The tech behind the Project Starline demo was detailed in a new research paper. Project Starline is a 3D video chat booth that is meant to replace a one-on-one 2D video conference call with an experience that feels like you are sitting in front of a real human being.
It sounds simple, but a research paper by the search engine shows how many challenges there are in tricking your brain into thinking there is a real human sitting a few feet away from you. The image needs to be high resolution and free of distraction, but it also needs to look correct from your relative position in the booth. Audio is a challenge as the system needs to make it sound like a person is talking. There is only the small matter of eye-contact.
The hope is that Project Starline will offer a similar feeling of presence as virtual or augmented reality, without users needing to wear bulky headsets or trackers.
Noupscale is a file on thechorusasset.com.
The display unit has various tracking hardware.
The image is from Google.
The paper shows how much hardware is needed to solve the problems. A 65-inch 8K panel runs at 60hertz. The three capturepods arranged around it are capable of capturing both color imagery and depth data. The system includes four additional cameras, four microphones, and two speakers. There are seven video streams, with color images from four viewpoints captured, as well as three depth maps. The audio is captured at 44.1 kHz.
The amount of data that needs to be transmitted is huge, and depending on the texture of the user's clothes and the magnitude of their gestures, the transmission bandwidth can range from 30Mbps up to 100Mbps. A typical office in a metropolitan area would not be able to handle this call. Project Starline has four high-end graphics cards that can be used to decode the data. The end-to-end time is reported to be 105.8 milliseconds.
:noupscale is a file on thechorusasset.com.
The system is made up of two units.
The image is from Google.
When it comes to creating a feeling of presence, personal connection, as well as helping with attentiveness and reaction-gauging, employees who have used Starline across the three sites where it has been installed think it beats traditional videoconferencing. The company says that over the course of nine months, 118 people held a total of 308 meetings in its telepresence booths, with an average meeting time of just over 35 minutes.
It all sounds promising, but there is no indication of when or even if the system will be commercially viable. There is no information about how much Starline will cost in reality, although Table 4 in the research paper outlines the tracking and display hardware it uses, if you want to do some math. Project Starline is available in more of the US offices of the internet giant.
