Bachelor Thesis

Feasibility of Interactive Real-Time Applications on a Holographic Pyramid

This work originated as part of my bachelor’s thesis based on a personal project. While browsing the video platform “YouTube,” I came across a video showing a homemade Plexiglas pyramid placed on a smartphone, on which a video with four faces was being played. Due to the so-called “Pepper’s Ghost effect,” the way the video is displayed and the arrangement of the Plexiglas create a visual effect that resembles holography. Initially, my work on the project focused on understanding how it works and creating various videos for the pyramid system. After further research, I discovered that there are hardly any implementations of such a system in the interactive field, or that they are only suitable for a specific pyramid system. For this reason, I began programming smaller applications capable of rendering 3D objects and animations for any type of pyramid.

For the initial approach, I used WebGL and JavaScript for programming. This allowed me to develop mini-test applications in which the user can interact with the displayed 3D objects. This led to the creation of various programs that enabled me, for example, to analyze the use of motion control (LeapMotion) or the feasibility of games. One advantage of using WebGL is that the applications can be displayed on virtually any type of device, such as computers, smartphones, or tablets. Since I became increasingly involved with Unreal Engine 4 during my studies, another approach was to create test applications using this development environment. My bachelor’s thesis contains various interdisciplinary chapters that first address the historical background of the creation of the effect as well as its distinction from holography. It also includes a detailed description of the procedure for creating such a pyramid system, as well as examples of test program implementation using WebGL and the Unreal Engine. Furthermore, I analyze and highlight various applications of the technology, its mode of operation, and its advantages and disadvantages.