NEXT 2008 show coverage

Page: 4/4






New technologies
Gigapan demonstrated their GigaPan Imager, a robotic device that makes it possible to make gigapixel photos with regular digital cameras. The GigaPan Imager takes tens, hundreds or even thousands of images with your camera and stitches them together to create a single, massive panorama with incredible amounts of detail. The device is currently available for $279. A series of videos about the GigaPan Imager can be found over here, here's the first of the set of four:



On the company's site there are dozens of user-submitted examples, here's a gigapixel panorama of the Golden Temple:



Another demonstration that impressed us was the 3D scanning hardware from a Belgian firm named Eyetronics. This firm is specialized in 3D scanning of faces but also larger stuff like buildings and even landscapes. Eyetronics' technology has been used in games like Mass Effect, Haze and Grand Theft Auto IV but they're also frequently hired by movie studios. Over at NEXT, the firm gave you the opportunity to create a 3D model of your face.

The scanning didn't take that long and the results looked pretty good. This kind of models could be used in games so you can play as yourself but I don't think the technology will go mainstream anytime soon.

I haven't created a 3D model of my head at NEXT but Flemish blogger Luc Van Braekel tried it and published a clip of his model on YouTube:



And that was it for NEXT this year, here's a look at all the goodies we collected. It includes a T-shirt of Tomb Raider: Underworld, a copy of RollerCoaster Tycoon 2, a plastic storage box for a couple of DVDs from Dicota, some stickers, a Tomb Raider photo and Tom Clancy's EndWar buttons.





Conclusion
We went to NEXT without knowing what to expect and were underwhelmed. Compared to major consumer electronics and gaming shows in other countries this new event looks rather pale. Teens who went to the event to try out the latest games all day long with their buddies seem to be satisfied but many other people told me they were disappointed.

Despite the evolution of the expo from a gaming-only show to a gaming & consumer electronics show, it was still too focused on games. The multimedia part was too small and there weren't enough exhibitors to fill the two expo halls, therefore there was a lot of empty space between the booths. Most exhibitors also failed to show off exciting new technology, there were presentations of flatscreen TVs, gadgets, dSLR cameras and Blu-ray but there were few things we hadn't seen yet.

Fortunately, the game developers brought most of their recently released games with them and provided lots of consoles or PCs to play on but I was disappointed that there were almost no previews of upcoming games. I expected there would be at least a couple of presentations of hits that come out next year.

Overall I had mixed feelings about NEXT but I will probably go again next year, hopefully the second edition of NEXT will give its visitors a better experience.

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