BBC tests ‘3D sound’
Engineers at the BBC are currently beavering away designing new 3D audio technologies. Soon, we will be able to enjoy our favourite radio and TV programmes in glorious three-dimensional sound. ...
So when can we hear it?
BBC press officers are currently keeping their cards close to their chest on this latest 3D audio research, but expect to find out a lot more about the Beeb's future broadcast plans later this year. ...
See the full story here: http://tech.uk.msn.com/audio/bbc-tests-3d-sound
MakieLab secures $1.4m in funding
'Smart toy' outfit secures cash, with contributions from games and anime angels
MakieLab has secured £1.4 million in funding for its user-designed, 3D-printed action doll business model.
The company lets users design digital dolls via its website. The designs are then made physical with 3D printing, and sent to customers who pay for the dolls.
Currently in open alpha, the service will eventually expand to included dolls with various new features, and link the vitrtual world where the Makies are created with the physical product through social and gameplay mechanics.
See the full story here:
Documentary shot with Kinect explores the beauty of coding
In Clouds, an upcoming documentary exploring the beauty of code, the talking heads on screen appear to be floating in thin air. Images of prominent hackers and artists, shot using a Microsoft Kinect sensor attached to a digital SLR, appear as points suspended in space that emerge, dissolve and reappear.
The look of Clouds was designed to match the subject matter.
"It's like painting an ice sculpture," said media artist James George, who is creating the film with Jonathan Minard, a fellow at Carnegie-Mellon's Studio for Creative Inquiry. "You have a sculpture -- the volume data -- and we use the SLR to color the data. The combination of the two creates the effect."
See the full story here: http://tinyurl.com/6wcqbmy
Predicting the Rise and Rise of 3-D
Despite a recent downturn in popularity, 3-D movies aren’t just going to prosper, according to one of their most vocal proponents. They are going to change the way stories are told, and may even change the structure of the art form.
“Slowly but surely, it is regaining the regard it was first held in,” Jeffrey Katzenberg, the chief executive of DreamWorksAnimation said in an interview. “Internationally, it continues to explode.” ...
See the full story here
To 3D Or Not To 3D: Buy The Right Prometheus Ticket
Final Verdict: This is damn close to a perfect score for 3D, and if you think that popping 3D effects out of the screen is gimmicky, you may as well call it perfect.Prometheus makes exceptional use of 3D, enhancing the already incredible visuals of the film and truly immersing the audience in its epic story. If you've been a 3D skeptic and are sick of shelling out the extra cash, this might be the movie to change your mind.
Rethinking Privacy in an Era of Big Data
Some years ago an engineer at Google told me why Google wasn’t collecting information linked to people’s names. “We don’t want the name. The name is noise.”
The point was that actually finding out people’s names isn’t necessary for sending them targeted ads.
“Privacy is a source of tremendous tension and anxiety in Big Data,” saysDanah Boyd, a senior researcher at Microsoft Research. Speaking last week at a conference on Big Data at the University of California, Berkeley, she said, “It’s a general anxiety that you can’t pinpoint, this odd moment of creepiness.” She asked, Iis this moving towards a society that we want to build?”
Ms. Boyd has made a specialty of studying young people’s behavior on the Internet. She says they are now often seeking power over their environment through misdirection, such as continually making and destroying Facebook accounts, or steganography, a cryptographic term for hiding things in plain sight by obscuring their true meaning.
See the full story here:
3D TV Gets Standardisation Boost From ITU
The boffins at ITU – the international organisation responsible for setting worldwide standards in TV broadcasting among other things – have been busy lately. Fresh from preparing the technical specifications for 4K and 8K UHDTV, the institution’s Radiocommunication division (ITU-R) has also developed the standards for 3D TV programming, again with the help of television industry professionals, broadcasters and regulating bodies who participated in its Study Group 6.
The new 3DTV standards (which are called “Recommendations” by ITU) aim to provide a recognised platform for the evaluation, production and broadcast of extra-dimensional programmes, in an effort to popularise 3D technology among global consumers. Focusing upon the two high-definition formats commonly used by countries around the world (namely 720p and 1080 HDTV), ITU-R’s newly drafted Recommendations lay down the guidelines for the digital interfaces used by film studios to make tri-dimensional content, as well as the requirements for 3D TV in general.
The procedures of judging the visual quality of 3DTV content have also been agreed upon. ITU-R Study Group 6 have outlined three “quality factors”: the image quality in the third dimension; the perceived 3D depth; and last but not least the level of viewing comfort experienced by the audience.
Commenting on the development, ITU’s secretary-general Hamadoun Toure hoped that the new standards – which have been submitted for fast-track approval – will give a boost to the 3D TV format which has opened up new possibilities for television broadcasters and consumer electronics manufacturers in recent years. ITU-R Working Party 6C (WP 6C) chairman David Wood added that the body’s Recommendations will prove invaluable to those who are involved in the production and distribution of 3-dimensional programmes, both in the present and in the future.
Read the full story here:
Best Buy Paints an Exciting Picture for Gamers at E3
For the first time, the team will be on the E3 show floor taking a real-life approach to gaming with a life-size 3D art installation highlighting the exclusive Multiplayer Raptor Armor skin. Attendees will be encouraged to step in the 3D painting as they pose with accompanying Halo props and walk away with a printed picture on behalf of Best Buy. The 3D artwork will be located in area F7 of the showroom floor.
See the full story here:
Samsung releases multimedia laptop
Samsung's “Alive” audio software further enables consumers to enjoy 3D surround sound when using its new laptop computers.
Read the full story here: