Daval

CNN's "Wolf Blitzer" android to interview 3D holograms on election night


I'm going out on a limb here, I realise, but it seems highly likely that this might actually be the best thing ever:

...Instead of the split screen or window TV viewers might typically see during live remote interviews [on election night], the Obama spokesperson will be projected as a three-dimensional hologram, making it appear as if he or she is in the Manhattan studio with [Wolf] Blitzer. The network plans to conduct similar holographic interviews with representatives from the McCain campaign in Phoenix.

Yes indeed: CNN plans to have campaign representatives filmed by 44 different cameras in Chicago and Arizona, then feed the data through 20 computers to result in a 360-degree image of the interviewee, there in the New York studio with Wolf Blitzer. CNN senior vice-president David Bohrman "says the network can project two different views from each city so Blitzer can appear to be in the studio with two holograms." This is, of course, almost indescribably brilliant; there's no word yet on whether Wolf Blitzer has been updated with a new voice chip to enable him to speak in a variety of pitches instead of a monotone, but CNN surely has its best minds on the matter. (PBS, meanwhile, are rumoured to be preparing to roll out a new gizmo, the "video screen", so that Jim Lehrer doesn't have to rely entirely on paper flipcharts. I'll believe it when I see it.)

If you're inclined to think CNN's plan at all absurd, don't forget that Sky News is currently broadcasting from a villa in Biscayne Bay, Florida, which it's calling "The White House" -- that's a joke, you see, because the White House in Washington is where the president lives. On election night, 150 guests will gather round the swimming pool there to discuss the results, and where a 54-foot yacht is being used to interview "floating voters", even though this is not a term anybody uses in the United States, thereby making a terrible pun worse.

Source

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Just saw this happen on CNN, I found it quite annoying to be honest, they are so terribly pleased with themselves that they keep going on and on about it. I wish they would just go with the tried and true and play with your little toys sometime else :P

The blog post I linked above though is pretty funny though.

Any of you guys see this and what do you think about it?


btw. John King just zoomed into the interactive map down to the county level - finish your drink! (reference the election drinking game thread)

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Willravel

Help me, Wolf Blitzer; you're my only hope.

kurty[B]

I feel like I'm watching Star Wars.

I wish I had access to alcohol right now.

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Amaras

I love how they crow about new technology, and ignore old fashioned integrity in news reporting.

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Bill O'Rights

It's all about flash and showmanship. There hasn't been old fashioned integrity in news reporting since Chet Huntley and David Brinkley did the Huntley Brinkley Report.

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Halx

The holograms weren't real. It was simply an image pasted onto the screen from 2 different angles. Wolf Blitzer and Anderson Cooper were staring into space.

I can't believe people actually think these were holograms.

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ratbastid

But I like how they ringed them in blue, so they had a nice hologrammy effect. They probably could have done it totally clean, but they had to add a little ugly to make us understand what a fancy-ass thing they were doing. How this is better than a satellite feed on a flat screen is beyond me, but there you go.

I heard about a commercial shot with a talking parrot. in post-production, they realized that the parrot didn't SOUND like a parrot, it sounded like a person. So they dubbed a voice-actor over the parrot, talking like a PARROT. This is a little like that.

Lasereth

I thought it was pretty darn cool.

shakran

Asinine. No more information was delivered via the . .hologram. . than would have been delivered via the standard interview technique, and it took 44 times the resources. How idiotic. In an age when veteran journalists are losing their jobs due to budget crunches, CNN goes and spends what must be a metric crap-ton of money on 0-benefit technology, and /then/ wastes time which could be used to deliver the news, by bragging about their damned holograms.

Reese

As long as Jack Cafferty keeps working for CNN, I'll keep watching.

That "hologram" was the dumbest thing ever... It was nothing more than a green screen with a few different angles.

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Cynosure

A "hologram" of a hologram.
-----Added 5/11/2008 at 04 : 50 : 13-----
Yes, but was more sensationalism delivered via the "hologram"? (The answer to that is quite obvious.)

mrklixx

When this is applied to porn, I'll pay attention.

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