Home » Archives for October 2009
Lest you think that NVidia is the only GPU provider implementing acceleration for Flash video, AMD has just announced that they are also implementing hardware acceleration to be available on the same timeline at the NVidia offering.
AMD’s informed us that it plans to support Adobe Flash Player 10.1 at the same level and in step with the beta release later this year.
“AMD is committed to making the video usage scenario — playback, editing and transcoding — a focal point for AMD platform innovation, smartly using the full CPU + GPU assets of our platform to enrich and accelerate the experience,” an AMD representative told us.
via AMD/ATI Accelerating GPU Flash Player 10.1 Too – Tom’s Hardware.
Hardware amd, ati, flash
OpenCL is poised to be the replacement for NVidia’s popular CUDA libraries, but driver development is coming along slowly. Anandtech takes a look at the available options and writes it up on their site.
Last week NVIDIA released their first set of end-user OpenCL drivers. Previously OpenCL drivers had only been available for developers on the NVIDIA side of things, and this continues to be the case on the AMD side of things. With NVIDIA’s driver release, the launch of AMD’s 5800 series, and some recent developments with OpenCL, this is a good time to recap the current state of OpenCL, and what has changed since our OpenCL introductory article from last year.
via AnandTech.
Hardware, Science opencl
Here’s the roundup for today:
Graphics, Science pixels
MPC has updated their website with some behind-the-scenes VFX breakdowns of what you can see in the upcoming film Dorian Gray.
Promo – VFX Breakdowns.
Graphics breakdown, dorian gray, movie, mpc, vfx
The Associated Press has updated their Economic Stress Index Breakdown by County Infographic with new data from August 2009. Simply browse over the map to see unemployment, foreclosure, and bankruptcy statistics for the current month compared to October 2007. In addition you can click on the headers across the top to see individual statistics, or enable a slider allowing you to see the results for any month in the last 2 years.
Associated Press Interactive: AP Economic Stress Index.
Science ap, economic, financial, infographic, interactive
After the earlier post on the list of 10 AR Concept Games, someone on Twitter pointed out another fantastic game in-concept from Frantz Lasorne called “Scope”. From the description:
SCOPE merges the basic characteristics of video games and real-life toys to improve existing games or create new ones. By attributing various virtual parameters commonly used in video games (power, life, magic, experience, attack, weapons, etc.) to tangible toys, it brings the toys to life. With this approach, it is possible to create all sorts of videogame concepts mixed with the real world. For example, a child’s bedroom could become a natural battleground for play.
It’s an interesting concept using head-mounted displays for visuals and vision direction for selection (which is a bit clunky but effective). In the example he shows a turn-based battle-game between a lego man and some small bear toy (a mimobot maybe?)
See some video demonstrations of the concept after the break.
Read more…
Graphics augmented reality, toy, video game
Robin Strand & Stefan Gustavson have published some source-code, binaries, and documentation on a new Distance Transform algorithm that works with anti-aliased grayscale images (similar to OpenGL’s existing depthmap) rather than the super-high resolution images required by other methods. Their abstract:
We present a modified distance transform measure for use with anti-aliased grayscale images of arbitrary contours. The modified measure can be used in any vector-propagation Euclidean distance transform, and provides a much improved distance accuracy compared to a traditional binary image transform. We also modify the fast-marching method to get a smoother distance transform.
You can visit their modest website to visit the forums and read the pre-print version of the paper as a PDF.
Science algorithm, paper
When people think of Virtual Reality they immediately imagine seeing a virtual world full of sights and sensations not available in reality, but they almost never think of the sound. Ford has found a new use for Virtual Reality in using it to create the “Virtual Vehicle Sound Simulator” to test out various automotive noises on future prototype cars.
“We create an array of 76 different simulated sounds from data gathered about the proposed vehicle,” said Clapper. “We consider body shape and powertrain design under various road conditions and speeds. When we drive the simulator, it’s amazing how we’re able to recognize sounds with our ears that we would have never picked up otherwise from that mountain of data.”
via SOUND EFFECTS: FORD USING VIRTUAL REALITY TO FINE-TUNE SOUND QUALITY INSIDE FUTURE VEHICLES | Ford Motor Company Newsroom.
Hardware, Science automotive, ford, sound, virtual reality
Augmented Planet has compiled a 2-part list (part1, part 2) of Augmented Reality concept games. None of the games on the list are publicly available yet, but it’s a great selection. Many of the games on the list we’ve covered before like Ahrrr. So go check it out, and then make sure to browse the full list of Augmented Reality News here on VizWorld.
Top 10 Augmented Reality Concept Games – Part 2 | AugmentedPlanet.
Science augmented reality, list, video game
About two weeks ago, news made a splash all over the internet that NVidia wasn’t going to implement DirectX11, shunning and infuriating video gamers around the world. This game from the following quote made by Mike Hara at an analysts conference:
“DirectX 11 by itself is not going be the defining reason to buy a new GPU. It will be one of the reasons.”
I’m sure that NVidia will implement DirectX11, probably as soon as it’s available. The focus of his comment was that DirectX and Video Games are not the powerful driving force behind video cards that they once were. In this feature I take a look in-depth at what NVidia is up to and what recent changes could mean for the gaming industry, and come up with 3 main reasons why DirectX is not the industry-driver it once was.
Read more…
Graphics, Hardware, Science directx, feature, nvidia, opengl
VizWorld.com 
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