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Wednesday 21 May 2008
Design
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3D graphics in mobile phones makes sense
Friday 2 March 2007
Putting 3D graphics in phone handsets might seem a bit pointless. With small screens, it is difficult to get great images, and the increased power drain is a problem. But chip makers are now looking to put 3D into their offerings throughout the range, not necessarily for games but for the user interface. This is allowing new applications and new ways of handling the large amounts of complex data that are increasingly appearing on phones.
After severing its co-marketing deal with Imagination Technologies last year and buying Falanx of Norway instead, ARM has launched its own 3D cores. The Mali 200 and Mali 55, the first from the Falanx team, provide 3D graphics for gaming, but more importantly, for new ways of displaying information.
Although the team that developed the cores is new, they support ARM’s existing embedded Java-based 3D graphics, including the Swerve Client software. This software ships in high volumes today in phones from Siemens, Motorola, Samsung and LG Electronics, and the combination of Swerve and the higher performance of Mali200 provides a boost for 3D gaming as well as supporting existing games.
TI’s latest chip platform, Omap3, uses the latest technology from Imagination, the SGX core, as well as the existing MBX and MBXlite cores. “With HD capability and 3D graphics, all of a sudden things jump out at you and that’s the whole point of Omap3,” said Rick Wietfeldt, CTO of the wireless terminals business at TI. The SGX core adds a multi-threaded parallel shading engine to improve the quality of the images.
But the key now is not just the gaming, but 3D becoming more ubiquitous in handsets and providing new ways to design interfaces, handling more complex data in more intuitive ways.
This move is the key, says Tony King-Smith, v-p of marketing at Imagination Technologies. This is driving more software developers to use 3D in all sorts of different ways. This only becomes compelling when the technology moves down into the feature phones, he says, and then the ecosystem of software provides is vital.
This opens up the possibility of downloading different UIs to a phone depending on the operator look-and-feel or the user preference. The UI can be targetted to different types of user, and you could even download a different make, for example downloading a Toshiba UI to a Sharp phone. Acrodea worked with Softbank in Japan on 350 old user interfaces to download for exactly this approach. Imagination itself is using the Acrodea tools to develop new 3D UIs internally, says King-Smith.
“We are going from a push model to trying to get a pull through from the phone makers and it will come through the retail channel,” he said. “That’s why the UI is such a great story because every handset manufacturer understands the importance of the UI.”
It’s not just the basic control of the phone either. Companies such as NetDimension are using it to provide 3D mapping of building, both inside and out, linked to low cost navigation systems using both satellites and the cell sites. This can even be tied up with products, to take you straight to the handbag section of a store, for example, says Tetsu Hayasi, CEO of NetDimension and demonstrating the software with Imagination. “The experience is pretty complete, very smooth, and this navigation with fine grain textures is something the handset vendors are very, very keen to do over the next few years,” said King-Smith.
Nvidia was also demonstrating the first prototype implementation of the Khronos OpenKODE 1.0 specification, using this to develop an intuitive user interface concept design. OpenKODE is a royalty-free open standard set of native APIs for media and graphics applications, essentially competing with ARM’s Swerve.
“Nvidia is a strong supporter of the Khronos Group and is committed to promoting open standards for the mobile industry to reduce software fragmentation and enable truly compelling handheld rich media to make its way into the hands of consumers,” said Neil Trevett, v-p of embedded content at Nvidia and chairman of the Khronos Group. “Nvidia is strongly focused on supporting Khronos standards to expose its advanced media acceleration capabilities to the software developer community while helping to drive the industry towards mass acceptance of such open standards to enable a new generation of innovative mobile content.”
Nvidia has launched its first venture into the applications processor arena with the first chip from its acquisition of Portalplayer last year. But Nvidia is already supplying the 3D engines for high end Motorola 3G phones and the applications processor will drive 3D into much more of the market, says Glenn Schuster, general manager of Nvidia wireless media processor business.
The GoForce6100 includes an ARM1176 core alongside a 3D accelerator developed by PortalPlayer. But future versions will use accelerator cores from Nvidia.
In the same vein, AMD is licensing the 3D technology from its acquisition of ATI technologies to go into handsets. STMicroelectronics is the first to license the technology from AMD, including 2D, 3D and vector graphics core engines, as well as related software compliant with OpenGL ES 2.0 and OpenVG 1.0 standards, for its Nomadik applications processor family.
“Our extensive benchmarking research found that AMD delivers the highest quality graphics technology for handheld user interfaces and sophisticated applications such as GPS,” said Jyrki Hannikainen, general manager of ST’s Application Processor Division. “Combining AMD’s leading graphics core with the proven strengths of our Nomadik leading-edge multimedia platform will not only drive interest with application developers, but will help feed the consumer appetite for visually rich 3D applications and multimedia.”
ARM’s Mali55 also aims for this higher volume market, measuring under 1.4mm2 on a 90nm generic process, and providing full scene anti-aliasing up to 16x, to turn a quarterVGA screen into a high-cost VGA system for UI and gaming. “Mobile multimedia phones today rival the personal computers of ten years ago. Now, console-quality 3D graphics are transforming the mobile handset into a compelling gaming platform, and recent innovations are redefining the very way we interact with the UI,” said Ian Drew, v-p of marketing at ARM. “With the integration of the Mali processors into the ARM portfolio, we can now offer comprehensive 2D and 3D graphics solutions for a wide range of handsets – from low-cost phones to high-end mobile multimedia devices – and accelerate time-to-market.”
The trend is also bringing new players into the market. IP developer CEVA is looking at how it can include 3D graphics in the IP it supplies to companies such as Infineon. “3D is something we are exploring heavily,” said Gideon Wertheizer, CEO of Ceva. “We are now trying to understand exactly what customers want as we are getting confused messages. Some people want it just for icons and menus, others want games, and our idea is to build a platform for the mainstream that provides both.”
So 3D is becoming a key part of handset design. As a result, the phones of the next few years will look very different to the flat, 2D menus-driven phones we have today.
After severing its co-marketing deal with Imagination Technologies last year and buying Falanx of Norway instead, ARM has launched its own 3D cores. The Mali 200 and Mali 55, the first from the Falanx team, provide 3D graphics for gaming, but more importantly, for new ways of displaying information.
Although the team that developed the cores is new, they support ARM’s existing embedded Java-based 3D graphics, including the Swerve Client software. This software ships in high volumes today in phones from Siemens, Motorola, Samsung and LG Electronics, and the combination of Swerve and the higher performance of Mali200 provides a boost for 3D gaming as well as supporting existing games.
TI’s latest chip platform, Omap3, uses the latest technology from Imagination, the SGX core, as well as the existing MBX and MBXlite cores. “With HD capability and 3D graphics, all of a sudden things jump out at you and that’s the whole point of Omap3,” said Rick Wietfeldt, CTO of the wireless terminals business at TI. The SGX core adds a multi-threaded parallel shading engine to improve the quality of the images.
But the key now is not just the gaming, but 3D becoming more ubiquitous in handsets and providing new ways to design interfaces, handling more complex data in more intuitive ways.
This move is the key, says Tony King-Smith, v-p of marketing at Imagination Technologies. This is driving more software developers to use 3D in all sorts of different ways. This only becomes compelling when the technology moves down into the feature phones, he says, and then the ecosystem of software provides is vital.
This opens up the possibility of downloading different UIs to a phone depending on the operator look-and-feel or the user preference. The UI can be targetted to different types of user, and you could even download a different make, for example downloading a Toshiba UI to a Sharp phone. Acrodea worked with Softbank in Japan on 350 old user interfaces to download for exactly this approach. Imagination itself is using the Acrodea tools to develop new 3D UIs internally, says King-Smith.
“We are going from a push model to trying to get a pull through from the phone makers and it will come through the retail channel,” he said. “That’s why the UI is such a great story because every handset manufacturer understands the importance of the UI.”
It’s not just the basic control of the phone either. Companies such as NetDimension are using it to provide 3D mapping of building, both inside and out, linked to low cost navigation systems using both satellites and the cell sites. This can even be tied up with products, to take you straight to the handbag section of a store, for example, says Tetsu Hayasi, CEO of NetDimension and demonstrating the software with Imagination. “The experience is pretty complete, very smooth, and this navigation with fine grain textures is something the handset vendors are very, very keen to do over the next few years,” said King-Smith.
Nvidia was also demonstrating the first prototype implementation of the Khronos OpenKODE 1.0 specification, using this to develop an intuitive user interface concept design. OpenKODE is a royalty-free open standard set of native APIs for media and graphics applications, essentially competing with ARM’s Swerve.
“Nvidia is a strong supporter of the Khronos Group and is committed to promoting open standards for the mobile industry to reduce software fragmentation and enable truly compelling handheld rich media to make its way into the hands of consumers,” said Neil Trevett, v-p of embedded content at Nvidia and chairman of the Khronos Group. “Nvidia is strongly focused on supporting Khronos standards to expose its advanced media acceleration capabilities to the software developer community while helping to drive the industry towards mass acceptance of such open standards to enable a new generation of innovative mobile content.”
Nvidia has launched its first venture into the applications processor arena with the first chip from its acquisition of Portalplayer last year. But Nvidia is already supplying the 3D engines for high end Motorola 3G phones and the applications processor will drive 3D into much more of the market, says Glenn Schuster, general manager of Nvidia wireless media processor business.
The GoForce6100 includes an ARM1176 core alongside a 3D accelerator developed by PortalPlayer. But future versions will use accelerator cores from Nvidia.
In the same vein, AMD is licensing the 3D technology from its acquisition of ATI technologies to go into handsets. STMicroelectronics is the first to license the technology from AMD, including 2D, 3D and vector graphics core engines, as well as related software compliant with OpenGL ES 2.0 and OpenVG 1.0 standards, for its Nomadik applications processor family.
“Our extensive benchmarking research found that AMD delivers the highest quality graphics technology for handheld user interfaces and sophisticated applications such as GPS,” said Jyrki Hannikainen, general manager of ST’s Application Processor Division. “Combining AMD’s leading graphics core with the proven strengths of our Nomadik leading-edge multimedia platform will not only drive interest with application developers, but will help feed the consumer appetite for visually rich 3D applications and multimedia.”
ARM’s Mali55 also aims for this higher volume market, measuring under 1.4mm2 on a 90nm generic process, and providing full scene anti-aliasing up to 16x, to turn a quarterVGA screen into a high-cost VGA system for UI and gaming. “Mobile multimedia phones today rival the personal computers of ten years ago. Now, console-quality 3D graphics are transforming the mobile handset into a compelling gaming platform, and recent innovations are redefining the very way we interact with the UI,” said Ian Drew, v-p of marketing at ARM. “With the integration of the Mali processors into the ARM portfolio, we can now offer comprehensive 2D and 3D graphics solutions for a wide range of handsets – from low-cost phones to high-end mobile multimedia devices – and accelerate time-to-market.”
The trend is also bringing new players into the market. IP developer CEVA is looking at how it can include 3D graphics in the IP it supplies to companies such as Infineon. “3D is something we are exploring heavily,” said Gideon Wertheizer, CEO of Ceva. “We are now trying to understand exactly what customers want as we are getting confused messages. Some people want it just for icons and menus, others want games, and our idea is to build a platform for the mainstream that provides both.”
So 3D is becoming a key part of handset design. As a result, the phones of the next few years will look very different to the flat, 2D menus-driven phones we have today.
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