Wallace and Gromit go virtual

New video-conferencing system smart enough for Hollywood

Hewlett Packard’s new Halo video-conferencing technology ought to have the airlines scared. Developed for Dreamworks when they were working with Bristol-based Aardman Animations on a Wallace and Gromit film, Halo was designed to be realistic enough to let creative people in different countries work together to produce a Hollywood movie, without continually getting on planes.

It can bring together four different locations, project a broadcast quality image where people appear as their actual size, and has no delays at all. The overhead cameras that focus in on the tabletop mean cartoonists can share doodles and designs - or colleagues can annotate documents. With each Halo studio identical to its peers, virtual guests have said they felt they could reach across the table and touch the other people. Which might explain the £200,000 price tag…

11 March 2007