Researchers develop a way to project holographs on an iPhone display

Back in 2012 as lines formed outside the New York City Apple Store on Fifth Avenue prior to the release of the iPhone 5, the local Fox News affiliate reported how the iPhone 5 would feature a laser keyboard and a holographic display. Of course, the iPhone 5 had none of those things. The reporter had confused a video of Aatma Studio's concept iPhone 5 with features that would be on the real device.

Skip ahead 12 years, and the iPhone 16 series, due out this September, won't offer those features either. However, according to an article published by researchers in Optics Letters (via BGR), a 3D holographic image can be created using a touchscreen iPhone display. Holographs usually require the use of expensive and complicated lasers so being able to create one using an iPhone would be a huge breakthrough.

Not that using an iPhone makes creating a hologram any less complex. This is the Abstract from the researcher's article which is a summary of the research done, the methodology of the research, and the author's findings: 

"We propose a method of computer-generated holography (CGH) using incoherent light emitted from a mobile phone screen. In this method, we suppose a cascade of holograms in which the first hologram is a color image displayed on the mobile phone screen. The hologram cascade is synthesized by solving an inverse problem with respect to the propagation of incoherent light. We demonstrate a three-dimensional color image reproduction using a two-layered hologram cascade composed of an iPhone and a spatial light modulator."

The holograph was created on an iPhone 14 display using two layers to reproduce a three-dimensional object image and the results were nearly comparable to a holograph produced by the expensive laser system. Don't start thinking, like that Fox reporter did back in 2012, that a holographic display is coming to all new iPhone models. It will still require leaps in technology for any smartphone to feature a 3D holographic display that everyone can view on a display held in their hands.

Back in 2012, we told you how you can create the illusion that a holograph was appearing on your smartphone screen. In August 2015, Samsung filed a patent for a smartphone that would display holographic icons on the screen.