3D Hologram smartphone

[rufwoof]

Turn your Smartphone into a 3D Hologram

[eric52]

Right! That is incredibly cool. I guess it's a refraction offset effect that makes a 3D "trading card" with the mother images broadcast by phone. Wow!

[Geoffrey]

Wouldn't be 3d or a hologram, it's a four sided HUD.

A head-up display also known as a HUD—is any transparent display that presents data without requiring users to look away from their usual viewpoints.

[starhawk]

Just a lensing trick. Nifty parlor trick, but not (AFAIK) a hologram, I'm afraid.

IIRC, this contraption works off a similar principle to that old mirror dish that you put a penny into -- you know, it makes it look like the thing's in a different location so when you go to get it out all you grab is air.

Mildly amusing, fof sure -- but that's about as close to practical as it gets at that scale.

Now if you had a decent projector and scaled it up big... that's different you could do some useful things with it then, maybe.

EDIT: OK, I see exactly how this works. It relies on the fact that anything transparent is also somewhat reflective -- and you want something that gives you lots of glare here. What's happening is that the smartphone screen is acting as a low-power projector, and the image on the screen reflects off the angled clear acrylic (or whatever) plastic into your eyeballs. Your mind gets a little confused, at this point, because you can see a reflected image from the acrylic, but you can also see what's behind that acrylic -- so your brain concludes that the image you see is not, in fact, from the acrylic, but rather from the space behind it. That is how you get the "Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi" sort of effect. It's a little primitive in comparison, of course -- but it actually works.

I'll note that you have to get the acrylic at a near-exact 45deg angle to the screen, or you'll stretch or squash the image. (A higher angle toward vertical will stretch it, and closer to horizontal will squish it down.)

That said, I do see potential for this, if it can be scaled up, to be used as a sci fi display. "Fascinating!"

[eric52]

I don't think it's a reflect-through effect - a turning 360 rotating animation is shown. The angle of observation is always @45 to the pyramid faces, so that is important, but my money is combined with the high refractive index of plastic - what keeps the light inside fiber optic cable. I really suspect it's an enhancement of the 2D still on credit cards - not truly a hologram, but holographic in nature. It's true beauty is how simply it does so much with so little. It needs a Puppy barking in there!

[rufwoof]

Just a lensing trick. Nifty parlor trick, but not (AFAIK) a hologram, I'm afraid.

IIRC, this contraption works off a similar principle to that old mirror dish that you put a penny into -- you know, it makes it look like the thing's in a different location so when you go to get it out all you grab is air.

Mildly amusing, fof sure -- but that's about as close to practical as it gets at that scale.

Now if you had a decent projector and scaled it up big... that's different you could do some useful things with it then, maybe.

EDIT: OK, I see exactly how this works. It relies on the fact that anything transparent is also somewhat reflective -- and you want something that gives you lots of glare here. What's happening is that the smartphone screen is acting as a low-power projector, and the image on the screen reflects off the angled clear acrylic (or whatever) plastic into your eyeballs. Your mind gets a little confused, at this point, because you can see a reflected image from the acrylic, but you can also see what's behind that acrylic -- so your brain concludes that the image you see is not, in fact, from the acrylic, but rather from the space behind it. That is how you get the "Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi" sort of effect. It's a little primitive in comparison, of course -- but it actually works.

I'll note that you have to get the acrylic at a near-exact 45deg angle to the screen, or you'll stretch or squash the image. (A higher angle toward vertical will stretch it, and closer to horizontal will squish it down.)

That said, I do see potential for this, if it can be scaled up, to be used as a sci fi display. "Fascinating!"

This guy scaled the smartphone up to using a TV https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bpp5k0AXNTA
You can better see how the four images around the somewhat V shaped acrylics align to reflect those images towards the central 'focal point'.

Here's another - July 2013 first ever holographic presentation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLavoahAfv8

[rufwoof]

This one is amazing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=droAANtDzB0 as it combines the projection with body motion interaction/control. Touch screen - without the screen.

[eric52]

Once again cool overcomes the law of diminishing returns.

[rufwoof]

In the V shaped arrangement there are four images involved, the image in effect comes out straight from the flat base (smartphone) until it encounters its respective flat plastic sheet that is at 45 degrees, and the light is redirected, to converge with the other four images also being redirected towards the central focal point. That entails the images being on the outside.

You could have a central projection arrangement at a central point, directly below the focal point, directed towards plastic sheets that redirected to a focal point above the projection (smartphone), which would make the system more usable/compact, especially if combined with motion detection. i.e. a phone with more of a pea sized central unit that projected four (or however many) images towards four (or whatever) plastic sheets that could be raised to a fixed/locked position, that provided a central focal 3D like image that could be manipulated (by the motion sensing element).

Background light would be a issue (best used in a dark setting), that that might be addressed by having a lift up arrangement where the four sheets also had a black cover/background - which would also serve to offer the user some privacy. A bit like a lift up tent with viewing only possible from one direction. Flexible enough to fold down to a very small (pocket/zippo-lighter) sized package, tablet sized perhaps when unfolded/opened up with user control via voice and hand gestures applied to a 3D type image.

Something like a 3D version of this 2D image (created using Libre Calc)