Live data from Hacker News

Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

digitalcameraworld.com

231–240 of 253 posts

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#231

I've read through all the comments here but I still don't have the slightest idea of how this works . I see some references to "light guides" and words like "coupling" but I don't know what those mean at all, and all of my googling is not helping to explain how light guides embedded in a thin, mostly transparent layer could possibly be used to project a hi-res holographic 3D light field out of a piece of glass. How b…

There are nanoscale features in the glass that scatter or reflect the incoming light in an engineered way to small camera sensors in the frame.

It's basically something like the Microsoft Halolens in reverse.

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#232

For the people kinda worried: this is a highly specialized piece of glass that is extremely complicated to manufacture at present and must, due to the laws of thermodynamics, not be 100% transparent. It's not going to allow surveillance through existing glass installations in any form, just possibly new ones if there's room for the support equipment and through the use of 4-5 digit piles of cash. Any camera glass lik…

>and must, due to the laws of thermodynamics, not be 100% transparent. It's perhaps worth noting, however, that it wouldn't be unusual for a window to have only ~60% transmittance in visible spectrum.

A fresh piece of uncoated perfectly clean glass is ~ 90% transparent.

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#233

For the people kinda worried: this is a highly specialized piece of glass that is extremely complicated to manufacture at present and must, due to the laws of thermodynamics, not be 100% transparent. It's not going to allow surveillance through existing glass installations in any form, just possibly new ones if there's room for the support equipment and through the use of 4-5 digit piles of cash. Any camera glass lik…

>For the people kinda worried: this is a highly specialized piece of glass that is extremely complicated to manufacture at present and must, due to the laws of thermodynamics, not be 100% transparent. It's not going to allow surveillance through existing glass installations in any form If you're worried that your Airbnb host is going to use it to spy on you (which was mentioned in the article), unless you already scr…

Pinhole cameras by definition do not have lenses and are known since 500 BCE or 1893 if you need a recording unit ;)

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's not going to allow surveillance through existing glass installations in any form, just possibly new ones if there's room for the support equipment and through the use of 4-5 digit piles of cash. Total surveillance is just a matter of time...

I agree. I had this worrying idea (realisation..?) that one day, maybe triple digit years away, maybe sooner, that tiny cameras and mics the size of grains of salt will be everywhere. They will cost nothing to produce, be self-charging, interconnected to each other and created to ‘reduce crime’ or ‘make you safer’. And in the same way as forever chemicals, you can’t get rid of them. Trillions of them, in fields, the…

" that one day, maybe triple digit years away, maybe sooner, that tiny cameras and mics the size of grains of salt will be everywhere"

Why spend the effort, if everyone is already carrying their smartphones around with them?

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>and must, due to the laws of thermodynamics, not be 100% transparent. It's perhaps worth noting, however, that it wouldn't be unusual for a window to have only ~60% transmittance in visible spectrum.

A fresh piece of uncoated perfectly clean glass is ~ 90% transparent.

I think people think that light goes through glass like a laser beam nothing in its way. Just flying right through. But it's actually like a pool ball hitting another pool ago and so on. The original photon of light is not what you see on the other side of the glass.

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A fresh piece of uncoated perfectly clean glass is ~ 90% transparent.

I think people think that light goes through glass like a laser beam nothing in its way. Just flying right through. But it's actually like a pool ball hitting another pool ago and so on. The original photon of light is not what you see on the other side of the glass.

> The original photon of light is not what you see on the other side of the glass.

Oh no! How do I check if I'm getting counterfeit sunlight?

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>and must, due to the laws of thermodynamics, not be 100% transparent. It's perhaps worth noting, however, that it wouldn't be unusual for a window to have only ~60% transmittance in visible spectrum.

A fresh piece of uncoated perfectly clean glass is ~ 90% transparent.

But windows are often multiple panes and coated.

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A fresh piece of uncoated perfectly clean glass is ~ 90% transparent.

I think people think that light goes through glass like a laser beam nothing in its way. Just flying right through. But it's actually like a pool ball hitting another pool ago and so on. The original photon of light is not what you see on the other side of the glass.

I did mostly think that. So what's the thing in the glass that gets hit like the "another pool ball"?

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>For the people kinda worried: this is a highly specialized piece of glass that is extremely complicated to manufacture at present and must, due to the laws of thermodynamics, not be 100% transparent. It's not going to allow surveillance through existing glass installations in any form If you're worried that your Airbnb host is going to use it to spy on you (which was mentioned in the article), unless you already scr…

Pinhole cameras by definition do not have lenses and are known since 500 BCE or 1893 if you need a recording unit ;)

Language and technology has evolved a bit since 1893:

https://www.google.com/search?q=pinhole+surveillance+camera

Re: Zeiss's "Holocam" turns glass windows into cameras

#240

For the people kinda worried: this is a highly specialized piece of glass that is extremely complicated to manufacture at present and must, due to the laws of thermodynamics, not be 100% transparent. It's not going to allow surveillance through existing glass installations in any form, just possibly new ones if there's room for the support equipment and through the use of 4-5 digit piles of cash. Any camera glass lik…

Oh tempo oh rex moores
Post reply on HN