A project of some fun and interest to me was that of my pseudo-hologram. It started with the simple observation of a reflection off of a surface. The observation led me to consider how it might be possible to reflect a panoramic image off of a cone as to appear 3-D. However, until a friend had asked me to present a project at a MiniMaker Fair at the Barnes and Nobles in the Mall of Georgia, I had little to no drive/reason to build it.
In all, it took me about a week to design, fabricate, and build the pseudo-hologram. In that time I learned not only how to use AutoCAD more efficiently, but I also learned how to cut and mold plexiglass. Further more, I learned how to design some of the molds needed to better form the plexiglass pieces. I even picked up a little bit of photoshop to help me warp panoramic images into polar images.
Since finishing the project, Pseudo-Hologram mk: I and II, I have begun considering how it might be possible to incorporate a Raspberry Pi and Python so that I don’t have to use photoshop to warp the images. It may also be possible to have a panoramic camera stream images directly to the pseudo-hologram real time.
The following is a screen shot of a CAD rendering of my initial prototype:
And an image of the globe that I warped to use as a test image:
Tucker's Box of Thoughts 