@erichg14: What did you think of the Bigotron 5000 that Soledad and Mr. Peanut used to analyze the exit-polling data?

"Now here, you can see that this demographic is clearly racist because of how they broke for McCain. While this other demographic is clearly sexist due to their dislike for Palin..."

bpapa9013

@VincentioSnipe: It was just a cheezy video effect. There was no "hologram" in the studio. The only way you saw anything was as a TV viewer.

tande04

@erichg14: Did you see the daily show's version of that map? It was great!

I remember... "we're just going to pull oregon out and leave it in the ocean. That's very dangerous right there"

tek_nic

@vicsells: Green screen, real-time post-proc overlay...

bpapa9013

@John_001: The correspondents that were actually on the set, couldn't see shit, they were just looking generally in his direction to preserve the illusion.

I did actually think the capitol was kinda cool tho, despite my previous sargasm above...

bpapa9013

They did it to show off of course. For the same reason they have Microsoft Surface.

SmartyPantsDance.

@Hiphopopotamus: C'MON!?!

The 3D VR Capitol was awesome! I never could have visualized the seats gained by the democrats in the election with out it, and the House?!? Foggetaboutit!

Numbers are for Wonks, I need pointlessly complex enhanced reality models to be able to pay attention to anything let alone comprehend it!

bpapa9013

I was just pissed off that they insisted on calling it a hologram. It was augmented reality. They superimposed it onto the broadcast video, they didn't project it into the air in front of him.

TurboFool

All I was thinking was "Wow, all that money, time and tech to show a person standing still, how is this better than a split screen?"
Then today I read the specs on just how big and expensive this little gimmick was. Fail.
Besides, IT'S NOT A HOLOGRAM. A simple green screen setup would've produced the same results for viewers. They just wanted to say they have hologram tech, when they don't.

kahri

@Reil(aos): That's my understanding of it too. The only cool thing I suppose is that it was being done in real-time.

future-proof

LOL I loved that part. Will.I.Am for Geek President!!

Nitecrawlah2

@SirDrinksalot: Ditto.

A Pimp Named DaveR

@burnt2acrisp: Yes sir.

And he was amazing on Saturday Night Live. I really like this guy.

future-proof

Had to laugh a little when Will I Am brought it up and compared it to Star Wars (which is what I thought it was a knock off of) Then the CNN anchor said "yes it is like when the beamed people up on star trek."

You could see Will I Am start to correct him, then I guess he thought as I did, correcting a CNN anchor would be futile.

UncleArgyll

@baltwade: I agree. As a TV viewer, I couldn't really tell it was a hologram. It could have just as easily been some cheezy video affects for all we could tell.

VincentioSnipe

To paraphrase myself:

When you use technology to enable someone describe where she is and what is around her when it would be easier to actually show where she is and what is around her, then the technology is meaningless.

(I did like when AC tried to justify its use with .w.i.l!l?ia...m.; "We're using this because it's quieter this way!" Yes AC, that's certainly reasonable.)

92BuickLeSabre

yeah i saw this. SO stupid. i couldn't believe how terrible it was, bad green screening too. the only thing slightly impressive was how it matched camera moment on both sides, but it still looked like shit as well as completely pointless and awkward.

september11th

it's a little too gimmicky for my tastes, but then again CNN has been more about how the story gets displayed than the actual content of the story in the last couple of years. So this is hardly surprising from them

Maybe they set this up in case the election wasn't interesting and they'd have a way to fill up air time

arras

This isn't really a hologram, right? o.o The way they talk about it makes it sound more like a two-way AR system (the monitors and TV's 'see' the hologram, but the actual people on set do not).

Reil(aos)

I have no idea... I got all my election coverage information from Google.

Rabid Penguin

It was marginally cool, but mostly stupid. Seriously, what is wrong with the regular way of doing it, with one camera and one microphone?

It all reminded me of Fred Armisen moving the states around on Weekend Update. And Star Wars. Just a little.

grapejoos

He couldn't even see her in the studio. No hologram is produced on the floor, but we see it in our homes after 30+ HD cameras filming her are layered and the resulting picture is processed.

I think that's why people are calling BS.

Tastic7

If they can somehow combine this technology with the Japanese virtual reality schoolgirl thingy from a few posts back, maybe the news will get more interesting.

What was that Mrs. Couric? Don't make me poke you with my virtual hand and knock you off your box. Here, have a teddy bear.

winshape

Surely the word hologram suggests the method the image is projected in 3d space and interacted with. What we had was someone talking to an empty point in space and having someone else's image superimposed on top. TV has been doing that for years, the only difference here was the method used to capture that image.

Good idea, just poorly implemented (she kept dancing over that red dot, and seemed out of scale) and badly publicised.

Wraithen

I really liked the multitouch touchscreen they used on CNN way better than any of the gimmicks they've tried in the past. It actually was put to pretty good use when they started going through the map and assigning possible wins for either side, and showing those "paths to 270".

Hologram was stupid. I didn't see a point to it. I's rather they just split the screen and have whoever they are interviewing sitting there.

erichg14

help me Wolf Blitzer. Youre my only hope.

ThomasPullus

what's up with her feet?

Ornament

Dumb. Until the hologram is standing in front of me, it's pointless.

weatherman

@bkchosun: For reference:

+ Watch video

bkchosun

seriously, whats the point? It tech cool but does the return justify the investment? This HAD to be expensive. They could have purchased (or borrowed) a 150in HD; set it up as a 'wall' screen and had almost the same affect for less cash.

justsomereportingguy

i still don't totally understand how they did it

vicsells

I think the technology is cool and all, but CNN's exocution of it was kinda lame. BTW, is the blue halo intentional, like to cover up minor visual defects, or is it for fun. Cuz it would be awesome if they lost it.

Boot Shrew

Stupid. Might have been really cool in studio, but stupid from TV viewers point of view.

baltwade

@OGHowie: By the time Will.i.am came on I was about done with a 12 pack of beer so my confusion was soaring as to what he had to do with all of this.

Qu33f_Machine

@John_001: bit*

John_001

This is pretty badass, but a bi impractical for CNN. This could take teleconferencing and virtual meetings to a whole new level in the future though.

John_001

Stupid.
Waste of time.
NOT A HOLOGRAM.
FALSE ADVERTISING.
= Insulting.

SirDrinksalot

who cares, NBC had a much cooler setup, plus when Brian Williams talks it makes me feel warm inside...

burnt2acrisp

@bkchosun: Sorry, that's "Ja Rule". No comparison to Jah...

bkchosun

Somebody get Jah Rule! Where is Jah?!?!?

bkchosun

It was stupid, but better than their interactive 3-D capitol building.

Hiphopopotamus

It looked like a cheesy green screen effect not a hologram.

Blastfemur

Still wondering why they interviewed Will I Am with it....

OGHowie

@nizzy1115: Why?

I wouldn't want to watch a professor just lecture on TV in the first place let alone watch a professor lecture on TV with a blue outline around him.

tande04

It didn't add much, but why not throw in some gadget eye candy to break up the monotony of all the time they need to fill waiting for news. I laughed a lot more than I expected to last night because of it.

Duke

I thought it was cool. I hope we see more of this in the future. Maybe college can be taught like this as well.

nizzy1115

I hope news continues to use camera tricks. Maybe Bill O'Riley can gain a lightsaber and cut through his guests in fits of rage.

Pudge

grapejoos said : "what is wrong with the regular way of doing it, with one camera and one microphone?"

You can't see her ass.

weatherman

Stupid.

shamoononon has a hebetudinous dog

@vicsells: Instead of filming her with one camera and putting her on a screen, they filmed her with a bunch of cameras and put her "in the room". Wolf didn't see anything, just the viewing public.

Pudge

@John_001: If everyone has TVs, then it would work well for meetings. Sadly, that's how we already do things. This is purely a camera trick meant to fool the technologically retarded into thinking we have Star Trek technology.

Pudge

Really stupid, because wasn't it just a greenscreen effect? Wolf Blitzer wasn't actually looking at a hologram projected on the floor in front of him, like in Star Wars, he was pretending to look at one. Right?

Spero

Personally I thought it was incredibly stupid. It was a cheap gimmick that was useful for nothing..

Now, once they have a REAL hologram in the studio (and not an overlay) my mind might change.

But, I doubt it, because it's still going to be useless :p

MadMonkey572

@winshape: The VR Schoolgirl thing is essentially the exact same tech as the VR capitol building they showed.

bpapa9013

@Boot Shrew: Looked to me like they had been zapped by a Proton Pack.

Or maybe from the movie Ghost. Didn't he have a weird blur-halo in that?

FrankGrimesJr

I didn't see it on CNN, but looking at it here, it is pretty cool. It's also kind of cool that Wolf Blitzer's a robot and Larry King is a gnome.

frigg

@Blastfemur: exactly, calling it a hologram was really stretching the truth.

evan

1. Would have been more cool if they didn't spend so much time making it a bigger deal than it was.

2. Tech wise, the remote camera sync so that both soundstages had cameras moving together so the perspective shots made sense was pretty cool.

3. The perspective was off. She seemed alternately shorter/taller and sort of half there.

If they'd passed it off as everyday, it would have worked better.

AndrewJayPollack

@bpapa9013: It's the state of the nation, these days. Mention a number or word with more than 3 or 4 syllables, you lose half to 3/4 of the people. Show a pretty picture, it's all clear.

Con Seannery

should cut more from the edges, more tolerance to the mask

shpe11

@ThomasPullus: Yes! Finally...I was waiting for that.

AxCrusnik

@Tastic7: I agree, I was pretty impressed when I heard "hologram produced by 30+ HD cams and 20+ computers." But then I read that they were just overlaying the feed onto the broadcast. There was only 2 main angles, They could have pulled off the same effect with 2 cameras and 1 computer.

idlemind

Star Wars tech is ALWAYS cool!

FritzLaurel

@OGHowie: At first I thought it was Spike Lee,which would have made slightly more sense.

FiveLiters

@OGHowie: So he could do an "I'm from the future of the '80s" shoulder roll. that was by far my favorite hologram moment.

m4ximusprim3

I thought it was pretty cool. Their reason for doing it though (because it's so loud in those crowds) was kinda retarded. Like, unless the person was using some kind of magic holographic microphone, I don't see the difference.

sam-i-am

@Rabid Penguin: theres a youtube clip above to help you out

pdditty

Didn't quite catch that name there.... was it Jessica Yellin?

hired_geek

The technology is interesting, the usage of it was stupid.

Bokusatsu_Tenshi

@erichg14: Did everyone just get these? Mythbusters just got one, CBS just got one, CNN, SNL, I mean, DAMN!

Con Seannery

@bkchosun: haha

pdditty

@tek_nic: Wasn't that SNL?

Con Seannery

There was no excuse for them to 'dumb down' the simple digital compositing effect by a) calling it a hologram and b) making it look crap-tastic just to look more like Star Wars. No excuse at all, and even mildly insulting to those who know what they're looking at.

It's only /mildly/ interesting that they did this live.

GothAlice

@bkchosun: Man I miss Dave Chappelle!

midwestkel

@tek_nic: Oh, lord. I laughed when I read this.

I love those crazy morons on the Daily Show.

erichg14

@grapejoos: "where are you from? New Hampshire? Wouldn't it be a drag if we pulled it over...to Mexico?!?

Oh, QUE PASO? QUE PASO?"

m4ximusprim3

Nothing cool at all and 100% not a hologram. All they did was shoot her on a blue screen and insert her image into the video stream. THERE WAS NO HOLOGRAM IN FRONT OF WOLF! He was talking at space just like she was talking at space. All they did was put the same camera setup and angles around her as were in the studio so when they switched camera views on him they switched on her. Lame and of absolutely no technical significance.

Uncle Remus

@erichg14: And here I thought it was the Mega-iPhone!

Though if he would have played MonkeyBall on it,that would have totally ruled!

FiveLiters

Geez, people are so negative these days.

ShoyuRamen

with a few more patches this could be uber cool.

beau.ryan

@John_001: The thing I find amazing is how Star Trek technology has become reality!

T-Will

Just a stupid gimmick.
No real purpose other than to brag about having it.

kenbrbkr

Mostly stupid. The only cool part is that they are trying something new and one day it will evolve into something useful. I guess you have to start somewhere. But for now it's just an experiment and mostly pointless, as well as distracting for the viewer. He could have interviewed them with a normal camera and achieved exactly the same thing.

redman042

What's the point of the hologram, just the host was the only one able to see the actual hologram. (which I have serious doubts about it).

The only thing I saw was flat people talking with a halo...

Stupid.

DeLarge

"3D" effect on a 2D screen? Time to poke out my eyes.

MyPetFly

Considering it's just a 2D picture overlayed on top of live footage in real time, it's not that cool. It's about as cool as the colored line on the football field.

While the design and implementation is a step in the right direction, the technology and practicality is not.

PresidenToor

@burnt2acrisp: Agreed. I like all of NBC's anchors—Williams, Lester Holt, and the "retired" Tom Brokaw are all excellent imo.

ezman

How is this a hologram when it's on TV?

jimwithajeep

Yeah they need to demonstrate this tech in front of a wide group of people in person. Not just Wolf Blitzer. Watching a 3D hologram on a 2D set didn't do anything for me. Maybe next time they'll use stop motion instead.

BigPanda

I didn't ever see that on CNN the few times we switched to it... we got our election coverage from Dan Rather and it was 100x better than MSNBC, Fox News and CNN combined (at least from what we noticed from those channels).

From watching the clip, though... very gimmicky and lame.

ttech10

I'm surprised it even made it on tv....usually this stuff is cut out because it's so expensive. they must have a nice budget for pointless things that don't look as good as less expensive alternatives...

Randy87

Not the place to try and unveil new technologies. I think it would've confused a lot more people, and the delay was annoying.

teexcue

Until they can have actual holograms in space, and can beam sound in such a way that it radiates from the hologram's mouth, and the visual that the person sees is from the perspective of the hologram, it will be stupid.

Tolgak

@A Pimp Named DaveR: Tritto

This was basic rotoscoping at best, and an insult to holography.

JediMasta

@bkchosun: IT's Ja not Jah but I get the joke. I watch Dave Chappelle

Nat3

I wonder if the gimmick..I mean the hologram talk increased CNN ratings?

W10002

It was interesting for what they have done in the past. CNN rocks, FOX NEWS SUCKS BIG TIME! MSNBC is AOK in my book. It did seem basic but the guy who created this had a great idea, and did a great job at implementing it. Great job sir!

ziggieboi

"Does this hologram make my butt look big?"

Windhawk

Help me Obi Won Obama

thebear91

@Con Seannery: Yes indeed - SNL. Loved the ending, in particular - "Look, I can make Michigan bounce!"

Pixelologist

@Pixelologist: Yep

Con Seannery

it was stupid

cbandes

the blue glow around the edge was kinda weird.

trekkie

Would have been cooler if they didnt tell you about it and he put a gun to her hologram head and pulled the trigger and then she played the part and fell over... then got up

DssTrainer

@baltwade: Guess who's stupid here. If it wasn't blatantly obvious to you this a blue screen effect like how they shot "Honey I shrunk the kids" and crap like that. You morons believe anything they say on TV don't you.

sxr7171

@Pudge: Well said: "technologically retarded".

sxr7171

@Blastfemur: Agree, it was retarded. Seriously.

sxr7171

I don't get it ... isn't this way cooler?

+ Watch video

markps

@idlemind: No kidding. It was so unbelievably cheesy and to actually reveal the effort that went into it just makes the whole thing laughable.

sxr7171

@justsomereportingguy: It was so lame that they could have done the whole thing in CGI and it would have looked better. Why even have real people when you could just do this kind of crappy look with animation or stick figures? It would actually look better that way.

sxr7171

So... was Jessica yellin via hologram?

001

This was cool...WHEN IT WAS CALLED EYE OF JUDGMENT FOR THE PLAYSTATION 3!

justhesh

It wasn't just stupid, it was FAKE. Blitzer wasn't actually looking at whatshername at all, he was just talking to blank space, and whatshername was composited into the video feed afterward. Blitzer was lying when he said he was talking to her 'just like she was in the studio.' I can't believe they called it a hologram; it was a 3-D bluescreen.

jackbrown

Jessica Yellin? or chancellor of the senate...

nicksears

Actually this would be pretty awesome videoconferencing tool.

Just hook up a wii-mote headset like that one dude did to set up a 3D head tracker, and it would look like the other person is behind your TV (of course it would only work for 1 viewer).

dcartist

She was wearing black. There was no detail besides the face. Also that "glow" looked like she just came back from Chernobyl.

rockhopper

On a related technology, it was obvious that the CNN folks were more experienced with their touchscreens then Charlie Gibson of ABC, who didn't exactly fumble with ABC's new touchscreen but it was obvious he was not as practiced with it. ABC also did not take advantage of the wide screen to put up any information down the left and right sides, as did NBC, CBS and CNN (maybe other networks too, but those were the ones I watched on election night).

So when the other networks imitate the fake hologram gimmick, will the talking heads have enough savvy to look at the correct spot of empty air to make "eye contact" and carry on a beleivable conversation?

Barcard

I thought it was rather unnecessary... especially because it wasn't a hologram at all, just special effects.

sos10

@m4ximusprim3: hahahah hell yea!! i've being doing the shoulder roll and saying 'hey check this out' (as he said to A.C.) to my gf for the past couple days!! Anderson Cooper just looked at him like, yea thats why I voted for McCain....

mdawg4624

@Nat3: Yes, thanks. I cleared that up in my first reply. I think the Rasta's in my hood would probably kill me for making that mistake.

bkchosun

Well, its quite a good trick

a bunch of cameras shooting on a angle no greater than 220° and no less than 180°, shooting her standing on a blue screen and pasting that image to the transmission, but the reporter just see a empty space, pretty surer there is a screen so he know where' she supposed to be, so there is no screw up.

Good trick, but still, pretty far away of what Star Wars and many others sci fi tv/movies tell us what hollographic communication will be

CarlosLopez

If Wolf didn't see her standing there, then it wasn't a hologram. It was a green/blue screen effect.

I vote "Stupid"!

Spotz

They basically used the same technology as what we now see watching NFL games, with the lines of scrimmage, yardage, and other info being digitally overlaid on the field. I didn't mind the Capitol building model so much as a visual tool for viewers, but the fake "holographic" anchors was completely stoopid since you know damn well the live anchors were just looking at empty air.

ackthbbft

@Con Seannery: ...and that speaks volumes to the outcome of Tuesday's election.

LastOne

The holograms were both stupid AND cool. Stupid-cool! A bunch of people at the Obama rally in Chicago (where I was!) commented on the new technology. This just in: America has elected its first black president! And oh yeah in other news, we also have holograms now too! Look for flying cars that run on smiles in 2009! All hail Barack Obama, savior of the known universe!! hehehe

gloveofpower

STUPID?! thats the least of it .. IT WAS A LIE!!

FAKE!!!

CNN DECIEVES...WOLF BLITZER DECIEVES

THEY ARE LIARS... FOOLING THE PUBLIC!!!

no hologram... with bltizer acting as if she was in the studio... then false propaganda as if it was a real holographic image in the studio!!

henhen

2 words: Publicity Stunt. Hmmm...much like a certain VP candidate was.

smegz

Stupid. But that's typical of CNN and their need to impress viewers with snazzy graphics and sound effects to focus short attention spans. I want to watch the news, not a sci-fi movie.

Obsidian

Not a hologram, not even ( as some have said) a CGI hack. Just a bunch of coordinated cameras in two places with some cheap video effects ( around her) thrown in. The computer controlled multi-camera stuff is lame (for anything live - great for commercials and movies) because unlike a real hologram (if such a thing existed) or 3D graphics which optical or mathematically has a 3d person there (in 3 space) that you can interactively move around at will, this is just canned camera moves that are coordinated. Wolf does not see her, Wolf can not move around her ( the basis of VR and realness), Wolf was just part of a scripted series of camera moves. OF course there is other tech which could have thousands of cameras and record everyone of them, which you then could interactive see her from different angles (discussed on digg before) but still not even metaphorically close to hologram because Wolf still would not see her in the space and interactively move around her as a thing that took up specific space. Note there is no such thing as long form ( over a 1/2 a minute) holography yet. VR while still a lie, would at least be closer to the truth of what they were doing. If Wolf had VR stereo glasses ( with a 3d tracker) on he could conceivably have moved around her and felt that she was there in an actual physical location this is done all the time with 3D VR, but for Hires video - again they would have needed to transmit 1000s of live video feeds from a 180 degree apertures around her.

BrunoClytemnestra

@Blastfemur: Read an article yesterday in a Norwegian news paper (as a Norwegian company is behind the technology used), and they say that they HAD to "tone it down". In other words. CNN stressed the fact that they had to make it look fake, because CNN wouldn't want anyone to think they were "cheating" (having someone in studio that wasn't really there). Apparently this technology can be much better... :)

ReedCaba?ero

I agree with posters above. Besides the low frame rate, it would have been almost the same to just use one camera and a green screen and track the motion of the camera in the studio. They could have made it look real at that point. By the way, was the blue light around her just a bad post-production gimmick to make her look like princess Leia, or was is just some sort of light effect they couldn't remove? I vote stupid until they actualy project the holograms.

PobreGizmo

The technology was provided by the norwegian based media-company vizrt. The reason for the crappy quality was that cnn wanted it to be obvious that she was not physically present in the studio, therefore not falsifying anything in the news studio. The techniques used are simple, but needs lots of hardware. Without the "starwars" filter effects, the result is marvelous!

RoscoeElectra

It was just stupid. Didn't look like anything that couldn't be done with a greenscreen and camera tracking. And it would have even looked better.

Not to mention it looked like they used a ring of cellphone cameras for this. It looked like the first attempt at chroma-keying or something.

r0b2186