Podcast Series: Innovations in Education

Explore the full series of eSchool News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.

Scientists move closer to live 3-D video

Researchers are working to achieve the "magic rate" of 30 frames per second.

In a development with important implications for future teaching and learning, scientists say they have taken a big step toward displaying live video in three dimensions—a technology that is much more advanced than 3-D movies and more like the “Star Wars” scene where a ghostly Princess Leia image pleads, “Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi.”

In that classic movie, the audience sees her back before a new camera perspective shows her face. Such a wraparound view of a moving image was just movie-trick fantasy in the 1977 film, but now?

“It is actually very, very close to reality. We have demonstrated the concept that it works. It’s no longer something that is science fiction,” said Nasser Peyghambarian of the University of Arizona.…Read More

New 3-D imaging system could touch more students

A program at Richmond County Schools in North Carolina that uses military technology from nearby Fort Bragg has catapulted a member of Richmond’s senior class into a summer internship at the military installation, and observers say the technology could engage students in learning core curriculum content, reports the Richmond County Daily Journal. Senior Miles Pattan was one of the first to take a course in interactive three-dimensional (I 3-D) digital imaging design at the school this semester, and he announced March 30 that he was just accepted into an on-base summer internship. On hand was U.S. Rep. Larry Kissell, who represents the district. “This is from a kid [who] didn’t even particularly like school,” Miles’ mother, Tammy Pattan, told the congressman in making the announcement. “But when he started doing this, it very quickly turned from a hobby into a career path.” Kissell was on hand to see the I 3-D classroom the high school has assembled using equipment from Fort Bragg’s Base Realignment and Closure Regional Task Force. A former civics teacher, he, noted the potential of using images that resemble something from an iMax theater to engage students in a lesson plan. “Right away, I can see the applications in civics and teaching about ancient Egypt,” Kissell said. “You could have the Nile River flowing, and the Pyramids, and the way the people dressed.”

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