Response to Holographic Cinema: A New World by Gene Youngblood

Partial explanation of holographic images “Each point on the surface of an object reflects light waves inconstantly expanding concentric circles in much the same way that rings are formed when a pebble is dropped into a pool of still water. A collection of these circles and the interference pattern resulting from their intersecting trajectories constitute the wave front of light from the object.” I believe if you can understand the previous quote, you can understand the rest of the chapter.

Youngblood begins this chapter by explaining his first experience with holographic motion picture and an analogy holographic to conventional cinema circa 1900. The next section discusses how true holography does not use lens or is an optical image. The insert from above explains why this is so. This recognition of wave patterns was discovered by Dr. Dennis Gabor. Because there was no lights strong enough at the time, Dr. Gabor's work had to be postpone until the 1960's when Dr. Maiman invented the Laser. Leith and Upatnieks then took this new invention and with the help of Dr. Gabor's theory created the first 3 dimensional image. Also mentioned here is knowing that there is a difference between 3D films that require polarized glasses (stereoptic process) and true 3D projection.

Later Dr. Alex Jacobson invented the first holography with motion. It was basically tropical first in an aquarium. The holography was tented red because no other light source or laser was could emit burst of the required magnitude. After a length explanation of how Jacobson produced his holography, Youngblood explains some of the limitations of holographic images of the time. As mention before the lasers strong enough to work were ruby laser so the images were red in color.

I thought this written was fascinating to say the least. It reads relatively recent because not too many significant advances in holographics have been made. Granted we have exploited 3D movies as of the past 2-3 years, but those are still stereoptic films. I did a little research on the topic and found that in Japan that have actually advanced holographics to a personal level. Below is a video that explains it.