[From The Express] VOYAGE TO MARS? WE’RE ALREADY THERE! As a one-way trip to the Red Planet is mooted, we reveal how, deep in the most inhospitable places on Earth, astronauts are already living as if they were actually colonising Mars. Saturday October 30,2010 By Jane Warren The idea of making a new life on Mars is strangely hypnotic. It may be famously inhospitable – there’s hardly any oxygen and if you step out unsuited your lungs will explode due to the thin atmosphere – but these drawbacks don’t seem to stop the allure of the Red Planet in the…

[From Wired, which features a 1:40 minute video] Holographic Telecommuting May Soon Be Possible By Lisa Grossman November 3, 2010 A new holographic display can transmit three-dimensional movies from one location to another almost in real time. If Princess Leia had to send her “Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope” message from Earth today, it would now be technologically possible. “We can take objects from one location and show them in another location in 3-D in near real time,” said optical scientist Nasser Peyghambarian, and project leader from the University of Arizona in a press conference Nov.…

[From New Scientist, where a 0:33 minute video is available; the Stoll et al article is available here] Game characters to get authentically rumpled clothes 17:30 24 October 2010 by Shanta Barley Computer game developers use sophisticated algorithms to inject real physics into virtual worlds – painstakingly mimicking the way that light reflects off objects, for instance. But there’s something unrealistic about the citizens of those virtual worlds: their clothes barely register a crease or crumple, no matter how much running and jumping they perform. That could soon change, thanks to software which ensures that a game character’s clothes ripple…

[A press release from Mechdyne via HPCwire (High Productivity Computing); a description of the episode from the Sci Fi Science web site follows below]   November 01, 2010 Mechdyne CAVE To Be Featured on Discovery Science Channel MARSHALLTOWN, Iowa, Nov. 1 — The CAVE Automatic Virtual Environment integrated by Mechdyne Corporation in March 2009, at Rowan University in Camden, NJ, will be featured in and episode of Sci Fi Science–Physics of the Impossible airing on the Discovery Science Channel beginning November 3, 2010, at 9 p.m. (CDT.) Dr. Michio Kaku serves as host of the program and was on site…

[From PhysOrg, which features a 1:15 minute video (many other videos are available at the popcode web site)] New mobile phone app ‘Popcode’ adds virtual reality to real world objects (w/ Video) October 20, 2010 Have you ever struggled to follow a set of assembly instructions for flat-pack furniture? Simon Taylor, a PhD student in Dr Tom Drummond’s group, and Connell Gauld, a graduate of the MEng course in 2010, have been working on a framework for adding virtual content to real world objects. They can bring written instructions to life using a technique called Augmented Reality (AR). Augmented Reality has…

[A press release from 3-D Vision; see the 1 minute promotional video here]  World’s First 3-D Broadcast Nationwide for All TVs in Full Color Rachael Ray ground breaking episode “Halloween Bash in 3-D” to be broadcast on Oct 29   New York – October 25, 2010 The Rachael Ray Show, along with 3-D Vision, Inc., (both based in New York), are taking a major step forward in the exploding 3-D TV market. On October 29, “Rach’s Halloween Bash in 3-D” will be broadcast to millions of viewers with 3-D Vision’s revolutionary new 3-D process called “FullColor 3D™”. The Rachael Ray…

[From The New York Times Editorial Notebook Is That a Dagger I See? By EDUARDO PORTER Published: October 22, 2010 We’ve been waiting a long time for technology to deliver us an alternative reality, like the future in H.G. Wells’s “Time Machine,” Neo’s Matrix, or the universe of code navigated by the “Neuromancer” hacker, Case. The future has arrived, finally — by the prosaic hand of our cellphones. Chances are it will soon be sponsored by laundry detergent or a fast-food chain. Just the other day, my iPhone showed me an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art that most…

[From VR-News.com] Post Published: 22 October 2010 Dassault Systèmes helps consumers enjoy a virtual reality experience with Nestlé breakfast Cereals Dassault Systèmes creates a video game combining real-time motion sensing with stereoscopic 3-D for Nestlé Breakfast Cereals Following the success of the augmented reality game integrated into Chocapic and Nesquik cereal packs launched in France at the end of 2009, Dassault Systèmes has deployed leading-edge know-how and experiential 3D technologies to support the marketing strategy of Nestlé France Breakfast Cereals with the roll-out of a new immersive virtual reality application  The promotion is timed to coincide with the launch of…

[From 1UP.com, where you can find several additional images] Our Undeniable Bond With Virtual Pets How games like EyePet and Kinectimals are changing the cute little face of virtual pet interactions. By Anthony John Agnello Something strange happens to you when you’re playing with the EyePet. After you’ve learned all the different ways you can interact with Sony’s cuddly little beast — you’ve fed the blighter, cleaned him, fed him, taught him how to conjure an airplane out of thin air by drawing it in his magic notebook — you start to wonder if there’s any real reason to continue…

[From The Wall Street Journal] ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT OCTOBER 23, 2010 On the Threshold of the Avatar Era By JARON LANIER In a garage in Palo Alto, Calif., in the 1980s, some friends and I were the first humans to experience becoming avatars—that is, movable representations of ourselves in cyberspace. Amazingly, all these years later, almost no one else has been able to experience a hint of what will be one of the great cognitive adventures of this century. It has been possible for some years for visitors to theme parks to try out virtual-reality “rides,” but these don’t capture…

[From Salt Lake City’s Deseret News] [Image: Cecilia Rea kisses her newborn baby Amelie while talking with her husband Senior Airman Geiber Rea through Skype while he is in Afgahnistan in American Fork Wednesday.] A soldier watches the birth of his daughter from thousands of miles away Published: Wednesday, Oct. 6, 2010 AMERICAN FORK — Geiber Rea soothed and encouraged his wife Cecilia throughout an induced labor Tuesday at American Fork Hospital. From his perch at her bedside he witnessed the strain in her eyes and beaded perspiration on her forehead as she pushed the couple’s second daughter out into…

[From Hacked Gadgets, where more pictures and video are available] Crazy Racing Simulator by Motion Sim Written by: Alan Parekh October 16, 2010 I’m not much of a gamer but I think this Racing Simulator by Motion Sim could cure me! Have a look at the first video [here] to get an idea of what this system can do. The company that makes it is actually in the industrial automation business so they clearly have a good handle on what is needed to fling around the 300KG that the system is rated to handle.…