May 26 2010
The Society for Information Display (SID), the leading global organization dedicated to the advancement of electronic display technology, today revealed the 2010 winners of the 15th annual Display of the Year Awards, presented to the products deemed to have most significantly advanced the state of the art in display technology during the preceding calendar year.
Pixel Qi 3Qi Multimode LCD
The inventive products selected as this year's honorees highlight the proliferation of several key trends, including 3D, touch technology and power-efficient "green" solutions — all of which contribute to an increasingly personalized user experience.
"Choosing the products for the Display of the Year Awards is always an exciting challenge," said Robert Melcher, SID Display of the Year committee chair. "This year's winners are impressive not only because of the advancements they enable, but also because of the degree of innovation that they represent. The display industry exhibited a strong showing in this respect last year, despite the challenging global economy. We look forward to seeing these new technologies spark the next wave of ground-breaking developments — many of which may be exclusively previewed to attendees at future Display Weeks."
The six products chosen — two each for Display, Display Component and Display Application of the Year categories — will be honored at the annual SID Luncheon on May 26, to be held during Display Week 2010 (May 23-28) at the Washington State Convention Center in Seattle, Wash. The top, or Gold Award, winner in each category will screen a short video on the winning product during the ceremony.
The winning products and a brief description of each are listed below. In-depth descriptions of the award winners can be found in the Display Week 2010 Show Issue of Information Display magazine.
Display of the Year
Gold Award: LG Display 47-in. 3D LCD Panel
LG Display's 47-in. 3D LCD module is the first commercially available TFT-LCD module for 3D televisions in the mid-40-inch range. The panel works with polarized glasses and provides excellent, bright, and comfortable-to-eye 3D imagery, free from crosstalk and flicker that causes dizziness and eye tiredness. The patterned retarder separates the polarization states between the odd and even lines so that right- and left-eye images can be seen perfect separately. Right-eye images are presented by the odd lines, and left-eye images by the even lines. Viewers' right and left eyes therefore see different images with the polarized glasses, making the images appear three-dimensional. In addition, the panel also uses IPS (in-plane switching) for superior viewing. It employs LG Display's proprietary technology to realize clear imagery, and is brighter than any other currently available 3D LCD panels that use glasses.
Silver Award: Pixel Qi 3Qi Multimode LCD
Like standard backlit AMLCD displays, the 3Qi Multimode LCD from startup Pixel Qi renders quality full-color images, full-motion video, and high screen luminance. However, in environments with high ambient light levels, the 3Qi's reflective mode contributes to the rendered image, allowing the backlight to be turned down or off. This unique capability delivers significant power savings, an attractive screen and a comfortable reading experience, with very high resolution. Outdoors, the 3Qi display's Transflective 2.0 technology comes into play — each pixel is mainly reflective, but has about the same transmissive efficiency as a standard LCD, enabling the user to experience a crisp image with excellent contrast and brightness in any light. This highly "green" LCD consumes 80 percent less power in reflective mode, yet delivers a contrast ratio of 10:1 and a hemispheric reflectance approaching 30 percent — typical of the best electrophoretic displays.
Display Component of the Year
Gold Award: N-Trig DuoSense (for pen, touch and multi-touch)
N-trig's DuoSense solution offers a more natural interaction between people and their computers by enabling pen and true multi-touch capabilities in a single device. Utilizing an all-in-one transparent sensor that integrates on top of any LCD panel, the DuoSense digitizer is sensitive, accurate, low power, and easily integrated into existing solutions. DuoSense is based on projected capacitive touch, and employs highly sensitive pen functionality, with the option of using either an electrostatic pen or a battery-powered Digital Pencil. The Digital Pencil can be provided as an add-on option for systems that did not originally include in-the-box pen functionality.
Silver Award: RealD XL Cinema System
The 2008 Silver Award winner for the first implementation of its stereoscopic 3D cinema technology, RealD was once again selected for its latest 3D cinema projection innovation. Inspired by the need to present high-quality 3D images on larger screens, the XL Cinema System is an efficient polarization modulator that mounts externally to a digital cinema projector. It works in concert with passive, circular-polarizing eyewear to produce cinematic-quality 3D images. A single digital cinema projector using a XL Cinema System is capable of showing 3D movies on screens up to 80 feet in width, an industry-best. Moreover, 2D to 3D changeover is simple and the XL Cinema System utilizes the same lamp and lamp power as 2D projections, conserving resources and allowing theaters to be maintained in a greener and more cost-effective manner.
Display Application of the Year
Gold Award: Nikon COOLPIX S1000pj
The COOLPIX S1000pj is the first compact digital camera to feature a built-in projector. With a simple touch of a button, the camera projects photos or movie clips at up to 40 inches in size on any flat surface. Pictures can be projected individually or as slide shows, complete with music and added effects to enhance the experience. The ability to project still images or movie clips creates a new form of communication in which all participants can share imagery at the same time. For example, the COOLPIX S1000pj can capture photos on a family vacation and then serve as a personal theater in the evening, projecting the highlights of the day on a ceiling or wall for family members to enjoy together.
Silver Award: NVIDIA 3D Vision
NVIDIA 3D Vision technology, consisting of software and wireless active-shutter glasses, enables users to enjoy ultra-realistic gaming, high-definition video playback, rich movie viewing, and crisp photos — all in 3D. The technology was designed with top-of-the-line optics to deliver 2X the resolution per eye vs. passive glasses, plus ultra-wide viewing angles. Comfortable to wear and modeled after modern sunglasses, 3D Vision eyewear offers a lightweight, fully un-tethered alternative to traditional 3D glasses, enabling free range of motion and up to 40 feet of wireless 3D viewing. Powered by NVIDIA GeForce GPUs, 3D Vision is among the world's highest quality stereoscopic 3D consumer solutions for desktop and notebooks PCs, and works with any 120Hz certified display, including the newest 3D HDTVs, computer LCDs, notebook computers and 3D projectors. The included NVIDIA software also automatically converts over 450 games to work in 3D stereo right out of the box.