Saudi Arabia and Japan to collaborate on training Saudi students in Manga comics Saudi Minister of Culture discusses cultural collaboration during Tokyo visit    Saudi defense minister meets with Swedish state secretary    Navigating healthcare's future: Solutions for a sustainable system    Sixth foreign tourist dies of suspected methanol poisoning in Laos    Hungary's Orbán vows to ignore war crimes arrest warrant for Netanyahu    Russia gives North Korea million barrels of oil, breaking sanctions: report    Al Khaleej qualifies for Asian Men's Club League Handball Championship final    Katy Perry v Katie Perry: Singer wins right to use name in Australia    Trump picks Pam Bondi as attorney general after Matt Gaetz withdraws    9 erring body care centers shut in Riyadh    Al-Jasser: Saudi Arabia to expand rail network to over 8,000 km    OMODA&JAECOO: Unstoppable global cumulative sales over 360,000 units    Saudi Arabia sees 73.7% rise in investment licenses in Q3 2024    Al Hilal doesn't need extra support to bring new players, CEO says    20,000 military emblems confiscated in Riyadh    Rafael Nadal: Farewell to the 'King of Clay'    Indonesia shocks Saudi Arabia with 2-0 victory in AFC Asian Qualifiers    Sitting too much linked to heart disease –– even if you work out    GASTAT report: 45.1% of Saudis are overweight    Denmark's Victoria Kjær Theilvig wins Miss Universe 2024    Order vs. Morality: Lessons from New York's 1977 Blackout    India puts blockbuster Pakistani film on hold    The Vikings and the Islamic world    Filipino pilgrim's incredible evolution from an enemy of Islam to its staunch advocate    Exotic Taif Roses Simulation Performed at Taif Rose Festival    Asian shares mixed Tuesday    Weather Forecast for Tuesday    Saudi Tourism Authority Participates in Arabian Travel Market Exhibition in Dubai    Minister of Industry Announces 50 Investment Opportunities Worth over SAR 96 Billion in Machinery, Equipment Sector    HRH Crown Prince Offers Condolences to Crown Prince of Kuwait on Death of Sheikh Fawaz Salman Abdullah Al-Ali Al-Malek Al-Sabah    HRH Crown Prince Congratulates Santiago Peña on Winning Presidential Election in Paraguay    SDAIA Launches 1st Phase of 'Elevate Program' to Train 1,000 Women on Data, AI    41 Saudi Citizens and 171 Others from Brotherly and Friendly Countries Arrive in Saudi Arabia from Sudan    Saudi Arabia Hosts 1st Meeting of Arab Authorities Controlling Medicines    General Directorate of Narcotics Control Foils Attempt to Smuggle over 5 Million Amphetamine Pills    NAVI Javelins Crowned as Champions of Women's Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) Competitions    Saudi Karate Team Wins Four Medals in World Youth League Championship    Third Edition of FIFA Forward Program Kicks off in Riyadh    Evacuated from Sudan, 187 Nationals from Several Countries Arrive in Jeddah    SPA Documents Thajjud Prayer at Prophet's Mosque in Madinah    SFDA Recommends to Test Blood Sugar at Home Two or Three Hours after Meals    SFDA Offers Various Recommendations for Safe Food Frying    SFDA Provides Five Tips for Using Home Blood Pressure Monitor    SFDA: Instant Soup Contains Large Amounts of Salt    Mawani: New shipping service to connect Jubail Commercial Port to 11 global ports    Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Delivers Speech to Pilgrims, Citizens, Residents and Muslims around the World    Sheikh Al-Issa in Arafah's Sermon: Allaah Blessed You by Making It Easy for You to Carry out This Obligation. Thus, Ensure Following the Guidance of Your Prophet    Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques addresses citizens and all Muslims on the occasion of the Holy month of Ramadan    







Thank you for reporting!
This image will be automatically disabled when it gets reported by several people.



Holograms go mainstream, with future full of possibility
Published in The Saudi Gazette on 02 - 11 - 2015

Concert promoters hoping to bring out legends such as Whitney Houston, Billie Holiday and Elvis Presley used to face an obvious problem — the singers are dead. But with rapid advances in technology, those stars and many more are returning to life through holograms, the three-dimensional light projections that have opened new frontiers for the live music and other industries.
The hologram boom began in April 2012 when Coachella, one of the most influential music festivals, resurrected slain rapper Tupac Shakur in a headlining set by his former collaborators Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg.
Two years later, the King of Pop Michael Jackson came back from the dead at the Billboard Music Awards, the annual event hosted by the US music industry magazine. In recent months, hologram announcements have become so regular they are almost mainstream. Hologram USA has announced tours by Whitney Houston, who died in 2012.
The firm also plans to bring Billie Holiday, who died in 1959, back to Harlem's Apollo Theater in what would be the first regularly scheduled hologram show.
Holograms record light fields, rather than standard camera images, thereby allowing a three-dimensional presentation.
For Tupac and Michael Jackson, the holograms, however realistic looking, still used a 150-year-old technology — the image was projected onto a transparent screen.
For Whitney Houston's tour, which four venues have so far agreed to welcome, the late singer's image will be projected onto a live artist on stage.
"Whitney will be able to interact live in a real performance. It won't be scripted," said Alki David, the founder of Hologram USA.
"There is a performer — an actor whose body is like Whitney," he said.
Another US company, Pulse Evolution, is preparing a musical based on Elvis that will take place on stage through virtual reality.
Concert promoters are avidly seeking unique headliners as the number of summer festivals has grown rapidly in the past years, in one of the music industry's few areas of substantial growth.
But will the public keep shelling out money to see dead entertainers once the novelty fades?
Reid Genauer, a member of the band Strangefolk and chief marketing officer of the movie app company Magisto, said he struggled to see how holograms would work once the technology becomes commonplace.
"Meeting dead celebrities, it seems reasonable to me. Is there business there? Probably. The difficulty I have — and it's a lack of imagination, not a lack of possibility — is envisioning how holograms scale," he said.
Jason Ross, a veteran producer of multi-media music projects, said that holograms may have more practical uses in classrooms — for example, for dissections in biology courses.
"I think there is a market for it, but I think from an instructional video standpoint it's going to be much stronger," he said.
Some promoters already shy away from hologram concerts, finding them tacky.
When rock legends the Grateful Dead threw five self-declared final concerts in June and July, the band considered — but decided against — creating a hologram of Jerry Garcia, the hippie-era group's most recognizable member who died in 1995.
John Textor, the chairman of Pulse Evolution which spearheaded the Tupac and Michael Jackson holograms, said it was critical to design real shows, not just to rely on holograms.
He expected the Elvis musical to run 90 minutes and feature live dancers and actors, in the fashion of a Broadway show.
"I don't believe in digital performance concerts. By the time you get to the third song, you're done. The novelty is gone," Textor said in an interview.
Textor sees concerts not as an end in themselves but as one application for virtual reality.
Digital Domain, the company he ran from 2006 to 2012, made its name in cinema and won several Oscars, most notably for 2008's "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" in which the hero, played by Brad Pitt, ages backwards.
Virtual reality technologists have long warned of the dangers of the "uncanny valley" — a theory that, the more perfectly an image resembles a real being, the more the audience will notice the imperfections.
But for Textor, that bridge has been crossed. In the first part of "Benjamin Button," he recalled that audiences believed they were watching Pitt, when in fact it was a virtual image.
University of Southern California professor Paul Debevec, a pioneer in the field, said that creating holograms of dead people was much more challenging than the actual concert design.
"The technology that is new and interesting is the ability to create a human likeness to someone that is dead — Tupac, Michael Jackson," he said. "The technology of putting it on stage is completely uninteresting."
Beyond concerts, Textor has plenty of other ideas in store for the technology. He hopes to "reinvent karaoke" by letting amateur crooners perform with their favorite singers. Textor also sees great possibilities for video games by allowing players to create virtual doubles.
"We're working with gaming companies to bring them out of the stone age," he said.


Clic here to read the story from its source.