Fastest Book Scanner Ever Captures Flipping Pages with High-Speed Camera

The technology blows away the competition by scanning 200 pages a minute

By Jeremy Hsu

From http://www.popsci.com/

Super-Fast Book Scanner A high-speed camera eye takes speed-reading to a new level ... at least for Johnny 5 University of Tokyo/IEEE Spectrum

A new super-fast book-scanning technology could make publishers cringe even more than when they heard about Google Book Search. A University of Tokyo researcher has developed a "book flipping scanning" method that does exactly what it sounds like, digitizing 200 pages per minute, according to IEEE Spectrum. The Japanese researchers hope to enable a digital library for Japanese manga comics.

The scanner's camera runs at 500 frames per second, and captures rapidly flipping book pages in two modes. First, a regular line shines on the page to capture text and images. The second mode then manages neat the trick of reconstructing the curved, distorted pages in their original form. A laser device projects lines onto each page that the system can use to recreate the 3-D page model and correct the deformed lines.

Google's own proprietary book-scanning technology seems to use some sort of infrared camera to capture the 3-D shape of book pages, but the book lies flat and the page-turning mechanism is unclear. Other book scanners boast of capturing about 50 pages per minute, which is four times slower than the new method.

Masatoshi Ishikawa -- the University of Tokyo researcher behind the book-scanning marvel -- previously developed the fastest robot hands in the East, so he's probably not too worried about tiring out human hands by flipping book pages.

Miniaturized versions of this technology could eventually find their way into our smartphones for completely legal digitizing delights. Or it might combine with the robot hands to bring Short Circuit's Johnny 5 to life.

[via IEEE Spectrum]

Hover-Chair Brings Senior Citizen Air Hockey One Step Closer To Reality

By Clay Dillow
From http://www.popsci.com/

A Real Way to Hover 'Round The hoverchair can float up to 330 pounds around a room on a cushion of air.

Never at a loss for creative ways to make aging look like more fun than it is, the Japanese are developing an approach to senior mobility that's far more like a hovercraft than the mis-named Hoveround. Researchers there have engineered a chair that floats on a cushion of air, gently cruising above the floor like a puck on an air hockey table.

The prototype, designed by Tsunesuke Furuta and colleagues at Japan's Kobe Gakuin University, can be fitted with a performance-style car seat as well as a zabuton -- that's a Japanese-style floor cushion -- and reportedly can corner with ease while transporting a 330-pound payload.

The research team at Kobe Gakuin is looking for a commercial partner to help develop their hover-chair. In the meantime, you can see it in action below.

[CNET]

6 gadgets Japan loves (and the U.S. rejected)

Popular gadgets in Japan often just need a little time to start popping up in the U.S. For instance, most Japanese were using LCD monitors years before they were common stateside. But the rule doesn't hold for every gadget. Every now and then Japan produces a consumer technology that's incompatible with the American populace. Hit the Continue jump for some standout tech absences that are all the rage in the Far East.

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6. Massage chairs

The Japanese buy massage chairs like they were La-Z-Boys. Maybe the stresses of everyday Japanese life encourage people there to put a massage chair in their home, but for whatever reason they're popular enough to have a whole section dedicated to them in many department stores.

Why they haven't caught on stateside: Call us crazy, but the thought of having a chair grip you tightly enough to give you a massage is more than a little unsettling. I tried it once, and I couldn't stop thinking, "Don't piss this thing off."

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5. Elongated phones

Walk down a crowded street in Tokyo and you'll see any number of people holding a phone to their face. What's surprising is how many of those phones are long and slim — often much longer than is necessary for the speaker to be clearly heard by the mike.

Why they haven't caught on stateside: Style, mainly. Super-skinny phones, like the Motorola KRZR, were so 2007.

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4. Blu-ray recorders

Witness this machine, a Panasonic Blu-ray recorder that can hold up to two terabytes on its internal hard disk, ready to burn that video onto a Blu-ray disc anytime. That's pretty impressive technology, letting users save entire seasons of TV shows before archiving them to disc.

Why they haven't caught on stateside: Americans use video technology differently. Setting up a machine to record TV shows to discs — or tapes, for that matter — is beyond many people. The U.S. rejected DVD recorders because we use DVD machines as players only, with the DVR essentially taking over all video-recording duties. By the time Blu-ray came, virtually no one was recording to disc anymore outside of the PC.

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3. Sit-down showers

Need a shower? In Japan, it's not uncommon to be able to kick your feet up while you rinse, sitting on a stool or, as in this photo, a chair built right into the wall. Pretty handy at the end of a long day, or if you simply don't want to get your hair wet.

Why they haven't caught on stateside: Showers in Japan are used before you get in the bath, and in public baths you're supposed to wash only from the neck down. In the U.S. public baths aren't mainstream, and sit-down showers have pretty much been relegated to bathrooms of the elderly and disabled.

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2. Really small netbooks

Yes, you can get mini laptops here in the U.S., but in Japan it's the really tiny ones that stand out. Asus and Acer, known for their tiny (sub 10-inch) machines, have dominated the netbook market in Japan, and other manufacturers (notably Sharp) are following suit.

Why they haven't caught on stateside: You've got us. Maybe those small screens look a little too dainty to American sensibilities. Or maybe we just need to give it a few more months.

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1. Bidet toilets

No list of curiously popular technologies in Japan would be complete without mentioning bidet toilets. As any visitor will tell you, going number two is a whole experience in Japan, from the first moment your behind touches the heated seat to the built-in stereos to the automatic flush.

Why they haven't caught on stateside: Beyond the sheer impractibility of connecting power cables to every toilet in America, here it's more accepted to catch up on some reading while sitting on the throne. That's entertaining enough for us.

Teaching Mathematics in Finland with Japanese Puzzles

For two years in a row Leena Helttula, a math teacher from Finland, included a course about Japanese puzzles in her teaching schedule at Turun iltalukio, night gymnasium for adults. What a great way to teach math.

read more | digg story

Japan's terrifyingly beautiful monster factories

This gallery of Japanese monster factories at night are astonishing: industry at its most beautiful and terrifying. The resemblance to Final Fantasy VII's city scapes can not be accidental.

Fantastic photos of factories in Japan [Bouncing Red Ball via Gizmodo]

Japan sewage yields more gold than top mines

TOKYO, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Resource-poor Japan just discovered a new source of mineral wealth -- sewage.

A sewage treatment facility in central Japan has recorded a higher gold yield from sludge than can be found at some of the world's best mines. An official in Nagano prefecture, northwest of Tokyo, said the high percentage of gold found at the Suwa facility was probably due to the large number of precision equipment manufacturers in the vicinity that use the yellow metal. The facility recently recorded finding 1,890 grammes of gold per tonne of ash from incinerated sludge.

That is a far higher gold content than Japan's Hishikari Mine, one of the world's top gold mines, owned by Sumitomo Metal Mining Co Ltd (5713.T), which contains 20-40 grammes of the precious metal per tonne of ore.

The prefecture is so far due to receive 5 million yen ($55,810) for the gold, minus expenses.

It expects to earn about 15 million yen for the fiscal year to the end of March from the gold it has retrieved from the ashes of incinerated sludge.

"How much we actually receive will depend on gold prices at the time," the official said.

Some gold industry officials expect prices this year to top the all-time high above $1,030 per ounce set in 2008, on buying by investors worried about the deepening economic downturn. (Reporting by Miho Yoshikawa; Editing by Hugh Lawson)

© Thomson Reuters 2009 All rights reserved

Vending Machines Craze in Japan

Instant Gratification to the Nth Degree

Welcome our contributing writer Michael I. Colwill of Kanteker's Craft. After living in Japan for some time, he became enchanted with the Japanese culture and technology, as this article clearly demonstrates.

Vending machines in Japan are as commonplace as temples, bicycles, and karaoke booths. It's not uncommon to see a street lined with a dozen or more machines selling products ranging from cold and hot drinks to flowers or rice. And almost none of these vending machines are vandalized or non-functional. According to the Vending Machine Manufacturers Association, Japan has one vending machine for every 23 people.


(image credit: Stefano)

A Coke vending machine robot walks around Shibuya Station in Tokyo:


(image credit: Sanchome)

According to Tracy Jones in a web article titled "Jidoohanbaiki - Japanese Vending Machines, "the real surge in interest in jidoohanbaiki began during the Tokyo Olympics in 1964 with the need to supply large numbers of people with a number of goods and a severe lack of space and staff."

On the UCLA Asia Institute’s "Two Minute Japan" website you can find a picture of the first official vending machine in Japan. This wooden machine, built in 1904, sold postage stamps and postcards:



Here is a collection of interesting vending machines that you will find scattered throughout Japan’s cities, towns, and even countryside.

Get Your Drink, Coffee & Cigarettes Anytime, Anywhere

These are some of your standard drink vending machines. You’ll find them on practically every street corner. They usually sell a standard variety of sodas, complemented with all kinds of teas, hot and cold coffee, and energy drinks.


Photo by Mac Kane


Photo by Mac Kane

Most drinks around the size of a regular can of soda sell for around 120 yen. This is roughly around $1.05 in American currency. Smaller cans, usually of coffee, can sell for less than that.


Photo by Mac Kane

Notice the different color bands below the drink displays. This is standard on all drink machines and indicates the temperature of the drink, blue for cold and red for hot.


Photo by Ry Tweedie-Cullen


Photo by Mac Kane

It’s actually more common to see several vending machines together, than an individual vending machine on its own. These random conglomerations of vending machines can be found anywhere from a Tokyo street corner to the side of a remote country road.


Photo by Mac Kane

Google offices in Japan have plenty of those:


(image credit: Loren Baker)

Most vending machines will have a recycling container nearby, or even built into the machine. This encourages people to obey the recycling laws, which are enforced in Japan.


Photo by Mac Kane

Here are some pictures of the cigarette vending machines. These machines will generally carry a wide variety of cigarettes, many of which are American brands, both popular and obscure. You will also come across some brands you probably never knew existed. This particular batch of cigarette vending machines has a girl outside promoting some of the products.


Photo by Paul Vlar

During my time in Japan I was amazed at the number of smokers. The World Health Organization has some great statistics on smoking in Japan and many other countries. According to their website, 51% of adult men smoke in Japan, which is down from the number of male smokers in the 1980s. Smoking among women was once considered taboo, but has now risen to nearly 10% in the last decade.


Photo by Mac Kane

A survey in the early 1990s indicated that 44% of Japanese physicians were smokers. And with 500,000 cigarette vending machines the young can easily purchase cigarettes. Smoking is legally prohibited until 20 years of age. The only method of prevention related to cigarette vending machines is that they are turned off between 11:00 P.M. and 6:00 A.M. Japan has some of the weakest anti-tobacco laws. There are very few public areas that are smoke-free.


Photo by Doug Mann


Better ask what they DON'T sell in these machines...

Soft drinks and cigarettes are only a fraction of vast multitude of goods sold from such machines. Rice being a major staple for the Japanese it is no surprise that large bags of rice can be purchased from vending machines. This particular set of machines sells rice in ten kilogram bags. There are some rice vending machines today that sell rice in the same plastic bottles that soda is sold in.


Photo by Doug Mann

Though I've never encountered one of these, the flower machine seems to be a good idea, especially in Japan. Most businessmen are expected to work late, and then socialize with co-workers at a nearby bar; so the 24-hour availability of flowers seems to be promoted as a way for these men to "make it up" to their spouses. I wonder how well it works.


Photo by Doug Mann

Porno vending machine:


(image credit: SweetThaiThai)

Lingerie vending machine (quite common in large cities, actually):


(image credit: François Rejeté)

The number of alcohol vending machines probably matches the number of cigarette machines in Japan. Drinking, like smoking, is prohibited until age 20. And, like cigarette vending machines, the preventative method to keep youth from purchasing alcohol is to turn the machines off between the hours of 11 P.M. and 6 A.M.


Photo by Doug Mann

Many travelers to Japan wonder why most alcohol dispensing machines are located just outside the door of a liquor store. There may be a small convenience factor. But both store and machine would be closed during the night. Note the bottle of whiskey on the bottom shelf.


Photo by Doug Mann

With all the electronics in stores everywhere, is it any wonder that battery vending machines would be available?


Photo by Doug Mann


(image credit: Isodacafe)

Most Japanese households use kerosene heaters to keep out the cold of winter. Because of this you will often hear vehicles driving around towns in the evenings or at night warning people over a loudspeaker to turn off their heaters before they go to sleep.


Photo by Doug Mann

The various parking ingenuities in Japan would take another article to describe in detail. This one appears to be an automated parking elevator where you park your vehicle and receive a card or ticket. When you’re ready to depart you would insert your card, pay your fee, and the elevator would bring your vehicle down to the entry level, often times facing outward so you don’t have to back out. I never figured out how they did that part in some of these elevators.


Photo by Doug Mann

All your bare necessities can be purchased from a vending machine... not the least of them is toilet paper:


Photo by Doug Mann

How many times have you left home only to be caught in a rainstorm later that day? How many times did you remember to carry an umbrella with you? Now it’s nothing to worry about, as long as an umbrella vending machine is nearby.


Photo by Doug Mann

You can buy eggs in a vending machine? Don’t they break when they fall off the shelf? This particular machine seems to have a separate door for every product shelf. However, some vending machines (not necessarily egg-dispensing ones) will move the entire shelf down, until it's on one level with the dispensing window. Then your product will be carefully deposited onto takeout tray, safe and sound.


(image credit: Sally Kernick)

Frogs are perhaps the only thing these machines do not sell:




Photographer: Tetsuya Tanaka


The two photos above are taken by my father-in-law, Tetsuya Tanaka. He is an amateur photographer who has an eye for the beauty of Japan. You can find more pictures by him on my website.

For some other great collections of Japanese Vending Machine pictures please check out the websites of all the photographers included (by permission) in this article.
- Vending Machines of Japan, by PhotoMann
- Polar Interia, journal of nomadic and popular culture, by Mac Kane
- DutchAngle by Paul Vlar.
Also check out "Japanese Vending Machines" Pool, and this wonderful set on Flickr.

Article by Michael Colwill, Kanteker's Craft for Dark Roasted Blend.