HP Introduces Wobulation To Double Resolution of DTVs, Projectors

[Suhit Gupta]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://news.com.com/%27Wobulation%27+to+boost+HP+digital+projectors/2100-7337_3-5229745.html' target='_blank'>http://news.com.com/%27Wobulation%27+to+boost+HP+digital+projectors/2100-7337_3-5229745.html</a><br /><br /></div><i>"Hewlett-Packard has developed technology called "wobulation" that it says will dramatically improve the image quality of HP digital projectors due to start arriving in 2005. First-generation "2X" wobulation will double the effective resolution of digital projectors without changing the number of pixels it displays, and a later "4X" version will provide further improvements, the Palo Alto, Calif.-based company said Wednesday. The technology means that high-quality projectors can be made with lower-cost components, HP said."</i><br /><br /><img src="http://www.digitalmediathoughts.com/images/wobulation.jpg" /><br /><br />This new technology called wobulation works by shifting an image slightly in one direction or another, the shift being less than the amount of the width of any pixel. Due to this shift and by overlapping these shifted images, they are able to achieve an effective resolution of 2,048 pixels by 1,536 pixels or 4,096 pixels by 3,072 pixels for a 1024-by-768 pixel image display with 2x and 4x wobulation respectively. Lots more information in the News.com article above and <a href="http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1558,1609519,00.asp">this ExtremeTech article</a>.

[Jason Dunn]

This looks SERIOUSLY cool. Too bad it will be several years before it makes it into the market...

[OSUKid7]

Wow. That's one of those how did they not think of that before? things. It makes so much sense. Awesome. :)

[Felix Torres]

This looks to be seriously useful.
There is a whole new paradigm of video display at work here.
Instead of a single image per frame, they're breaking up each frame into over-lapping images that get composited into the frame the eye sees.
Suddenly, all previously accepted limits no longer apply.
And video projection displays now move to the top of the image quality pecking order.

For starters, the 4X wobulation of a 1024 by 768 DLP chip, which is current off-the-shelf tech, would let you display a 4096 pixel screen which is enough resolution to pixel-double (with a 7% overscan) a 1080P signal *and* pixel-triple a 720P signal. Hence you get a display that works equally well for both HD modes.

Second, the extra pixels don't *have* to be used for simple pixel-doubling or tripling but can (and most likely will) be interpolated pixels because of the godawful frame rates (240 fps) the tech can display, so you get most of the benefits of the higher res without the need for increased transmission bandwidth.

An interesting side-effect of this is that since wobulation essentially enables you to display whatever your video processor can generate, the quality bottleneck moves away from the display tech, as it is today, and into the realm of the semi-conductor-based video processors.
Moore's law comes to video. :D

Third, this allows TI to effectively and cheaply match the SONY super hi-res theatrical digital projectors. This also allows for movies that will be mastered only once for both theatrical and HD-DVD distribution, while still allowing theaters an image quality advantage over consumer gear.

Finally; can 16X wobulation be far behind?:twisted:
Or multi-chip tiled displays?
Multi-processing *will* work here...

Hopefully the first products won't be too long in arriving; they quoted 05, after all.

[Chris Gohlke]

Sounds like something Willy Wonka would develop. :D

[klinux]

Sounds like something Willy Wonka would develop. :D

... or Elmer Fudd.

[David Prahl]

Wow - a great idea that we can all understand and see the benefits of (at least those of us with five grand to drop on a projector)!