Japan dreams of the hologram
このブログの日本語訳はこちらまで (for the Japanese version of this post, please click here!)
I think I just walked into the holographic equivalent of the Homebrew Computer Club — something that the organizers call the “Looking Glass Club” — which as far as I can tell is the world’s first self-organized group of hologram hackers.
It’s not hosted by Facebook in a fancy office in Silicon Valley. It’s not a press-laden conference run by the hype-men of Magic Leap. And it’s not even funded or organized by Looking Glass Factory, the company I co-founded that makes the holographic displays being used here.
It’s a group of hundreds of 3D creators that pulled together a club of their own, because they wanted to share their holographic creations in the Looking Glass with their friends. A hundred of the club members gathered last week for the first in-person meeting, The Looking Glass Study Group, with dozens of Looking Glasses running all sorts of holographic apps and hacks all over the room, some of which I haven’t seen anyone else in the world attempt or in some cases even conceive of yet.
Oh yeah, and it’s in Tokyo :)
To get a sense of how completely insane the pace of holographic creation is in Japan, browse through our Twitter feed. There’s real-time volumetric video streaming, voxel-based game engines for the Looking Glass, software robots, flocks of birdoids, VTuber Looking Glass streaming support, stacked Looking Glasses, VRM model importers, accelerometer controls, and other impossible things. And that’s just in the last two months.
I’ve never seen anything like this taking on a life of its own so quickly. So, we’re going to pour some fuel onto the fires of creation in Japan.
Today, we’re officially launching the Looking Glass holographic display for 3D creators in Japan on Makuake.com. Any Japanese creator can get a very special price on both the Standard and Large Looking Glass, with extreme specials for the first day and some of the specials continuing to run for 60 days. We will cover the shipping and consumption tax to Japan! We’re shipping with a special Japanese Getting Started guide! A Japan-only set of Looking Glass stickers and limited edition pin! And Japanese-language customer support (we’ve just hired our first full-time staff that’s fluent in Japanese)! And as always, no VR or AR headsets required to use the Looking Glass.
We’ve also a number of special software releases that we’ll be announcing during the course of the next 60 days that will give the Looking Glass more capabilities than ever before.
So, if you’re a 3D creator living in Japan that wants to join the Looking Glass craze sweeping through the country, today is the best time to get one of your own here. And if you’ve any questions, please post in the comments below or write me at smf@lookingglassfactory.com — I’d love to hear from you!
To the future!
- Shawn (that’s me in there!) & the entire team at Looking Glass Factory
