I have always been a huge Star Wars fan and this was something right out of Star Wars which made it very cool to me.  Only problem, like the special effect in the movies, it was not real either.  The "hologram" was not really a hologram at all.

Here is a story which I am providing you via www.gearlog.com posted by Sascha Segan:

One of the most talked-about features of last night's election coverage was CNN's supposedly-holographic projections of correspondent Jessica Yellin and musician Will.I.Am onto the CNN studio floor. But CNN's name for the tech was misleading. As Gizmodo explains, the anchors on the studio floor couldn't see 3D images of the correspondents - there was no "hologram" being projected.

Rather, the correspondents were being shot by 35 HD cameras simultaneously to create a 3D image which was then digitally composited into CNN's broadcast image of their studio. There was no live, glowing, 3D picture that people could walk around. The "image" of Jessica Yellin and Wolf Blitzer standing in the same room existed only on TV screens.

If you want to be really pedantic (oh, and I do), Merriam-Webster describes a "hologram" as "a three-dimensional image reproduced from a pattern of interference produced by a split coherent beam of radiation." The CNN shots weren't three-dimensional images - they existed only on two-D TV screens. And they weren't produced from a pattern of interference, etc etc. They were produced by meshing live feeds from 35 cameras pointing in different angles.

It was movie magic, folks, similar to what we all remember from The Matrix. Given that it was done live without a hitch, it was extremely way cool. But it wasn't a hologram, and no amount of wishing will make it so.

Very well written article explaining the stunt, so I thought it was worth sharing.  We are now in 2008 and I would have expected to see more real technology like having a discussion with a hologram or flying cars or (insert your favorite sci-fi futuristic ability here).  Until I checked into it, I thought that CNN had broken through with at least one of those inventions.  Though it now seems extremely unnecessary, it was kind of cool to see Anderson Cooper interview Will.I.Am in this manner.  Here is a link to watch the video of this particular "hologram" interview.

I am a little disappointed that the interviewer was just staring at blank space and that at no time was there an actual holographic projection being displayed anywhere.  The more I think about it, the more it seems this illusion was kind of pointless.  On the other hand, it made me watch last night and it has me writing about it today... so it can't be all bad.

That will wrap up this short issue of Kickin' it Old School.  Thanks for reading and we will be back to 80's stuff again soon.  Peace and much love.

Check this out:  My friends over at 80sInjection.com take some regular pictures and insert 80's cartoon characters into them to make it a little more interesting.  Since it is sort of 80s related, it caught my attention.  I am including one example from last night below, but please go check out the others at the site yourself.  More are added everyday.

Quote of the day:  "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character." -Martin Luther King, Jr. on August 28, 1963

Download this:  "Human" by The Killers - Great new song which has a sound like it could have been released back in the mid-80's and fit right in.