California-based Ostendo Technologies has developed a chip that could be used in TVs, computer screens, smartwatches and tablets to create 3D holographic images.
The Ostendo Quantum Photonic Imager is an image processor with thin micro light-emitting diodes and software that renders the image correctly. The image processor comprises of six chips laid together that so far can emit a 3D image of green dice into the air. Ostendo chip can create images mid-air, which makes them suited to smartphones.
The company says that smartphones could soon have the same capabilities as R2-D2 in Star Wars films when the robot emits a hologram of Princess Leia. It will start selling a 2D version of its high-res projector in 2015, with the hologram-projecting one set to launch in 2016. Ostendo will deliver a final prototype 3D holographic system to the US Air Force by July 2016.
Ostendo has been financed by $90 million from venture capital firms and Peter Thiel, Facebook’s first outside investor. US government’s futuristic Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has also been awarded around $38 million to the company.
Ostendo's chief executive Hussein El-Ghoroury said: ‘Imagine if everything coming back to you was in 3D; all of your shopping, all of your gaming, every way you retrieve data’.
There has been an increased interest in virtual reality with Microsoft working on its own virtual reality room and social networking giant Facebook buying Oculus Reality for $2 billion. The company's Oculus Rift headset pulls users into 360-degree virtual environments.
Source: WSJ