[From The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW); a 1:02 minute video is available here] Fruit Ninja live, bring your overcoat by Dana Franklin (RSS feed) on Mar 28th 2011 Your virtual overcoat, that is. Students in a virtual reality workshop at the FH Wedel University of Applied Sciences cloned Fruit Ninja, the best-selling game for smartphones and tablets, in 3D using the Cave Automatic Virtual Environment (CAVE). The result is a life-size, fully immersive fruit slicing experience that transforms the casual game into a serious workout where players slay seedy sprouts with their (almost) bare hands.…

[From DigInfo.TV, where the story includes additional pictures and a 1:41 minute video] Paranga Adding Tactile Feedback to E-Reader Devices 23 March 2011 At Interaction 2011, a research group with members from Osaka University demonstrated the Paranga, a device which recreates the sensation of turning pages when using an e-book reader. “E-books are becoming popular, but the only feedback they give you is pictures and sound. For example, if you want to skip ahead several pages in an e-book, you scroll with your finger to the desired position. But the problem is, that’s not very intuitive. The advantage of this…

[From The Guardian’s Film blog] 3D technology has even sceptical directors embracing another dimension From Herzog to Coppola, big names are filming stereoscopically – and the technique’s full potential is still to be revealed Posted by Ben Walters Thursday 17 March 2011 guardian.co.uk Six years ago, 3D cinema seemed about as likely a candidate for a revival as Odorama. Today it owns the multiplex. After swiftly dominating CG animated features, it gained toe-holds in horror, action and concert films, achieving inarguable momentum even before the success of Avatar. Now – objectionable as it might be to refuseniks such as Walter…

[From DigInfo TV, where the story includes additional pictures and a 1:35 minute video] 3D Multi-Viewpoint Fog Projection Display 17 March 2011 At Interaction 2011, a research group from Osaka University exhibited a fog display that enables multi-viewpoint observation. “Ordinary fog displays use a single projector with fog on a flat surface, but this display uses three projectors, each showing a different picture. So when the observer moves around the fog, they get a three-dimensional view.” This system utilizes the fact that dispersion of light by fog has directionality. It projects different pictures, from different angles, onto a cylindrical fog…

[From the IEEE Spectrum blog Automaton; a 2:26 minute video is available here] BrainDriver: A Mind Controlled Car POSTED BY: Markus Waibel  /  Thu, February 17, 2011 Imagine you could drive your car using only your thoughts. German researchers have just made that possible — and they have the video to prove it. Following his recent interview on the Robots Podcast about autonomous vehicles, Raúl Rojas, an AI professor at the Freie Universität Berlin, and his team have demonstrated how a driver can use a brain interface to steer a vehicle. …

[From Parsippany New Jersey’s Daily Record] [Image: Staff Sgt. Joshua Johnson controls a virtual bomb-disarming robot using patented software developed at Picatinny Arsenal. Looking on is Staff Sgt. Christopher Duff at the Sgt. Ryan E. Doltz Software Engineering Center.  Staff Photos: Bob Karp] Virtual robot controller preparation for reality Picatinny engineer’s software incorporated into video game By Abbott Koloff Mar 20, 2011 Because bomb-disarming robots cost about $140,000 apiece, Bernard Reger’s superiors asked him to design a virtual training system that does not require using robots that might get blown up during an exercise or fall off a cliff. The Army already…