See Your Friend In iPod Silhouette
08.09.07 - 03:02pm
Now you can see your friend thousands of miles away in the same form in which you see the thousands of dancers in the iPod/iTunes ads - in the form of the silhouette
Japanese researches have developed a system called Teleshadow that pipes video showing what people are doing via the net in a way similar to that of web cams, but instead of seeing the person videotaped in full detail Teleshadow turns them into shadow outlines and projects their image onto a decorative lamp.
The researchers developed Teleshadow in the way of the Japanese tradition of Shoji, the paper walls that are often seen dividing rooms in Japan. Similarly Teleshadow adds the same presence but retains the privacy of friends.
The lamp is square and can show up to four different friends, each silhouetted on one of the lamps sides.
Smart cards are used to identify the friends and can be swapped out so you could have a thousand different friends just like on MySpace and swap out cards to see a different shadow.
Mr Yasuda one of the creators said, “As this is a new media that fits our daily life, it was important to make it as a piece of furniture.”
No word yet on when these will become available to the public. The first prototypes were shown off at the Siggraph computer graphics convention which ended today in San Diego.
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