philip lelyveld The world of entertainment technology

Nielsen Research Shows Differences Between Boomers, Millennials

Nielsen has released a report entitled “The Me Generation Meets Generation ME,” which explore the media consumption habits of the Boomers and Millennials, two sought-after audiences for ad dollars representing approximately the same number of consumers.

Baby Boomers (born between 1946 and 1964) control 70 percent of disposable income in the United States, in contrast to Millenials (born between 1977 and 1994) who are increasingly burdened by student loans ...

Nielsen also says its NeuroFocus research gives insight into how the changes that come with age affect the efficacy of communication. This is most marked beginning in the mid-50s, when distraction suppression mechanisms are weakened.

http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/newswire/2013/the-me-generation-meets-generation-me.html

Read the full report here: http://www.tvtechnology.com/article/nielsen-research-shows-differences-between-boomers-millenials-/219998 

Lensless Camera Takes Multiple-View Pictures

Earlier this month, we looked at a new kind of camera built at Bell Labs that creates pictures using no lenses and only a single pixel.  This lensless design is simple and easy to construct and suffers none of the aberrations usually associated with lenses—indeed none of the scene is out of focus.  So it’s easy to imagine that lensless cameras are threatening to change the way we think about imaging.

Today Hong Jiang and pals from Bell Labs show off another capability of their new design. The original camera makes an ordinary image with a single pixel. Jiang and co show how, with two pixels, it’s possible to create two different images of the scene.

Just where we’ll see practical applications of this kind of camera isn’t yet clear. But people who photograph slow-moving objects with expensive gear ought to be particularly interested. Since the lens or mirror is the most expensive part of any telescope—particularly space telescopes–perhaps astronomers will be first in the queue.

Read the full story here: http://www.technologyreview.com/view/516351/lensless-camera-takes-multiple-view-pictures/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20130625

Sony showcases new high-res 4K TV tech by planting tiny adverts on Wimbledon tennis player

Part of this year’s Wimbledon is being filmed for the first time in 4k Ultra HD, with Sony’s F55 35mm 4K and an NEX-FS700 camera providing up to four times greater resolution than that of standard HD. This means you should be able to see Keothavong sporting Sony ads on the hem of her skirt, shoelaces, fingernails and equipment.

See the full story here: http://thenextweb.com/media/2013/06/24/sony-showcases-its-new-high-res-4k-tv-tech-by-planting-tiny-adverts-on-wimbledon-tennis-player/

ESPN CTO: It’s Too Early to Make Big Bets on 4K TV

“Right now I have too many cogs between the two ends of this ecosystem. I’ve got a camera and I’ve got a TV set,” he said. “There’s still a lot of things to figure out before we can say we’re going to be playing in this space or not yet. We’re actively looking [at 4K], but I can’t tell you I have a date in mind.”

See the full story here: http://www.c2meworld.com/distributiondelivery/espn-cto-its-too-early-to-make-big-bets-on-4k-tv/

Why a 3-D Printer Giant Stratasys Just Bought MakerBot

[Philip Lelyveld comment; this units a bottom-up amateur solution with a high end multi-material system.]

The Brooklyn-based 3-D printer startup MakerBot Industries just got a little less hip, sinceannouncing yesterday that it had sold for $403 million in stock to Stratasys. The public company, founded in 1989 and based in Minnesota and Israel, is one of the two large manufacturers of expensive, industrial machines. It competes with 3D Systems, which already has a consumer 3D printer line.

What’s important to note, either way, is that consumer models have a ways to go before they can be broadly useful to most people (see “What Yoda Taught me About 3-D Printing”), and now the two companies together may be in the best position to make that happen.

See the full story here: http://www.technologyreview.com/view/516341/why-a-3-d-printer-giant-just-bought-makerbot/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20130621

Silicon Beach’s Hidden Advantage: More Talent?

According to recruiters, it's because Silicon Beach doesn't have the giant employee vacuum cleaners in the form of Google, Microsoft, Facebook, and many others, who apparently in recent years have made it very difficult to attract employees to startups.

That means--at least, according to the talk in the hallways--that Silicon Beach actually has a talent advantage over Silicon Valley, further bolstered by the fact that non-engineering skills--particularly in the area of graphics and web design skills and business development--have become so just as important as pure technical skills in making a company successful.

Read the full story here: http://www.socaltech.com/silicon_beach_s_hidden_advantage_more_talent_/s-0049943.html

Technicolor’s Color Certified Program ensures consistency across displays (video)

[Philip Lelyveld comment: Beyond see the real color of the object you are buying, a driver of this program is to deliver the 'director's original intent' to people watching movies and TV shows. There may someday even be a 'directors' setting on your display.]

There's THX certification for TVs, ensuring potential buyers that they'll get solid home-theater visuals, so why shouldn't there be an equivalent for your gadgets' displays? Technicolor, along with software company Portrait Displays, is stepping up to the plate with a new standard for guaranteeing hue quality across PC and mobile panels. The Technicolor Color Certified Program will award screens that meet its requirements with a seal -- or logo, as it were -- of approval. What are the qualifications, you ask? Technicolor's spec is based on software from Portrait Displays, which works with OEMs to fine-tune screens for color accuracy. For the end user, the result should be consistent tones across all certified devices either automatically or when the Technicolor color setting is enabled for specific programs or apps. Head past the break for our eyes-on impressions.

Read the full story here: http://www.engadget.com/2013/06/12/technicolor-color-certified-program/

E3 Entertainment Technology Highlights

By Philip Lelyveld

The Oculus Rift fully immersive head mounted display was being demo'd with 3D games.  In one game, trees attack you if you are not looking at them.  This highlights the Oculus Rift's competitive strength of low latency.  You can turn your head quickly and the image tracks with the motion sufficiently to not make you disoriented.

Zeiss was showing their latest version of the Cinemizer head mounted display.  It uses a pair of 800X500 resolution OLED displays.  The images look great.  The glasses are easy to focus.  The demo game responded well to rapid head movement.  However, at a price point in the neighborhood of $700 - twice the price that Oculus Rift currently  targets, a much narrower field of view, and without the Oculus Rift's community of developers creating games and applications, Zeiss faces an uphill battle marketing this hardware even though it can be used with many existing games as a peripheral device.

The Disney Infinity game environment integrates physical collectables with online creativity and gameplace.  Kids can buy 3 kinds of objects, character action figures, power discs, and play set hexagons.  Each object has an RF tag in it.  When placed on the game pad, they activate the characters, powers, and play sets (ex. vehicles) in the game.  Up to four kids can play at once in this child-safe walled garden online environment.  A major selling point is that aside from normal gameplay, the gamers can build and manipulate the world and game that they are in.  With the flip of a play set hexagon, one player can change the nature of the world for all the other players in their group.  And like an organic tetras game, each person can change out objects and topography around the other players.

App Annie wants to be the Neilsen business intelligence source for the App community.  Using proprietary resources and algorithms, they can provide market research data by type of App, individual App title, geographic region, and other parameters.  (www.appannie.com/evolution)

Corning’s Gorilla Glass Is Coming to Cars Next

The strong glass that is used in 1.5 billion consumer electronic devices worldwide could soon help make more fuel-efficient, quieter cars.

"Using Gorilla Glass would help reduce a vehicle’s weight and lower its center of mass, boosting fuel economy by up to a few percentage points depending on how much of the glass is used, according to Corning senior vice president Jeffrey Evenson..."

See the full story here: http://www.technologyreview.com/view/515921/cornings-gorilla-glass-is-coming-to-cars-next/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20130611

Quantifying Movie Magic with Google Search

Based on 99 of the top 2012 box office hits, Google identified the following about the way people search for movies:
1) The decision to see a movie is a very highly-considered research process.
2) Trailer-related search trends four weeks out from a movie release provide strong predictive power for opening weekend box office revenue.
3) Opening weekend prediction modeling shows high correlation between search volume/paid click volume and box office revenue.
4) Moviegoers search differently for big movie releases.
5) Forty-eight percent of moviegoers decide what film to watch the day they purchase their ticket.

“In the seven day window prior to a film’s release date, if a film receives 250,000 search queries more than a similar film, the film with more queries is likely to perform up to $4.3M better during opening weekend,” explains Chen. “When looking at search ad click volume, if a film has 20,000 more paid clicks than a similar film, it is expected to bring in up to $7.5M more during opening weekend.”

See the summary article here: http://adwords.blogspot.com/2013/06/quantifying-movie-magic-with-google.html

See the full research report here: http://www.google.com/think/research-studies/quantifying-movie-magic.html