Direct pixel manipulation

The below video shows a new intuitive and simple way of browsing through video material. Instead of browsing through time, by dragging the scrollbar or time bar, you can simply drag objects in the video. The video says it all. Funny side note: first author of the publication is Pierre Dragicevic. More videos and information here. You can even download their free "DimP" player.

Scalable pixel product

I've spotted the first real SVC product announcement. At NAB, MainConcept, a DivX daughter, presented their SVC implementation. SVC is the new video coding extension to H.264 that doesn't bring higher coding efficiency, but actually worsens it. I wrote about it earlier. The big benefit though is that you can decode parts of the bit stream in case you only need a smaller resolution picture. MainConcept writes "creating an SVC file only causes an approximate 10% file size increase compared to a regular H.264/AVC file".

10% is a lot in video compression.

Thin pixel machinery

In a recent post I briefly wrote about Sony's new OLED display. One of the main hindrances of market adoption of this technology is cost. But now DuPont and Dainippon have announced they're working together to develop equipment specifically to manufacture OLED displays. The plan is to make machines that basically print the display, using techniques similar to ink jet printers. The ultimate goal is for the OLED displays to achieve LCD price points. My prediction is that within 10 years OLED will have displaced LCD.

Shiny pixel fab being built

A little while ago I reported about the new IMOD display technology from Qualcomm, which should yield high quality displays that consume very low power. I saw the displays in action at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, but was unimpressed. The displays shown there were small, and perhaps similar to the LCDs that displayed the time on my watch about 30 years ago. Very few graphics and no moving pictures were shown. Still, LCDs have come a long way since the seventies, so perhaps the new IMOD displays will have a bright (no pun intended) future also.

What's the next step? High volume, low cost production facilities. Yesterday Qualcomm and Foxlink announced just that. They will jointly build a new dedicated IMOD fab in -- where else -- Taiwan. The fab is expected to be operational in 2009. There's no mention of how many units the fab can produce.

Can Qualcomm, the CDMA wireless communications company, be successful at entering such a new market? Will IMOD take off?