Voxiebox makes virtual reality without goggles

AUSTIN, TEXAS — Virtual Reality is one of the hottest trends at South by Southwest, but it's also pretty limited: If you want to experience it, you have to put on ungainly goggles. Unless, that is, you're using Voxiebox, which employs biology and physics to create live holograms that you can see with your naked eye, walk around, control and almost touch.

The device looks unlike an augmented reality or VR gadget you've seen before and it works in a fairly unique way

The bottom is a powerful PC with a small display and at the top is a display roughly the size of a 7-inch tablet. The screen points up at the ceiling, which would seem like a useless configuration, except that when the Voxon team that built the device powers it up, the screen starts fluttering up and down at a rate of roughly 3,000 frames per second. Suddenly, in place of the screen is a three dimensional image floating an inch or so above the computer box. The image, which can be anything from a car, to the human anatomy, to a game of Tetris, is rendered as an object that you can walk around and that is controlled via a joystick connected to the PC. Read more...