CRTs A Review

CRT technology hasnt changed much in 50 years

Early television technology
high resolution
requires synchronization between video signal and
electron beam vertical sync pulse
Early computer displays
avoided synchronization using vector algorithm
flicker and refresh were problematic

CRTs A Review
Raster Displays (early 70s)
like television, scan all pixels in regular pattern
use frame buffer (video RAM) to eliminate sync problems
RAM
MB (256 KB) cost $2 million in 1971
Do some math
- 1280 x 1024 screen resolution = 1,310,720 pixels
- Monochrome color (binary) requires 160 KB
- High resolution color requires 5.2 MB

Display Technology: LCDs

Liquid Crystal Displays (LCDs)
LCDs: organic molecules, naturally in crystalline
state, that liquefy when excited by heat or E field
Crystalline state twists polarized light 90.

Display Technology: LCDs

Liquid Crystal Displays (LCDs)
LCDs: organic molecules, naturally in crystalline
state, that liquefy when excited by heat or E field
Crystalline state twists polarized light 90

Display Technology: LCDs

Transmissive & reflective LCDs:
LCDs act as light valves, not light emitters, and thus rely on an
external light source.
Laptop screen
backlit
transmissive display
Palm Pilot/Game Boy
reflective display

Display Technology: Plasma

Plasma display panels
Similar in principle to
fluorescent light tubes
Small gas-filled capsules
are excited by electric field,
emits UV light
UV excites phosphor
Phosphor relaxes, emits
some other color

Display Technology
Plasma Display Panel Pros
Large viewing angle
Good for large-format displays
Fairly bright

Cons
Expensive
Large pixels (~1 mm versus ~0.2 mm)
Phosphors gradually deplete
Less bright than CRTs, using more power

Display Technology: DMD / DLP

Digital Micromirror Devices (projectors) or
Digital Light Processing
Microelectromechanical (MEM) devices, fabricated
with VLSI techniques

Display Technology: DMD / DLP

DMDs are truly digital pixels
Vary grey levels by modulating pulse length
Color: multiple chips, or color-wheel
Great resolution
Very bright
Flicker problems

Display Technologies:
Organic LED Arrays
Organic Light-Emitting Diode (OLED) Arrays
The display of the future? Many think so.
OLEDs function like regular semiconductor LEDs
But they emit light
Thin-film deposition of organic, lightemitting molecules through vapor
sublimation in a vacuum.
Dope emissive layers with fluorescent
molecules to create color.

Display Technologies:
Organic LED Arrays
OLED pros:
Transparent
Flexible
Light-emitting, and quite bright (daylight visible)
Large viewing angle
Fast (< 1 microsecond off-on-off)
Can be made large or small
Available for cell phones and car stereos

Display Technologies:
Organic LED Arrays
OLED cons:
Not very robust, display lifetime a key issue
Currently only passive matrix displays
Passive matrix: Pixels are illuminated in scanline
order (like a raster display), but the lack of
phospherescence causes flicker
Active matrix: A polysilicate layer provides thin
film transistors at each pixel, allowing direct pixel
access and constant illumination

Movie Theaters
U.S. film projectors play film at 24 fps
Projectors have a shutter to block light during frame advance
To reduce flicker, shutter opens twice for each frame resulting in 48
fps flashing
48 fps is perceptually acceptable

European film projectors play film at 25 fps

American films are played as is in Europe, resulting in everything
moving 4% faster
Faster movements and increased audio pitch are considered
perceptually acceptable

Viewing Movies at Home

Film to DVD transfer
Problem: 24 film fps must be converted to
NTSC U.S. television interlaced 29.97 fps 768x494
PAL Europe television 25 fps 752x582

Use 3:2 Pulldown

First frame of movie is broken into first three fields (odd, even, odd)
Next frame of movie is broken into next two fields (even, odd)
Next frame of movie is broken into next three fields (even, odd, even)

Additional Displays
Display Walls

Princeton

Stanford

UVa Greg Humphreys

Display Wall Alignment

Additional Displays
Stereo

Visual System
Well discuss more fully later in semester but
Our eyes dont mind smoothing across time
Still pictures appear to animate
Our eyes dont mind smoothing across space
Discrete pixels blend into continuous color sheets

Mathematical Foundations
Angel appendix B and C
Ill give a brief, informal review of some of the
mathematical tools well employ
Geometry (2D, 3D)
Trigonometry
Vector spaces
Points, vectors, and coordinates
Dot and cross products

Scalar Spaces
Scalars:
Addition and multiplication (+ and ) operations defined
Scalar operations are
Associative:
Commutative:
Distributive:

Scalar Spaces
Additive Identity = 0

Multiplicative Identity = 1

Additive Inverse = -

Multiplicative Inverse= -1

Vector Spaces
Two types of elements:
Scalars (real numbers):
Vectors (n-tuples): u, v, w,

Operations:
Addition
Subtraction

Vector Addition/Subtraction
operation u + v, with:
Identity 0 v + 0 = v
Inverse - v + (-v) = 0
Addition uses the parallelogram rule:
v

u+v

v
u

-v

u-v

-v

Affine Spaces
Vector spaces lack position and distance
They have magnitude and direction but no location
Add a new primitive, the point
Permits describing vectors relative to a common location
Point-point subtraction yields a vector
A point and three vectors define a 3-D coordinate system

Points
Points support these operations
Point-point subtraction:

Q-P=v

Result is a vector pointing from P to Q

Vector-point addition:
Result is a new point

P+v=Q

Note that the addition of two points is not defined

Coordinate Systems
Grasp

z-axis with hand

Thumb points in direction of z-axis
Roll fingers from positive x-axis towards positive y-axis
Y
Y

Right-handed
coordinate
system

Left-handed
coordinate
system

X
Z

Euclidean Spaces
Euclidean spaces permit the definition of distance
Dot product - distance between two vectors
Projection of one vector onto another

Euclidean Spaces
We commonly use vectors to represent:
Points in space (i.e., location)
Displacements from point to point
Direction (i.e., orientation)
We frequently use these operations
Dot Product
Cross Product
Norm

Scalar Multiplication
Scalar multiplication:
Distributive rule: (u + v) = (u) + (v)
( + )u = u + u
Scalar multiplication streches a vector, changing its length
(magnitude) but not its direction

Dot Product
The dot product or, more generally, inner product of two vectors
is a scalar:
v1 v2 = x1x2 + y1y2 + z1z2

(in 3D)

Useful for many purposes

Computing the length (Euclidean Norm) of a vector: length(v) = ||v|| = sqrt(v
v)

Normalizing a vector, making it unit-length: v = v / ||v||

Computing the angle between two vectors:

u v = |u| |v| cos()
Checking two vectors for orthogonality
u v = 0.0

Dot Product
Projecting one vector onto another
If v is a unit vector and we have another vector, w
We can project w perpendicularly onto v
w
v

And the result, u, has length w v

u w cos( )
vw
w
v w
v w

Dot Product
Is commutative
uv=vu

Is distributive with respect to addition

u (v + w) = u v + u w

Cross Product
The cross product or vector product of two vectors is a
vector:

y1 z 2 y 2 z1
v1 v 2 ( x1 z 2 x 2 z1)
x1 y 2 x 2 y1

The cross product of two vectors is orthogonal to both

Right-hand rule dictates direction of cross product

Cross Product Right Hand Rule

See: http://www.phy.syr.edu/courses/video/RightHandRule/index2.html
Orient your right hand such that your palm is at the
beginning of A and your fingers point in the direction of A
Twist your hand about the A-axis such that B extends
perpendicularly from your palm
As you curl your fingers to make a fist, your thumb will
point in the direction of the cross product

Cross Product Right Hand Rule

See: http://www.phy.syr.edu/courses/video/RightHandRule/index2.html
Orient your right hand such that your palm is at the
beginning of A and your fingers point in the direction of A
Twist your hand about the A-axis such that B extends
perpendicularly from your palm
As you curl your fingers to make a fist, your thumb will
point in the direction of the cross product

Cross Product Right Hand Rule

See: http://www.phy.syr.edu/courses/video/RightHandRule/index2.html
Orient your right hand such that your palm is at the
beginning of A and your fingers point in the
direction of A
Twist your hand about the A-axis such that B
extends perpendicularly from your palm
As you curl your fingers to make a fist, your thumb
will point in the direction of the cross product

Cross Product Right Hand Rule

See: http://www.phy.syr.edu/courses/video/RightHandRule/index2.html
Orient your right hand such that your palm is at the
beginning of A and your fingers point in the
direction of A
Twist your hand about the A-axis such that B
extends perpendicularly from your palm
As you curl your fingers to make a fist, your thumb
will point in the direction of the cross product

Cross Product Right Hand Rule

See: http://www.phy.syr.edu/courses/video/RightHandRule/index2.html
Orient your right hand such that your palm is at the
beginning of A and your fingers point in the
direction of A
Twist your hand about the A-axis such that B
extends perpendicularly from your palm
As you curl your fingers to make a fist, your thumb
will point in the direction of the cross product

2D Geometry
Know your high school geometry:
Total angle around a circle is 360 or 2 radians
When two lines cross:
Opposite angles are equivalent
Angles along line sum to 180
Similar triangles:
All corresponding angles are equivalent

Trigonometry
Sine: opposite over hypotenuse
Cosine: adjacent over hypotenuse
Tangent: opposite over adjacent
Unit circle definitions:
sin () = x
cos () = y
tan () = x/y
etc

(x, y)

Slope-intercept Line Equation

Slope

=m
= rise / run

Slope

P = (x, y)

= (y - y1) / (x - x1)
= (y2 - y1) / (x2 - x1)

P2 = (x2, y2)
P1 = (x1, y1)

Solve for y:
y = [(y2 - y1)/(x2 - x1)]x + [-(y2-y1)/(x2 - x1)]x1 + y1

or: y = mx + b

Parametric Line Equation

Given points P1 = (x1, y1) and P2 = (x2, y2)
x = x1 + t(x2 - x1)
y = y1 + t(y2 - y1)
y
When:
t=0, we get (x1, y1)
t=1, we get (x2, y2)
(0<t<1), we get points
on the segment between
(x1, y1) and (x2, y2)

P2 = (x2, y2)
P1 = (x1, y1)
x

Other helpful formulas

Length = sqrt (x2 - x1)2 + (y2 - y1)2
Midpoint, p2, between p1 and p3
p2 = ((x1 + x3) / 2, (y1 + y3) / 2))

Two lines are perpendicular if:

M1 = -1/M2
cosine of the angle between them is 0