Robert Dow

Reinventing the wheel for a racing motorcycle

Olaf Seger, an engineer at KTM, just reinvented the wheel. To be more specific, he designed a new wheel for the 2013 KTM 690 Duke, a powerful single-cylinder motorcycle used in racing and road riding.“The KTM 690 wheel introduces a new generation to the product line,” says Seger. “Going forward, KTM will use these wheels on many of its new … Read more

DEVELOP3D LIVE free Conference

Next week at the University of Warwick – Designers, hardware and software developers will be showing the latest in product development technology that will change the way you design. Demonstrations of what R&D teams will soon be bringing to market, and organisations that have rethought their use of engineering and design technology to gain an edge mean you can learn … Read more

New technologies for old problem

Could the game industry really be the source of salvation? Years ago, when I worked at a publishing house I was on a committee to figure out how the company would go digital. This was a publishing company that was already more than a hundred years old. It had hundreds of titles and millions of back issues. Usually we spent … Read more

Has Moore’s Law gotten away from Intel?

The democratization of Moore’s Law, the revolution led by ARM I think it’s pretty obvious the PC market is transforming from the conventional two form factors we have been using for the past 15 years into a three or four form factor future. Transforms, not disappears. The “new PC” is many things: tablet/convertible/hybrids; conventional clam shells with bigger processors, optical … Read more

This week at NAB

As the person on the monorail said, “it’s raining, we might as well go to the sessions.” The weather is surprisingly unpleasant for Las Vegas but inside, there is a lot going on. Perhaps no other industry has gone through so many changes as the TV industry. TV doesn’t mean networks or cable it means video. We’re all broadcasters now. … Read more

Opening at NAB

As the person on the monorail said, “it’s raining, we might as well go to the sessions.” The weather is surprisingly unpleasant for Las Vegas but inside, there is a lot going on. Perhaps no other industry has gone through so many changes as the TV industry. TV doesn’t mean networks or cable it means video. We’re all broadcasters now. … Read more

The National Association of Broadcasters show begins in Las Vegas

NAB opens up in Las Vegas today and will run through April 11th, the show draws over 100,000 industry insiders media and entertainment professionals to the desert once a year. The show features over 1,500 exhibiting companies and over 500 skill building sessions. You can follow the show and find access to NAB social media sites on the NAB Show … Read more

Making faces is harder than it looks

Facial animation is a very tough business for a number of reasons. When it comes to realistic human faces, one part of the equation is probably done, the ability to create a realistic human face. Paul Debevec and his team at the University of Southern California did an astounding job of recreating actress Emily O’Brien’s face for the Digital Emily … Read more

FX legend says Hollywood reluctant to embrace the future

Oscar-winner Douglas Trumbull is among a handful of technologists working on new technologies to transform cinema. But adoption is not certain. This year’s first big “tentpole” movie, “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” pioneered a new film technology, using a recording rate of 48 frames per second (fps) instead of the standard 24FPS.

Technology’s dark side is getting brighter

One of the panels at SXSW that we didn’t actually see but really really wish we did was a debate between University of Michigan at Dearborn philosophy lecturer David Skrbina, billed as the Unabomber’s pen pal, and writer/philosopher Peter Ludlow from Northwestern University. As you might expect, Skrbina goes to some lengths to distance himself from Kaczynski’s crimes, but he … Read more

The Cult of Maker prays for a burst-resistant bubble

3D printing shows signs of resiliance Most of us at Jon Peddie Research are old enough to have witnessed more bubble moments in the tech industry than we care to recall. Like stock market bubbles (to which they are usually connected at the bubble-hip) tech bubbles start with hype, grow with enthusiasm, float on a greedy breeze, and pop when … Read more

The Game Developers Conference this week in San Francisco

The GDC attracts over 22,500 attendees, and is the primary forum where programmers, artists, producers, game designers, audio professionals, business decision-makers and others involved in the development of interactive games. This conference features over 400 lectures, panels, tutorials and round-table discussions and is taking place at San Francisco’s Moscone Center.