Hell's Gate computers

[MarkD]

How do the futuristic glass thin screens work?

[ScottWashburn]

Beautifully!

[MarkD]

I meant in technical terms. The screen is a see though sheet of glass. That said, then how do they work? Even in the Earth intro the little ID card the businessman had with Jake's photo was the same thing.

[Eternal Enigma]

In my own words how I understand it:

OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode) screens will be the next step in visual display technology. These paper thin completely transparent screens have been in development since the 80’s and they’ve recently become good enough to be manufactured into actual working screens for computer monitors and television displays. The one down side to this technology is one key word; organic. Because these screens are made from organic materials that means they break down and you see black streaks on the screens where the material no longer works properly. Advancements in this technology have improved the screen’s integrity and there are other OLED subtypes that are said to be even better. The future of this technology will be used for displays and lighting.

I’ve heard that they’re trying to engineer this organic material so that you can actually apply it to your living room wall as a type of “paint” (a material that can be applied to a surface and turn any surface into a video display) and you would be able to watch television on your wall to any scale you desire with restrictions to wall size of course. This technology is highly anticipated to be great for placing full scale advertisements on the buildings of the future. While the “paint” is still in early stages of development the OLED screens like what you see in Avatar are here now available to purchase; if you have the money. The two top developers are Samsung and Sony.

I used to have thousands of bookmarks on this subject, but this is what a quick internet search reveals.

Here is the Wikipedia on OLED technology, but keep in mind that not all things on Wikipedia are 100% accurate.

Organic light-emitting diode - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Here’s a YouTube video showing the durability of the OLED screens verses traditional LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) screens, which are currently the standard for monitors and televisions. At the end of the video you can see other videos of other types of OLED screens.

Here’s more OLED info from oled-info.com

OLED-Info | OLED TV and displays information and news

Here’s a PCworld.com article on one of Samsung’s prototype models, which can also be seen as links at the end of the YouTube video that I provided.

Samsung Shows Off See-Through Screens at CES | PCWorld

This is just a simple Google Image search for OLED Screens.

OLED screens - Google Search

The most exciting stuff is yet to come with the development of actual holographic projection technology underway indeed the future is here mate and these are exciting times for technology enthusiasts. James Cameron is pioneering 3D technology and God willing I’m sure he will pioneer holographic cinematography as well. Until then the next generation in video display technology is HD/3D on OLED/OLED subtype displays.

[MarkD]

I see, but those aren't see through like http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__...Ops_Center.png

[Eternal Enigma]

Yes, OLED technology is what you’re referring to. It can be seen in many different stages from solid and flexible, to having actual transparency.

Google <--search results for “Transparent OLED Display.”

OLED-TV Television

The OLED screens in the 80’s were far from transparent in fact they wouldn’t last for very long and if you bent them just one time you would destroy the organic materials and the screen would be ruined. Advancements have allowed for a lot of improvements and the newer OLED displays that I know very little about are actually transparent. I first learned about OLED technology in 2003 when I became very interested in the idea of using LED lights as regular house lighting instead of incandescent and fluorescent lights. That’s when I stumbled upon OLED technology. At first I was looking at them because they were referred to as “organic lighting” aka “Earth lighting” and eventually I found out about their display capabilities.

Most videos on YouTube are of the OLED technology at earlier stages, which were not transparent. I haven’t followed any advances in OLED technology since before 2009 and in fact the new subtypes (for example the AM-OLED) are brand new to me. The new displays currently in development are more like the displays seen at Hells Gate Tower. In the movie those screens aren’t real they’re only plexiglass reference markers, but the display screens at Hells Gate Tower are based off of OLED technology. As I said there are other subtypes and I haven’t been following the progress since 2009 so I have no idea what they have now other than what I can find in quick internet searches. They show this stuff at technology conventions around the world all the time where most of the stuff seen is still in the advanced prototype stages still years away from being sold as an actual product, but it’s still cool nonetheless.

Most people would rather not have a transparent display for their computer or watching television, but rather to have a completely clear screen that becomes solid when it’s turned on. Some of these types of displays are currently available to be purchased, but an 11” flat screen HD-OLED display will cost you at least $2,000. Or that’s what the price was in 2008. I’m sure as the technology progresses the displays will be cheaper. In near future OLED displays will be everywhere and quickly replace existing standards seen as state of the art today.

The transparent versions are being designed for many applications such as to use for window advertisements. The really cool thing that the auto industry is doing in their concept designs is that they’re incorporating these into the windshields of cars to give the driver a HUD (Heads Up Display). They’re going to make it fully interactive/customizable to allow the driver to display only the gauges/information he or she needs. They’re also working on this technology for improved vision for night time driving. Sort of like driving with night vision that displays across the windshield, but more advanced. There are lots of neat things going on in the automotive industries concept designs and the mixing of many new and upcoming technologies.

The almost science fiction side of video display technology is also being developed and is in it’s infancy. “Scientists” are working on tiny chips to be implanted directly in your eye onto your retina to display video directly to your brain. This technology is currently being developed to help the blind see and trials have allowed the neural interface aspect of this technology to have one blind man see in pixilated black and white. I saw this on the Discovery Channel. There’s a video of the man seeing well enough to make out shapes of trees and he even drove a car, but the camera system is retrofit to a pair of sunglasses. The technology for the chip implant is still in the “this is a joke” stage. Or at least it was last time I looked into it, which was a few years ago. It’s said that once this technology has been developed (I’ll be dead by then) that people will be able to watch television or use a computer without any physical displays.

Some of these developing technologies are going to be finalized well after most of us on the forum have died (or too far into the future to matter to us) so I’m just looking at the now and I’m waiting for affordable 60” (or larger) OLED televisions. It looks like these types of displays will be out and about as a mainstream product sometime by the year 2015. People are just now getting used to the idea of HDTV and 3D HDTV’s, but I would imagine the turnover rate of people switching to HD OLED displays from HD LCD displays to be quite high especially if the price is reasonable.

[Sanjwale]

I don't want a 3d screen, I want a OLED screen

[_Omaticaya_]

WOOOOOOW, damn, Thanks Eternal Enigma for opening up my horizons! damn i swear id didn't have a clue these things already existed, that is sooooooooo cool ^_^ That oled laptop with see through screen is FANTASTIC yet something else that makes Avatar more real and closer to us

[Ja'k Dawsiin]

that little clear-screen ipad thingie that Tony Stark had in the Senate meeting in IR2,was badass. i want one,too lol. thanks for posting the oled info.

[MarkD]

If you had a bank of those screens, you'd feel like you were at Hell's Gate.

That is cool. The movie shows the screens as just glass with spfx adding in what the screens will display. I bet in a few years or so we'll see all that Avatar tech in real life. well the human technology.