December 3, 2021 • 23 mins
In this episode, we introduce the REALHOLO project. Partners Hagen Stolle and Johannes Pleikies from SeeReal Technologies speak about the goals and challenges in this H2020 project which aims to bring holography to the forefront by prototyping practical applications.
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 101014977.
This project is an initiative of the Photonics Public Private Partnership.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
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Intro (00:01):
This is a Technikon podcast.
Peter Balint (00:08):
Have you heard of mixed reality? Sure, you may have
heard this phrase thrown around here and there, but what
is it really and how can this technology benefit you?
I am Peter Balint from Technikon and today we introduce the
REALHOLO project. In this European H2020 effort, project partners are
(00:29):
aiming to move mixed reality in the direction of, well,
reality and to clarify mixed reality is the blending of
the physical world with digital objects. In this environment, real
and cyber objects co-exist and interact in real time. And
the only way to effectively do this is by using Holography.
(00:51):
And this is where REALHOLO comes in. Scientists are working
on using micro mirrors to project these lifelike holographic objects.
It's no easy task or even easy to understand, but
to help us along today, we welcome Hagen Stolle and Johannes Pleikies from
SeeReal Technologies in Germany, whose mission is the development of
(01:14):
holographic 3D displays. Let's have a listen. Welcome, gentlemen, to
this podcast about REALHOLO .
Hagen Stolle (01:25):
Thanks, thanks for asking us to join.
Johannes Pleikies (01:27):
Yeah, thank you.
Peter Balint (01:28):
Tell us about the overarching mission in REALHOLO . And
we'll start with you, Johannes.
Johannes Pleikies (01:33):
Yeah. So the mission of the REALHOLO project one can
summarize such that we are developing a display technology for
mixed reality displays, which can be called real holographic. Mixed reality,
in general is emerging technology with a lot of promising
(02:00):
applications that can connect computer generated content and human perception,
and in the scope of mixed reality displays. That means
the display can allow to show content as it is
naturally seen by a human. So that means there are
(02:21):
that cues that the human is used to see in
the real world and that should be available at once
or in mixed reality displays. And in REALHOLO , we
will get a step further in allowing to reach such
(02:42):
ideal mixed reality displays and the main objective of REALHOLO is the
development of this new type of spatial light modulator that
will allow new types of mixed reality displays which have
(03:03):
new and extended feature sets. Hagen, what do you think? Do you
want to add something on this?
Hagen Stolle (03:12):
yeah Johannes actually explained it quite well, but what one can say
to provoke the imagination of what does a modulator do
when it does phase modulation of light you know because people
may hesitate and think about what is phase modulation? You could
say that the normal displays like you have in your
mobile phone or on your desktop only modulates the brightness
(03:36):
in each pixel, which we call the empty to the flight.
And if you compare it to waves, you can use
water waves if you want to put the height of
the waves that you modulate. But what we also modulate
in a hologram is the timing of these waves, which
is called the phase. So we don't only control the
height of the waves, but also the timing of waves.
(03:58):
And then you can imagine or may even remember from
the physics schools and class in schools you could you
could say, OK, if I know a modulate the timing,
the phase and the brightness of each pixel, I can
actually decide how the light interferes when travelling to your eyes.
(04:18):
And then you can imagine, OK, if then the light
waves interfere in space. These little 3D objects are created
in real space, not on the flat display. So the
whole principle of holography is different from from typical standard
2D displaying, so it just makes a whole difference. And
this micro display that we're developing actually enables very clean
(04:41):
modulation of these phase values by micronic movements of of
little mirrors.
Peter Balint (04:50):
OK, and to go back briefly to this idea of
mixed reality. Some listeners may have the idea of virtual
reality and maybe mix up the two. In mixed reality
we're sort of merging the real world and the virtual world.
Is that correct?
Hagen Stolle (05:05):
Yeah, I agree. So so there are different terms like
mixed reality and augmented reality, etc. So mixed reality. I
would mix real life content, real life objects with virtual objects.
And the really cool feature of real holography is that
the virtual objects are placed right next to the real objects.
(05:27):
And if you look at them, if they're perfectly done,
you cannot really differentiate between them. If the holograms are
really well done and then if you if you if
you look at them, your eyes really gets the same
information as they receive from the real objects. So you
can focus on these objects if you move around a
bit and space left and right, they move relatively to their
(05:49):
peers in space, virtual or natural. And that's really what
makes a true a real hologram and that the objects
behave the same as their Real-Life counterparts.
Peter Balint (06:01):
Hagen, I want to ask you as a company which, as
I mentioned earlier, you're working for and representing SeeReal in
the project. Tell us a little bit about what your
company is doing for REALHOLO .
Hagen Stolle (06:12):
So SeeReal has been working on such kind of technologies
for for many years, so we have expertise and experience
in holographic display technology. That whole range, from hardware development
to hologram computation in real time. And we are applying
the solutions that we generate and the scope of being hollow.
So we actually we have working prototypes that that use
(06:35):
holographic principles. So we can we can already show that
to the concepts of real holography work. We just want
to make them better and bring them to a commercial
level with these new components.
Peter Balint (06:46):
So it sounds like SeeReal is a perfect partner because
you have the experience to really push this thing forward.
Hagen Stolle (06:52):
Yes, we would tend to agree. So we work on -
we focus really on on real holographic 3D solutions. And
so this is our main purpose of the company. So
this is, you know, like our home field, we really
love doing this. And this device, that is being developed,
(07:14):
is perfectly suited for our applications. And then it it
doesn't really matter if it's - in which space you use this you know,
if it's really we aiming at 3D displays, but you
could also use in other applications ranging from scientific instrumentation
to astronomic devices, et cetera. But we are focusing on
(07:34):
this real 3D display devices.
Peter Balint (07:37):
We've done a lot of talk about 3D and Holography Johannes,
but I have a feeling that there is some misuse
when it comes to these two terms. And I think
you would agree. Tell us more about this.
Johannes Pleikies (07:50):
Yeah, Peter, you're right. So quite often in marketing messages,
one can find officially the word 3D and together with display,
and quite often they are even called holographic, but quite often
they are quite far away from the real holography, as
(08:11):
it is set by the physics. So Holography is generally
considered as the gold standard for 3D displays, and therefore
this term is quite often used for marketing purposes.
Peter Balint (08:25):
So 3D is not always 3D.
Johannes Pleikies (08:28):
Yeah, that's true. So quite often it's just two dimensions
and a little bit more.
Hagen Stolle (08:36):
We would say it's never 3D, before you really make
a holographic display. Maybe we are a bit biased, but
in principle, whatever you see on the market is not
really 3D.
Johannes Pleikies (08:48):
So basically, in real Holography, the wave of the light
is modulated such that one can see the scene as it
would really appear in real life. So basically, your eye
can focus on one part of the scene and the
(09:08):
other parts, which are maybe at a different depth. So
for example, if you focus to something which is in
touching distance and then the objects on the horizon will focus,
you can decide yourself where to look at, and the
display doesn't even change information. Still, one can concentrate on
(09:33):
different parts of the scene, and that's exactly what is
also happening in real life. And with such a display,
one can generate the same perception. And that's. So this
features are very important for mixed reality because of course,
(09:55):
they should integrate as good as possible into the reality.
Peter Balint (10:01):
And that's the the goal of REALHOLO . And I
wonder Hagen which industry is screaming the loudest for this
technology that you're developing in REALHOLO?
Hagen Stolle (10:11):
The use of real holographic 3D displays is driven by content,
of course. I mean, you need to have something to
show on a display, but there's a lot of 3D
data out there, but it's also driven by early use
cases and somebody daring to start with it. So, of course,
there's a big market of augmented reality and mixed reality,
(10:31):
but making a mobile display is quite challenging in terms
of power consumption, et cetera. So we are quite happy
to have this partnership the with automotive partner, Volkswagen, the largest
car maker in the world. So it's a it's a
nice starting point for us, and they want to use
this projection device or the holographic projection system for head up displays
(10:52):
to show 3D information in front of the driver or of
the co-driver, the passengers. And there are of course head up displays today. But
they are all 2D displays, so you show up a
2D plane in space somewhere in front of the driver
for showing the speed of the car on navigational information.
(11:12):
But this is a holographic display you can really show
these in proper space. So which means you can show the
navigation arrow at the street corner where you want to take a
turn or you can show a point of interest to the
driver to say, OK, that's where I'm going to shop.
That's where you want to exit the car. Autonomous driving,
you don't need to grab the steering wheel. You could
(11:33):
just watch where you're going and things like that. So
they are really interested in this type of application. But
of course, you could also use this for other applications,
and I think one of them may not be as obvious.
But if you think of a front projection, you know,
like the video beamer you have, maybe in your home
theater or a movie theater even, you you can increase the
(11:53):
contrast of the black levels, which is called high dynamic range.
So you can really make the images popping more out,
you know, by just making sure that the so it's
a 2D projection and the home theater. But the black levels,
you know, are just created by blocking some light. But
if you use this real hollow device inside the engine,
(12:14):
then you could actually ensure that the pixels that are supposed
to show a dark range in the night sky don't
get any light. So then the contrast of your 2D
projection becomes much, much better, and it becomes so much nicer.
So there is, even outside the real holographic display space, there's
a lot of applications that you could use this device.
Peter Balint (12:35):
But but it's mainly driven by the automotive industry. Is
that right?
Hagen Stolle (12:38):
Yeah. We are starting in the automotive industry and this
is really a cool application because right now, sometimes even
there's a head up display. You know, you don't have
to look down at your actual navigation system, just look
in front of you. But the navigation arrow still pointed
somewhere in the fixed distance today because that's a fixed
distance of your 2D projection head up display. And you
(12:59):
may still wondering, am I taking the turn on the
second or the third street on the right now? Because
the arrow is in the fixed distance. In a holographic display,
this arrow pinned to the street corner and while you're driving,
it stays there and you know exactly where to take
a turn.
Peter Balint (13:16):
So it's as if the arrow is actually there. I mean,
that's the way it looks to the driver that this
arrow in the street saying, turn here.
Hagen Stolle (13:23):
Exactly.
Peter Balint (13:24):
Yeah. Nice. So Johannes back to the project when you
are moving towards completion. There will be a demonstrator. And
can you tell us a little bit about what that
demonstrator is all about?
Johannes Pleikies (13:38):
Yeah. First, we are going to develop the SLM and then
we are going to demonstrate it. As you pointed out,
it's not only in one use case demonstration but in two.
And the first use case demonstration was already mentioned by Hagen.
That's the case of a head up display for the
(14:00):
automotive industry. That would be several different use cases within
the car for showing information to the driver, and this
will especially change in the future, when autonomous driving is
more and more developing. Then there will be the second demonstrator,
(14:21):
which is not directly mixed reality, but more a structured light
protection system. We are going to build the active headlamp,
which is using this SLM for protection on the street. So
(14:41):
for automotive use case a headlamp , that can show some
information on the street. And so here also, we are
looking for automotive market and we have two future trends here also
in focus. One is energy efficiency. And the second thing
is that there might be some communication needed between them.
(15:05):
Autonomous car and some human traffic participants and such an
active head lamp might be used for such a use case.
Hagen Stolle (15:18):
Yeah, actually, what I could add is that we have,
on one hand, really excited to work on making this
new device because it would improve the quality of holographic
image generation significantly. But on the other hand, we want
to demonstrate that it really works well and to show
the improvement. But the project is quite complex. So to
make such a device very high resolution, the high speed,
(15:40):
high precision is really a challenging project. So we have
to make sure that we use our budget accordingly. So
so only whatever 10 percent or so maybe a bit more is left
for the for the validation in our head up display
set up. But but the good thing is that are
working on such optical solutions anyway. So what we what
(16:00):
we can do is you can use some of our
of our knowhow and experience from head up display development
and and replace, you know, prior art modulators with a
new device and directly compare the quality improvements. So which
makes our lives much easier so we can show the
(16:22):
improvement rather straight away with minor modifications, and I think
this is a nice advantage that they can focus all
the effort in this project onto really making this new device.
Peter Balint (16:33):
Yeah, and Hagen this is incredible technology that for some
might sound a little bit like science fiction, but what
is the reality in terms of when we might see
these technologies in our world?
Hagen Stolle (16:46):
This is a good question. We want to get our
hands on on really devices that use this technology, and
we really love working on this automotive project because we
think it's really well-suited for for these new features. If
you can imagine, you know, protecting objects really onto onto
(17:07):
the street in front of you and the real positions.
But unfortunately, automotive projects typically take a few years more
than the normal project because you have all these safety certifications,
environmental tests and things like that. So head up display
in an automotive device or an automobile may, may actually
take up to five years, you know, is it maybe
(17:30):
26 27 when we see this in an actual car,
which is quite long. So other applications, whereas this device
can be used earlier is, for instance, front projection to
increase the HDR quality, high dynamic range image quality, increasing
black levels to make front projects and really more high
(17:53):
quality and more comparable to these large flat-screen displays, but
even at larger sizes. So the REALHOLO component of the
MEMS device, the pase of light modulator, how we call
it is really a projection engine that can be used
in the automotive space, which takes at least five years
(18:16):
to bring to market, but also in the front projection
and quality improvement like black levels and HDR image quality,
which may take only two years or three.
Peter Balint (18:26):
So the good news is there's really cool stuff happening,
and we just have to be patient a little bit. But it's coming.
Hagen Stolle (18:32):
Unfortunately, yes, but we are working hard on it.
Peter Balint (18:35):
Johannes, I want to ask you, this project has been
underway for a little less than a year now, and
that means you're about a quarter of the way through.
But have there been any unforeseen challenges?
Johannes Pleikies (18:49):
Yeah, Peter, that's that's a good question. There are challenges, indeed.
But until now, I would say we didn't find any unforeseen challenges.
So we have been preparing the project for some time
already with the project partner from Fraunhofer IMS . And
(19:14):
so we can say that our initial plans were quite
well thought of, and we did not really find large
rocking points or anything that seemed too ambitious in the
space of the project until now. So I would say
(19:38):
we we have some work to do, but we we
would not see very critical challenges.
Hagen Stolle (19:47):
Yeah, Johannes. You could actually say that we had a bit
of a running start. And fortunately, because we had some
prior studies and smaller projects, was the some of the
partners before to make sure it's really feasible. So we've
learned a bit before to make sure that it's really possible.
But it's still quite a challenging project because if you
(20:09):
just imagine what the precision of these devices has to be,
it's it's quite mind boggling. Prior micro mirror devices only switched the
light in each pixel on an officer's basically two end
positions and the flipping back and forth between those two positions.
You can imagine it's quite easy and still hard enough
to do this at high speed. But but we are
(20:30):
switching these tiny mirrors with 250 different positions, and the
total range is only 250 nanometers, so a quarter of
a micron. The total range and we split this up
into there are actually 100 and sorry, 125 positions approximately. So
(20:51):
we shift the mirror with increments of two nanometers or
three nanometers, which is really amazing. That it is technically possible.
So this is actually what we had to validate as
this is really possible to do these final adjustments with
an electrical drive and there's a certain mirror quality, planarity, etc.
(21:13):
And the springs that are helping to push this up
and down has to be of a certain precision. So
each mirror and the big array does the same job.
You know, it sees the same voltage and does the
same movement versus voltage range. So this is this is
part of the challenge to make sure this really works
homogeneously across a whole array of many millions of mirrors.
(21:37):
But we have a good partner, Fraunhofer IMS , who has
been working on such technologies before. So we're scaling this.
And so it's a lot of hard work, but we're
confident that we can get there. And also the electric
aside , the driving the voltage just to this mirrors, of course,
has to be of similar precision to make sure that
each pixel get the right voltage, no matter if it's
in the left corner, of the display. So this is
(22:00):
a lot of hard work with very fine precision. So
but we're confident that we will get there, and the
first year of development actually didn't bring up any any
reasons that we're not able to achieve this. So this is
quite nice to have to be still on the path
to our target specification.
Peter Balint (22:20):
Yeah, that's actually really encouraging. So this is our first
podcast in REALHOLO , and I'm certain that at some
point we will come back just to get a little update.
But for now, I want to say thanks for this
really great introduction to the project, and we wish you
much success as you move forward on REALHOLO .
Johannes Pleikies (22:38):
Thank you.
Hagen Stolle (22:39):
Thank you very much.
Outro (22:41):
For more information about REALHOLO , go to realholo.eu. This
project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020
Research and Innovation Programme under grant agreement number one zero
one zero one four nine seven seven. This project is
an initiative of the Photonics Public-Private Partnership.
This is a Technikon podcast.
Peter Balint (00:08):
Have you heard of mixed reality? Sure, you may have
heard this phrase thrown around here and there, but what
is it really and how can this technology benefit you?
I am Peter Balint from Technikon and today we introduce the
REALHOLO project. In this European H2020 effort, project partners are
(00:29):
aiming to move mixed reality in the direction of, well,
reality and to clarify mixed reality is the blending of
the physical world with digital objects. In this environment, real
and cyber objects co-exist and interact in real time. And
the only way to effectively do this is by using Holography.
(00:51):
And this is where REALHOLO comes in. Scientists are working
on using micro mirrors to project these lifelike holographic objects.
It's no easy task or even easy to understand, but
to help us along today, we welcome Hagen Stolle and Johannes Pleikies from
SeeReal Technologies in Germany, whose mission is the development of
(01:14):
holographic 3D displays. Let's have a listen. Welcome, gentlemen, to
this podcast about REALHOLO .
Hagen Stolle (01:25):
Thanks, thanks for asking us to join.
Johannes Pleikies (01:27):
Yeah, thank you.
Peter Balint (01:28):
Tell us about the overarching mission in REALHOLO . And
we'll start with you, Johannes.
Johannes Pleikies (01:33):
Yeah. So the mission of the REALHOLO project one can
summarize such that we are developing a display technology for
mixed reality displays, which can be called real holographic. Mixed reality,
in general is emerging technology with a lot of promising
(02:00):
applications that can connect computer generated content and human perception,
and in the scope of mixed reality displays. That means
the display can allow to show content as it is
naturally seen by a human. So that means there are
(02:21):
that cues that the human is used to see in
the real world and that should be available at once
or in mixed reality displays. And in REALHOLO , we
will get a step further in allowing to reach such
(02:42):
ideal mixed reality displays and the main objective of REALHOLO is the
development of this new type of spatial light modulator that
will allow new types of mixed reality displays which have
(03:03):
new and extended feature sets. Hagen, what do you think? Do you
want to add something on this?
Hagen Stolle (03:12):
yeah Johannes actually explained it quite well, but what one can say
to provoke the imagination of what does a modulator do
when it does phase modulation of light you know because people
may hesitate and think about what is phase modulation? You could
say that the normal displays like you have in your
mobile phone or on your desktop only modulates the brightness
(03:36):
in each pixel, which we call the empty to the flight.
And if you compare it to waves, you can use
water waves if you want to put the height of
the waves that you modulate. But what we also modulate
in a hologram is the timing of these waves, which
is called the phase. So we don't only control the
height of the waves, but also the timing of waves.
(03:58):
And then you can imagine or may even remember from
the physics schools and class in schools you could you
could say, OK, if I know a modulate the timing,
the phase and the brightness of each pixel, I can
actually decide how the light interferes when travelling to your eyes.
(04:18):
And then you can imagine, OK, if then the light
waves interfere in space. These little 3D objects are created
in real space, not on the flat display. So the
whole principle of holography is different from from typical standard
2D displaying, so it just makes a whole difference. And
this micro display that we're developing actually enables very clean
(04:41):
modulation of these phase values by micronic movements of of
little mirrors.
Peter Balint (04:50):
OK, and to go back briefly to this idea of
mixed reality. Some listeners may have the idea of virtual
reality and maybe mix up the two. In mixed reality
we're sort of merging the real world and the virtual world.
Is that correct?
Hagen Stolle (05:05):
Yeah, I agree. So so there are different terms like
mixed reality and augmented reality, etc. So mixed reality. I
would mix real life content, real life objects with virtual objects.
And the really cool feature of real holography is that
the virtual objects are placed right next to the real objects.
(05:27):
And if you look at them, if they're perfectly done,
you cannot really differentiate between them. If the holograms are
really well done and then if you if you if
you look at them, your eyes really gets the same
information as they receive from the real objects. So you
can focus on these objects if you move around a
bit and space left and right, they move relatively to their
(05:49):
peers in space, virtual or natural. And that's really what
makes a true a real hologram and that the objects
behave the same as their Real-Life counterparts.
Peter Balint (06:01):
Hagen, I want to ask you as a company which, as
I mentioned earlier, you're working for and representing SeeReal in
the project. Tell us a little bit about what your
company is doing for REALHOLO .
Hagen Stolle (06:12):
So SeeReal has been working on such kind of technologies
for for many years, so we have expertise and experience
in holographic display technology. That whole range, from hardware development
to hologram computation in real time. And we are applying
the solutions that we generate and the scope of being hollow.
So we actually we have working prototypes that that use
(06:35):
holographic principles. So we can we can already show that
to the concepts of real holography work. We just want
to make them better and bring them to a commercial
level with these new components.
Peter Balint (06:46):
So it sounds like SeeReal is a perfect partner because
you have the experience to really push this thing forward.
Hagen Stolle (06:52):
Yes, we would tend to agree. So we work on -
we focus really on on real holographic 3D solutions. And
so this is our main purpose of the company. So
this is, you know, like our home field, we really
love doing this. And this device, that is being developed,
(07:14):
is perfectly suited for our applications. And then it it
doesn't really matter if it's - in which space you use this you know,
if it's really we aiming at 3D displays, but you
could also use in other applications ranging from scientific instrumentation
to astronomic devices, et cetera. But we are focusing on
(07:34):
this real 3D display devices.
Peter Balint (07:37):
We've done a lot of talk about 3D and Holography Johannes,
but I have a feeling that there is some misuse
when it comes to these two terms. And I think
you would agree. Tell us more about this.
Johannes Pleikies (07:50):
Yeah, Peter, you're right. So quite often in marketing messages,
one can find officially the word 3D and together with display,
and quite often they are even called holographic, but quite often
they are quite far away from the real holography, as
(08:11):
it is set by the physics. So Holography is generally
considered as the gold standard for 3D displays, and therefore
this term is quite often used for marketing purposes.
Peter Balint (08:25):
So 3D is not always 3D.
Johannes Pleikies (08:28):
Yeah, that's true. So quite often it's just two dimensions
and a little bit more.
Hagen Stolle (08:36):
We would say it's never 3D, before you really make
a holographic display. Maybe we are a bit biased, but
in principle, whatever you see on the market is not
really 3D.
Johannes Pleikies (08:48):
So basically, in real Holography, the wave of the light
is modulated such that one can see the scene as it
would really appear in real life. So basically, your eye
can focus on one part of the scene and the
(09:08):
other parts, which are maybe at a different depth. So
for example, if you focus to something which is in
touching distance and then the objects on the horizon will focus,
you can decide yourself where to look at, and the
display doesn't even change information. Still, one can concentrate on
(09:33):
different parts of the scene, and that's exactly what is
also happening in real life. And with such a display,
one can generate the same perception. And that's. So this
features are very important for mixed reality because of course,
(09:55):
they should integrate as good as possible into the reality.
Peter Balint (10:01):
And that's the the goal of REALHOLO . And I
wonder Hagen which industry is screaming the loudest for this
technology that you're developing in REALHOLO?
Hagen Stolle (10:11):
The use of real holographic 3D displays is driven by content,
of course. I mean, you need to have something to
show on a display, but there's a lot of 3D
data out there, but it's also driven by early use
cases and somebody daring to start with it. So, of course,
there's a big market of augmented reality and mixed reality,
(10:31):
but making a mobile display is quite challenging in terms
of power consumption, et cetera. So we are quite happy
to have this partnership the with automotive partner, Volkswagen, the largest
car maker in the world. So it's a it's a
nice starting point for us, and they want to use
this projection device or the holographic projection system for head up displays
(10:52):
to show 3D information in front of the driver or of
the co-driver, the passengers. And there are of course head up displays today. But
they are all 2D displays, so you show up a
2D plane in space somewhere in front of the driver
for showing the speed of the car on navigational information.
(11:12):
But this is a holographic display you can really show
these in proper space. So which means you can show the
navigation arrow at the street corner where you want to take a
turn or you can show a point of interest to the
driver to say, OK, that's where I'm going to shop.
That's where you want to exit the car. Autonomous driving,
you don't need to grab the steering wheel. You could
(11:33):
just watch where you're going and things like that. So
they are really interested in this type of application. But
of course, you could also use this for other applications,
and I think one of them may not be as obvious.
But if you think of a front projection, you know,
like the video beamer you have, maybe in your home
theater or a movie theater even, you you can increase the
(11:53):
contrast of the black levels, which is called high dynamic range.
So you can really make the images popping more out,
you know, by just making sure that the so it's
a 2D projection and the home theater. But the black levels,
you know, are just created by blocking some light. But
if you use this real hollow device inside the engine,
(12:14):
then you could actually ensure that the pixels that are supposed
to show a dark range in the night sky don't
get any light. So then the contrast of your 2D
projection becomes much, much better, and it becomes so much nicer.
So there is, even outside the real holographic display space, there's
a lot of applications that you could use this device.
Peter Balint (12:35):
But but it's mainly driven by the automotive industry. Is
that right?
Hagen Stolle (12:38):
Yeah. We are starting in the automotive industry and this
is really a cool application because right now, sometimes even
there's a head up display. You know, you don't have
to look down at your actual navigation system, just look
in front of you. But the navigation arrow still pointed
somewhere in the fixed distance today because that's a fixed
distance of your 2D projection head up display. And you
(12:59):
may still wondering, am I taking the turn on the
second or the third street on the right now? Because
the arrow is in the fixed distance. In a holographic display,
this arrow pinned to the street corner and while you're driving,
it stays there and you know exactly where to take
a turn.
Peter Balint (13:16):
So it's as if the arrow is actually there. I mean,
that's the way it looks to the driver that this
arrow in the street saying, turn here.
Hagen Stolle (13:23):
Exactly.
Peter Balint (13:24):
Yeah. Nice. So Johannes back to the project when you
are moving towards completion. There will be a demonstrator. And
can you tell us a little bit about what that
demonstrator is all about?
Johannes Pleikies (13:38):
Yeah. First, we are going to develop the SLM and then
we are going to demonstrate it. As you pointed out,
it's not only in one use case demonstration but in two.
And the first use case demonstration was already mentioned by Hagen.
That's the case of a head up display for the
(14:00):
automotive industry. That would be several different use cases within
the car for showing information to the driver, and this
will especially change in the future, when autonomous driving is
more and more developing. Then there will be the second demonstrator,
(14:21):
which is not directly mixed reality, but more a structured light
protection system. We are going to build the active headlamp,
which is using this SLM for protection on the street. So
(14:41):
for automotive use case a headlamp , that can show some
information on the street. And so here also, we are
looking for automotive market and we have two future trends here also
in focus. One is energy efficiency. And the second thing
is that there might be some communication needed between them.
(15:05):
Autonomous car and some human traffic participants and such an
active head lamp might be used for such a use case.
Hagen Stolle (15:18):
Yeah, actually, what I could add is that we have,
on one hand, really excited to work on making this
new device because it would improve the quality of holographic
image generation significantly. But on the other hand, we want
to demonstrate that it really works well and to show
the improvement. But the project is quite complex. So to
make such a device very high resolution, the high speed,
(15:40):
high precision is really a challenging project. So we have
to make sure that we use our budget accordingly. So
so only whatever 10 percent or so maybe a bit more is left
for the for the validation in our head up display
set up. But but the good thing is that are
working on such optical solutions anyway. So what we what
(16:00):
we can do is you can use some of our
of our knowhow and experience from head up display development
and and replace, you know, prior art modulators with a
new device and directly compare the quality improvements. So which
makes our lives much easier so we can show the
(16:22):
improvement rather straight away with minor modifications, and I think
this is a nice advantage that they can focus all
the effort in this project onto really making this new device.
Peter Balint (16:33):
Yeah, and Hagen this is incredible technology that for some
might sound a little bit like science fiction, but what
is the reality in terms of when we might see
these technologies in our world?
Hagen Stolle (16:46):
This is a good question. We want to get our
hands on on really devices that use this technology, and
we really love working on this automotive project because we
think it's really well-suited for for these new features. If
you can imagine, you know, protecting objects really onto onto
(17:07):
the street in front of you and the real positions.
But unfortunately, automotive projects typically take a few years more
than the normal project because you have all these safety certifications,
environmental tests and things like that. So head up display
in an automotive device or an automobile may, may actually
take up to five years, you know, is it maybe
(17:30):
26 27 when we see this in an actual car,
which is quite long. So other applications, whereas this device
can be used earlier is, for instance, front projection to
increase the HDR quality, high dynamic range image quality, increasing
black levels to make front projects and really more high
(17:53):
quality and more comparable to these large flat-screen displays, but
even at larger sizes. So the REALHOLO component of the
MEMS device, the pase of light modulator, how we call
it is really a projection engine that can be used
in the automotive space, which takes at least five years
(18:16):
to bring to market, but also in the front projection
and quality improvement like black levels and HDR image quality,
which may take only two years or three.
Peter Balint (18:26):
So the good news is there's really cool stuff happening,
and we just have to be patient a little bit. But it's coming.
Hagen Stolle (18:32):
Unfortunately, yes, but we are working hard on it.
Peter Balint (18:35):
Johannes, I want to ask you, this project has been
underway for a little less than a year now, and
that means you're about a quarter of the way through.
But have there been any unforeseen challenges?
Johannes Pleikies (18:49):
Yeah, Peter, that's that's a good question. There are challenges, indeed.
But until now, I would say we didn't find any unforeseen challenges.
So we have been preparing the project for some time
already with the project partner from Fraunhofer IMS . And
(19:14):
so we can say that our initial plans were quite
well thought of, and we did not really find large
rocking points or anything that seemed too ambitious in the
space of the project until now. So I would say
(19:38):
we we have some work to do, but we we
would not see very critical challenges.
Hagen Stolle (19:47):
Yeah, Johannes. You could actually say that we had a bit
of a running start. And fortunately, because we had some
prior studies and smaller projects, was the some of the
partners before to make sure it's really feasible. So we've
learned a bit before to make sure that it's really possible.
But it's still quite a challenging project because if you
(20:09):
just imagine what the precision of these devices has to be,
it's it's quite mind boggling. Prior micro mirror devices only switched the
light in each pixel on an officer's basically two end
positions and the flipping back and forth between those two positions.
You can imagine it's quite easy and still hard enough
to do this at high speed. But but we are
(20:30):
switching these tiny mirrors with 250 different positions, and the
total range is only 250 nanometers, so a quarter of
a micron. The total range and we split this up
into there are actually 100 and sorry, 125 positions approximately. So
(20:51):
we shift the mirror with increments of two nanometers or
three nanometers, which is really amazing. That it is technically possible.
So this is actually what we had to validate as
this is really possible to do these final adjustments with
an electrical drive and there's a certain mirror quality, planarity, etc.
(21:13):
And the springs that are helping to push this up
and down has to be of a certain precision. So
each mirror and the big array does the same job.
You know, it sees the same voltage and does the
same movement versus voltage range. So this is this is
part of the challenge to make sure this really works
homogeneously across a whole array of many millions of mirrors.
(21:37):
But we have a good partner, Fraunhofer IMS , who has
been working on such technologies before. So we're scaling this.
And so it's a lot of hard work, but we're
confident that we can get there. And also the electric
aside , the driving the voltage just to this mirrors, of course,
has to be of similar precision to make sure that
each pixel get the right voltage, no matter if it's
in the left corner, of the display. So this is
(22:00):
a lot of hard work with very fine precision. So
but we're confident that we will get there, and the
first year of development actually didn't bring up any any
reasons that we're not able to achieve this. So this is
quite nice to have to be still on the path
to our target specification.
Peter Balint (22:20):
Yeah, that's actually really encouraging. So this is our first
podcast in REALHOLO , and I'm certain that at some
point we will come back just to get a little update.
But for now, I want to say thanks for this
really great introduction to the project, and we wish you
much success as you move forward on REALHOLO .
Johannes Pleikies (22:38):
Thank you.
Hagen Stolle (22:39):
Thank you very much.
Outro (22:41):
For more information about REALHOLO , go to realholo.eu. This
project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020
Research and Innovation Programme under grant agreement number one zero
one zero one four nine seven seven. This project is
an initiative of the Photonics Public-Private Partnership.
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