Projectors Click - Short Edition

Newswatch will be here in around ten minutes,

but first, it's Click.

Projectors have come a long way.

We first meet Team Lab, the 400-strong digital art collective

last year in Japan.

The team of artists programmers, engineers, CG

animators, mathematicians and the like, love to make an impact and

here at the Pace London gallery, they're presenting eight of their

most eye-popping pieces.

As with the work in Tokyo, the idea here

combines motion censors and the projectors,

which means you have a completely interactive piece that

you can touch and change.

The whole room has been fully calibrated so the censors can detect

where everyone in the installation is really, really accurately.

The artwork, the project, the projections,

are calculated live.

This is not prerecorded video.

The pictures really do react to whatever you do

while you're in the room.

So, for example, I can...

THUMP.

..kill a butterfly.

Don't show this at home, kids.

Don't try this at home, kids.

This room is called Flowers Bloom On People.

With no-one in here, it's just a black room but if you sit

around for a few minute, you'll find that nature

starts to grow on you.

Now I would say this is pretty cutting-edge projectector technology

but Marc Cieslak has assured me he can give this

a run for his money.

Go on then, Marc.

This is a home entertainment concept from Razor, a

company most famous for manufacturing gaming PCs, covering

more lights than Blackpool Illuminations.

The concept makes use of coloured lights and projected

image, working together in synchronised harmony.

What we have here is a concept lighting rig, which is key to the

action on-screen.

So the lights in this room will change colour

depending on what's happening but it's only

part of what's going on.

So if I just hit this button here, we get the largest

screen I've ever seen.

And that giant screen size is thanks to a pretty expensive Forke

projector.

The projector is fitted with a 155- degree fish eye lens,

combined with two depth sensing cameras that scans the rooms for

objects and furniture, and the system adjusts

the image to prevent it from becoming distorting.

So the idea is that by having a screen that

envelopes, the peripheral vision of the viewer,

you really feel like you're thrown inside the action,

and it is surprisingly effective.

Oh, yeah!

At the moment, this system remains a concept but Razor has hinted it

might one day bring it to market.

Oh, I can see lightings and stuff playing.

I've been discovering some of the the latest ways

that the technology is being used to help the visually

impaired.

It all starts with a spot of virtual reality.

OK.

If you can try it this way.

You pull it over your eyes.

It just made me so, it was happiness but it made me cry and I just

couldn't believe that...

I'd been without full sight for so many years and then

all of a sudden I could see

things that I hadn't seen for 30 years.

Here at the Beacon Centre, a charity supporting

those with sight loss, an interesting trial

is taking place.

I'm going to start the video...

It seems some people can see things in

VR they could never see in the real world or on a screen.

I've lost Paul McCartney, though. You've lost Paul?

Yes. Oh, no, he's there now!

I'd never expected it but when they put the head set on,

I mean there was giraffes,

coming up and looking at me!

What would you say to other people with a similar level of

vision to you about the experience of being able to do this and the

emotional side of it?

Oh, if you've got the chance, you have to have a go.

There is nothing quite like it.

I mean I know it's not full sight, because you've got to wear a

machine, I'm not saying, that but to give you the experience,

it's just absolutely wonderful.

There are a wide range of conditions that cause sight loss.

The nature of which can vary hugely, and even

for those with similar problems, the benefits of the VR have varied.

By along with the University of Wolverhampton, experts are trying to

understand how this is possible at all.

What we found quite quickly is that people who had central loss,

macular type conditions, as they are called, are the ones

who seem to get most benefit.

Where they still had peripheral vision and whether that

peripheral vision is so stimulated as to fill in the gaps,

or, whatever wee don't

understand yet, is it because it's so close?

Is it because there are still sight receptive cells in the

centre of the vision, so that when they're

stimulated enough, that they

will fire and therefore create the vision?

Is it the curvature of the lens?

There's a whole host of things we're still trying to explore to

understand how it works.

If I could use that when my daughter's doing her school plays or

she's singing in the choir, I could never pick out

who she was or what she was doing, or be able to see

what you are seeing and that could really be quite life changing.

But, however clear the virtual world may seem, finding ways to ease

day-to-day tasks is a real priority.

Diversion to the left.

Temporary footway in road.

Five to 10 metres.

There are eye beacons built in here that connect this to the mobile

app, so if somebody is approaching and they

have the app installed in their phone, they will receive

an alert to let them know about the roadworks and how best

to approach them.

And for someone like Louise with two young kids, this smart

street furniture could make all the difference.

Because it tells you which way to go, so it can still in my pocket

I can have their hands, one in each, and I can

hear the voiceover, so it will say something

like the pedestrian crossing is coming on the left.

It's there for three days or however long.

So if I do the school run the same day, I know exactly

where it's going to be, I have done that walk yesterday.

Also this week, big claims from a company that say their smart

glasses can give the legally blind 20/20 vision.

As well as being able to stream content, they've captured the

user's surroundings, converting them into a form,

they say, is easier to identify for those

with limited vision.

Sadly we couldn't put a pair to the test just yet, and it's early

days for much of what is being trialled here but the possibilities

are certainly looking good.

That was Lara.

Now, virtual reality has been grabbing all the headlines

in recent years but don't forget augmented reality.

Now this is the idea of projecting computer

generated images on top of the real world.

A bit like this but in a pair of glasses.

Well a small band of augmented reality pioneers have

been really pushing the technology.

Here's Marc again with some pretty classy eyewear.

These augmented reality glasses are basically

a wearable computer.

For the last couple of years, augmented reality

specs have been used primarily in an industrial setting

or in the workplace.

These have been competed by a company called ODG, and they've

been designed far more with the consumer in mind.

They feel a lot closer to normal glasses,

so to get the best out of them, I want to move around.

So, I stand up, at the moment, there's a 360-degree video playing.

If I look around, I get a different viewpoint here.

I see a robot in front of me and what looks like some kind

of futuristic hospital, and there's a guy over here,

who seems very unhappy and another guy who looks seems

to be shooting at him.

The images move seemlessly with my head.

If I look around I can see planet earth in front of me.

But this is the cool bit, it moves.

I can walk inside it and see from outside of the planet, and

appreciate it from this angle, and if I stand here, yep, a Space

Station that's orbiting the earth as well.

Now, the glasses know where they are, spacially, as there are a

couple of cameras on front of them.

All of the processing is happening on the head set itself.

The ODGR-8 glasses will cost around ?800

but they are basically a wearable computer there.

Are some cheaper, lower tech AR options out there, though.

There are lots of low-cost virtual reality headsets that make use of

smartphones.

This is a low-cost augmented reality headset that uses a phone.

Phones slot inside it here.

Put an AR app in it and the images on the screen

is reflected right here.

So, let's give it a go.

So, when the headset's on, I can look down the screen

and I scan see graphics reflected from the phone

just in the headset.

Now, it has another trick up its sleeve as well.

You can attach peripherals on to it.

I can see my hands in front of me and use them to cast flames.

Take that, Mr Crocodile.

That's it for the short cut of Click for this

week from Transcending Boundaries at the Pace London gallery.

The full lengths of the programme is up on

iPlayer for you to you watch now and there's loads of photos from all

of this week's items on BBC Click.

Thanks for watching.

See you soon.