DARPA's Urban Photonic Sandtable Display enables 3D battlefield planning without goofy glasses

You probably point and laugh at your friends when they have big, bulky 3D glasses perched on their noses in theaters. That kind of tomfoolery just won't do amongst the military brass, who frown at the slightest hint of snickering in the operations room. This new 3D system, called the Urban Photonic Sandtable Display (UPSD), should help. It's a DARPA project, a fully holographic table (no glasses required) that can be scaled up to six feet diagonally and allows visual depth of up to 12-inches. The technology comes courtesy of Zebra Imaging, which earlier wowed us with some insane 3D printouts, and the data will come from LIDAR systems like this ROAMS bot. No word on when the system will be deployed to the field, but it should allow grizzled commanders and uppity businessmen to find unobtanium deposits, even if they happen to be located right under a big 'ol tree.

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DARPA SUCCESSFULLY COMPLETES 3D HOLOGRAPHIC DISPLAY TECHNOLOGY DEMONSTRATION PROGRAM

March 24, 2011

Many of today's conflicts occur in urban settings, making the ability to visualize conditions in urban areas increasingly important to commanders and mission planners. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) recently completed a five-year program called Urban Photonic Sandtable Display (UPSD) that creates a real-time, color, 360-degree 3D holographic display to assist battle planners. Without having to wear 3D goggles or glasses, a team of planners can view a large-format, interactive 3D display. Until now, two-dimensional, high-resolution flat panel color displays and 3D static monochrome images have been the most advanced visual planning tools available.

UPSD assists team-based mission planning, visualization and interpretation of complex 3D data such as intelligence and medical imagery. It permits simultaneous viewing for up to 20 participants and is interactive, allowing the image to be frozen, rotated and zoomed up to the resolution limit of the data. The holographic display enables full visual depth capability up to 12 inches. The technology also enables realistic two-dimensional printouts of the 3D imagery that front line troops can take with them on missions.

UPSD is based on full-parallax technology, which enables each 3D holographic object to project the correct amount of light that the original object possessed in each direction, for full 360- degree viewing. Current 3D displays lack full-parallax and only provide 3D viewing from certain angles with typically only three to four inches of visual depth.

Presently UPSD is a scalable display platform that can be expanded from a six-inch diagonal size up to a six-foot diagonal, in both monochrome and color formats.

UPSD is part of DARPA's broader efforts in 3D technology research. DARPA recently demonstrated a wide-area 3D LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) mapping capability under DARPA's High Altitude LIDAR Operations Experiment (HALOE). HALOE is providing forces in Afghanistan with unprecedented access to high-resolution 3D data, collected at rates orders of magnitude faster and from much longer ranges than conventional methods. UPSD's 3D display can support the rapid exploitation of this data for detailed mission planning in rugged, mountainous and complex urban terrain.

DARPA is initially transitioning the UPSD technology to an Air Force research center and two Army research centers to apply the technology to critical applications where the 3D holographic display will provide a unique benefit.

Zebra Imaging of Austin, Texas, was awarded the initial contract in 2005 and has researched and developed the technology.

Eyez video recording glasses promise to 'revolutionize' social networking

Could this pair of relatively normal looking glasses "revolutionize" video on social networking sites? That's the bold claim made by the folks behind these so-called "Eyez," at least, which unsurprisingly seem to be filled more with vapor than any actual hardware at the moment. If the company is to be believed, however, they'll eventually pack a built-in camera that's able to record 1080p video, 16GB of flash memory, WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity, and a 350 mAh lithium ion battery that promises three hours of recording on a charge. You'll even apparently be able to pair the glasses with your phone via Bluetooth, and automatically upload or even stream live video to various social networking sites via an app. Of course, there's not even so much as a hint of a release date or a price, nor is there any evidence that an actual prototype even exists. There is, however, dramatic music on a Flash-heavy website -- and that counts for something, right?

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"Eyez™ Will Revolutionize Video on Facebook, YouTube, and LiveStream"

ZionEyez LLC is proud to unveil "Eyez™," the latest innovation in social media technology. Eyez™ are HD video recording eyeglasses that allow users to easily broadcast live, mobile, hands-free video footage to their preferred social networking site.

Seattle, WA (PRWEB) March 7, 2011

Eyez™ embeds an HD 1080p video camera within the frame of the eyeglasses to record live video data. The recorded data can be stored to the 16GB of flash memory within the Eyez™ glasses, transferred via Bluetooth or Micro USB to a computer, or wirelessly transferred to most iPhone or Android devices. After a one-time download of the "Eyez™" smartphone and tablet app, users can wirelessly broadcast the video in real time to their preferred social networking website.

"Sharing personal experiences online will no longer be a written status update and a few photos, but a full length HD video journal," said ZionEyez LLC co-founder Brent Burroff. "Eyez™ gives people the ability to share the world as they see it in real time, from a truly first person perspective, without compromising convenience or style."

Currently, the most popular way to record mobile video is via smartphone or digital camera. However, while the online social network platforms are excellent for receiving the video, physically recording the video remains problematic. Many recorded video streams are short, largely because it is uncomfortable for users to continuously hold their cameras up for longer than a few minutes. Also, users are forced to watch the event they are recording through the miniature mobile phone screen, rather than enjoying the action as it unfolds in front of them.

Eyez™ solves both of these problems. Now users can comfortably broadcast live video completely hands-free, and without the burden of watching it through a tiny screen. Users can simply tap the power sensor, open the Eyez™ app, and then forget about it. Several networking sites, including Qik and LiveStream, will broadcast to users profiles' and save the videos to cloud storage. If users prefer not to broadcast the video to the internet or to their mobile, the data will automatically save to the built-in flash memory, allowing for an easy upload later via Micro USB or Bluetooth.

While employing cutting-edge technological advances, Eyez™ glasses are also practical for daily use. Users can choose from high quality removable lenses in both clear and shaded tones. In addition, the shape of Eyez™ glasses is extremely popular, so most optical stores can easily fit the appropriate prescription lenses.

"Eyez™ will be loved by everyone," says co-founder of ZionEyez LLC, Evan Lindquist. "Dad can broadcast his son's game-winning catch to out-of-town family members so they can all cheer him on in real time. Outdoor enthusiasts will finally be able to stream themselves kayaking, mountain climbing, or snowboarding. A college student can record lectures to study for an exam and then later that night capture the highlights of his campus party scene."

Social networking is constantly being reinvented as technology advances, and the future of live broadcasting online is finally breaking free from its constraints. The world is ready for social networking to take the next big leap into the future, and Eyez™ video recording glasses are at the forefront of this technological evolution.

Visit http://www.zioneyez.com for product details.

Eyez™ Pat. Pending