Struggling to get comments working sensibly on this new blog so I'm posting responses in the blog itself for now. Here's a good one on the last post from Adam Grzesiczak:
"Problem is how we are seeing the world and how screens are build.
What we basically need is not to light up the pixels [LED for example] but change the pixels/picture on atom level, which we can do it using nano technology, let me explain.
We are trying to get pixels smaller and smaller and put millions of them in 1cm square and somehow light them up, pixels, LED, EInk, etc../
But if we want perfect screen, without pixels, you have to start changing image on atom levels and light them with normal light, then you are not gonna see the pixels but natural image, that what you are seeing now [not the screen] look at your wall, desk, water, bike, car you can see it but its not a screen, the light is coming from the sun and is reflecting by those things and coming into your eye [photons].
So we need to create dynamic screen which is gonna be able to change his nano structure [atomic structure], not lighting up the LEDs. More simple, create Dynamically changing atomic structure which you can control, sound easy but it's not...
That's the next level of Digital Signage and the world we live in.
I think changing image into vector graphics it's a good idea so brain will think that is not a screen.
How brain see and memorize things its a different story, perfect world for digital signage is Matrix which I hope will never come...
Otherwise you gonna have HDMI extreme input on the back of you head, plus couple of USB :)"
4 comments:
Don't you think that even if nano panels started operating on the atomic level they would still control pixels? It just pixels would be downsized to a size of atoms.
Absolutely right, but I think you'd find that quantum effects (the behaviour of individual photons) and the simple fact that you'd have pixels smaller than the wavelength of light would mean that - ultimately - you don't need pixels that small. Unless, that is, you want to recreate reality at the atomic level.
But, yes, a pixel is a pixel, however small. The question remains, how small do they really need to be?
I agree that pixels do not need to be that small (speaking in physics terms). But the main issue here is not physics but digital nature of information these devices process.
The ground for all digital devices is two levels of signal, 0/1 pair - also known as bit. And pixel is a bit in digital imaging world. Nowadays pixel is described as combination of RGB (or an alternative, like YUV) values. If a hypothetic nano panel needs to operate on atomic level it will need properties of every elementary particle. It means that pixel will be represented by a combination of proton, electron, neutron, spin, etc values (or just properties of a signal that alters a particle state).
Thus, no matter how small pixels are, we will still have them around. Unless analog computers start playing a leading role.
PS: Sorry, the previous anonymous comment was mine. Did not noticed the possibility to enter name.
Fascinating. In a sense, a pixel is an "atom" of an image. What I mean by this is that it is the smallest possible element of an image, beyond which anything smaller doesn't add any more detail.
So I see a pixel as more of an "Atom" in this sense than a "bit" because pixels can have (eg) 24 bit values - but I take your point.
Just another thought: I wonder what bandwidth you'd need to refresh a 40" screen that had atom-sized pixels?
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