The American company Ostendo Technology announced that it's working on a new technology which will allow us to talk on our smartphone using a hologram.
The creators state that traditional phone calls will disappear in the near future and people will communicate from a distance through holograms, similar to those in the Star Wars saga.
Representatives from the California company explain that unlike the holograms in the popular George Lucas film, modern holograms will be more substantial and brighter.
The images are planned to be projected at 5000 pixels per inch.
The first basic version will be released in 2015 but it will only be able to project 2D images.
This will allow smartphones to display a 48-inch screen on any surface that is smooth enough.
Projection of the holograms will happen using 3D chips, and reps from Quantum Photonic Imagers announced that such chips will become available in stores as early as next year.
For now, the price of the chips is not planned to exceed $30, which is more than twice the price of the cameras in smartphones.
The chip will be relatively easy to embed in the phone, with it being roughly the size of a pinky fingernail.
Ostendo Technology has already gathered funds for the project, whose sum comes out to be $90 million, from venture firms and from Peter Thiel, one of the first investors in Facebook.
$58 million also come from the Pentagon's DARPA, the agency for technological development. Ostendo will present the finished prototype of its holographic system to the US Air Forces in 2016.
