Nokia unveils new mind "bending" tech:
In case you thought technology had reached its limits.. take a look at future screen technology!
Who wants 3D when you can bend the dam thing??
Apparently both Nokia and Samsung are planning to release phones with these flexible OLED screens in the near future (and by near I mean as early as 2012). Source
What makes this possible?
OLED technology has been around for quite a while now but due to various manufacturing limitations, it has only recently started to develop in terms of the consumer market.With OLED technology, BTW OLED stands for - organic light emitting diode, one can "print" ultra thin displays on virtually any material. This is done using ink jet technology. Using ink jet technology, OLEDs are sprayed onto substrates just like inks are sprayed onto paper during printing. Ink jet technology greatly reduces the cost of OLED manufacturing and allows OLEDs to be printed onto very large films for large displays like 80-inch TV screens or electronic billboards. I don't want to bore you with all the technical details on how these things are made so if you want to learn about that then go HERE
The OLEDs act as standard LED's baring their physical structure i.e. they can be made incredibly small and this allows for the display to function much like the large LED displays found in stadiums and outdoor events, however on a much much smaller scale (we are talking hand held devices here). There are obvious benefits to this as one can imagine, firstly the OLED displays consume virtually NO power as they do not need a back light - the back light is the OLEDs, which means ultra small battery packs with solar power capabilities. The fact that they do not use a back light not only has power advantages but also has contrast advantages. Contrast is the measure of the black to white colour ratio and without a back light the display can achieve a near infinite contrast ratio (no leakage light as seen in the LCD and LED back light TV's as the pixels are turned off to represent black rather than blocking the back light). There are many variants of the OLED technology (owned by Samsung of course) such as AMOLED, AMOLED PLUS, S AMOLED PLUS and ClearBlack AMOLED to name a few. AMOLED stands for Active Matrix OLED which simply describes the control technology behind the display. Currently OLED displays can be seen in mobile phones such as the Samsung galaxy SII and the new Nokia phones (there are many examples that i am not going to cover).
Unfortunately, as with all new technology, the OLED manufacturing process remains a complicated one and that means that it is.. well.. expensive. haha. However it is expected to drop drastically in the upcomming months and hopefully within a few years commercially available display "printers" will be in our homes! (Holding thumbs here!)
One thing that this cool "new" tech does in no uncertain terms is open doors. It provides us with a glimpse into the not so far future.
I mean, who wouldn't want a TV on their T-shirt?? (telly tubbies anyone??)
