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The U.S. Census Bureau has released the data from its population count. This is important because seats in the House of Representatives are based on the population count for a state. It is expected that Texas will be the big winner this year, picking up an additional four seats in the House. Florida will gain two seats, while Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, South Carolina, Utah and Washington will each gain one seat.

Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey and Pennsylvania will each lose one seat. But it could be worse. They could have lost two House seats like Ohio and New York.

California is not gaining a seat in the House for the first time ever.

Above is an interactive graphic from the U.S. Census Bureau. Thus far, 2010 data has not been incorporated into the graphic, although that is likely to happen soon.

The U.S. Census Bureau announced today that the 2010 Census showed the resident population of the United States on April 1, 2010, was 308,745,538.

The resident population represented an increase of 9.7 percent over the 2000 U.S. resident population of 281,421,906.

via : 2010 Census Data

Graphics census

Asylum VFX is closed, but that really just means there’s another wave of great talent on the streets.  One of them, Nathan McGuinness, just got a job with Double Negative as Creative Director at their Singapore shop.

“We’ve admired the work Nathan and the team at Asylum did for a long time, and enjoyed the collaboration our two companies had in working on The Sorcerer’s Apprentice this year,” says Double Negative managing director, Alex Hope. “We recognized kindred spirits during that process and were incredibly sad when we heard of its demise. We are so excited that Nathan is now joining Double Negative to creatively head up our operation in Singapore. Nathan’s enthusiasm and talent will assist us in continuing to grow the technical and creative capabilities of the company both in London and Singapore.”

via Post Magazine – Nathan McGuinness joins Double Negative.

Graphics asylum, doublenegative

Over at Tel Aviv University, Dr. Alex Bronstein is developing a new way to detect pirated video using methods similar to the animal kingdom.  By mapping a grid over the video and analyzing various aspects mathematically, he can create a type of “genetic code” that can then be used to determine similarities between other videos.

The technique is called “video DNA matching.” It detects aberrations in pirated video in the same way that biologists detect mutations in the genetic code to determine, for example, an individual’s family connections. The technique works by identifying features of the film that remain basically unchanged by typical color and resolution manipulations, and geometric transformations. It’s effective even with border changes, commercials added or scenes edited out

This can then provide a type of “similarity metric”, similar to geneology tests.  The end result, he hopes, is a semi-automatic tool that can be used by the likes of YouTube and other studios to combat copyright infringement more effectively that current methods.

via Catching video pirates: Invisible DNA-like fingerprint on video assist law enforcement.

Science algorithm, copyright

Now here’s a clever trick, Quartarete TV and the Italian Sisvel Group have developed a new method of transmitting both Monoscopic 720P HD and Stereoscopic 3D in a single stream without any degradation of quality or display artifacts.  The trick is to put them into what would normally be a 1080p stream, and slicing up the alternate eye within the unused space (as shown above).

The 3D Tile Format was developed by the Sisvel Group (and inventors Paolo D’Amato and Giovanni Ballocca) and is being developed with the CSP-Innovazione nelle ICT, a Piedmont region research and development company that works with emerging technologies to productize them. The 3D Tile Format is a series of algorithms that splits a 3-D image into three parts that are compressed in H.264 and then transmitted along with a single HD frame.

It does require special hardware to reconstruct the view (which they hope to integrate into future televisions), but it’s pretty impressive.  This avoids the loss of resolution that comes with interlaced or “squished” plitscreen methods, and offers a nice “fallback” of 720P HD for folks without 3D, all in a single channel.

via Italian Broadcaster tries another way to send 3-D, HD simultaneously | BE on 3-D.

Hardware stereoscopic, television

I have to admit, I know very little of soccer and almost nothing of the World Cup Bid Process.  I heard a while back that Sony/Japan was thrown out of the 2022 Bid, but now I hear they’re back.  Of interest is the sheer manpower required of their entry, which discusses creation of over 400 special 3D stadiums around the world that will receive live streams (in 3D of course) of the World Cup games, creating a fully immersive 3D experience for people all around the world.

“I have to admit that the idea of this blows my mind away,” said Japan 2022 bid committee chief executive Kohzo Tashima.

“Three hundred and sixty million people could have a full stadium experience of matches; that’s over 100 times the number of spectators at the 1994 World Cup in the United States,” Tashima told FIFA’s executive committee as he pitched for the tournament.

The Japanese World Cup proposal also includes real-time translation machines and constant connection to handheld 3D video devices.

Combine the visuals with real-time language translation technology and mobile devices, and it looks like something straight out of BladeRunner.  Sony, who’s partnered with Japan on the bid, is careful to note that this is fully achievable.  With the rapid pace of technology, could we really have all of this in only 12 years?  Watch the amazing bid entry below.

Graphics, Hardware, Science soccer, sony, sports, world cup

O’Reilly has been hard at work promoting the upcoming Strata2011 Conference in Santa Clara, and it really looks like it’s gonna be a great show.

Big Data is here, and it changes everything. From startups to the Fortune 500, smart companies are betting on data-driven insight. Get control of the new data opportunity at Strata—immerse yourself in three full days of hands-on training, information-rich sessions, and a sponsor pavilion filled with the key players and products. This new O’Reilly conference brings together the people, tools, and technologies you need to make data work.

They’ve got tutorials onsite for Data Visualization, UI design, Graphing, Hadoop, and more, and several sessions scheduled on data privacy, portability, and several real-world scenarios. Register using the code str11vzw (or this link) and you can get in with an impressive 25% discount (improved from the previous 15% discount).

But that’s not all!  O’Reilly has given me a free-registration code good for a full-conference registration at no cost!  If you want this code (equivalent to the big $1700 Registration), here’s all you have to do.  Look over the wealth of graphics, visualizations, and data that came out as part of 2010, and pick your #1 “Best Visualization Resource of 2010″.  For starters, definitely look over:

• VizWorld.com’s Science Category and Infographics Category
• VisuaLoop
• FlowingData

That’ll get you started.  Once you’ve picked your #1, just comment here on this post!  When the ball drops on New Year’s Eve I’ll pick the winner!  Here’s the rules:

• Change your entry as often as you like, but I’ll only count your name once!
• In your comment, be sure to leave a link to where the visualization or data can be viewed, and why you think it’s #1
• Make sure you leave some valid contact with your comment (email address, twitter acount, Facebook Account).
• Once the winner is selected, you have 7 days to claim your prize (respond to my contact)
• Prize includes Conference Registration only, you’re on your own for travel & lodging still

So let’s get started and get those entries in!

Science conference, contest, feature, strata

Ok, at this point everybody knows why reputation management is important, right? Well…Better have a look at Digimind‘s overview on that. An updated version of Get Satisfaction‘s evolution of CRM was released, Flowtown breaks down the Fortune 50 use of Mobile, and DIYSEO teaches us how to choose the best keywords for SEO. And, while we’re at it, Credit Loan shows us how Social Media invaded Law Enforcement

Read more…

Graphics, Science design, economy, environment, infographic, infoviz, Visual Loop, visualizations

If you’ve seen the new TRON: Legacy film then you saw the impressive scenes of the lightcycle races, and the fantastic crashes that resulted from them.  That work was done by VICON House of Moves at their 26,000 square foot studio over two weeks of rehearsal and motion capture work.

The “TRON: Legacy” production crew spent five days rehearsing on the HOM stages followed by seven days of motion capture shooting. The crew shot high-impact stunt work along with more subtle body and finger poses, and movements of actors sitting on and riding the film’s signature Light Cycles at HOM’s 26,000 square foot studio. HOM was hired to contribute to the project based on the success of their previous collaboration with Grid Productions on motion capture shoots for the first “TRON: Legacy” teaser trailer that screened at Comic-Con 2008.

Get all the details after the break.

Read more…

Graphics "motion capture", movie, tron, vfx, vicon

Conversion Works is a Vancouver-based Stereoscopic 3D conversion studio, and has just signed a deal with Southpaw Technology to standardize on their TACTIC workflow technology.

“We are transitioning from developing our core technology with a small technical team into full production,” said Daniel Roizman, director of production technology at Conversion Works. “With the volume of data going through our pipeline each day, efficiency is key to our success. By integrating project and asset management into one solution, TACTIC will streamline our whole process and give us the efficiency we need.”

They’ve integrated it into their own True Stereo 3DX conversion pipeline to create a single web-interface with built-in automation.

Get the full release after the break.

Read more…

Graphics conversion works, software, southpaw, tactic

To demonstrate the raw power of the new AMD Radeon 6900 series  video cards, AMD has a new Tech Demo that, at least from the description, seems to utilize every buzzword and fancy graphics trick of 2010.

The HK-2207 real-time demo features a number of post processing effects (depth-of-field, lens flare, ghosting, aerial perspective/atmospheric, LUT, emissive and reflection) provided as an easy approach for developers and artists to adopt Microsoft® DirectX® 11 programming. This demo also uses a current trend in game engines utilizing deferred lighting and deferred shading allowing many more lights and rapid prototyping. A newly developed GPU accelerated physics particle system is introduced utilizing DX11 DirectCompute. Bullet Physics is used with a new fracture/destruction approach that also features procedurally generated unique debris leveraging DX11 tessellation.

Even though it’s from AMD, reports say that it actually runs pretty well on the NVidia Fermi cards. (35fps on GTX480′s).

via Radeon™ HD 6900 Series Graphics Real-Time Demo.

Science amd, demo, nvidia