it comes to laundry!

    -Pete
  • A 3-D computer monitor sharp enough to make a hardcore gamer's heart stop

    now come on... we all know for which kind of "hardcore action" this will be used...

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