Mystery Image #29

Posted by Jenifer Monger on June 27, 2012

Hey Readers! Welcome to RPI HISTORY REVEALED, our new blog platform. We were a bit nervous about this transition, asking ourselves "will we lose them," "will they stay tuned?"

Please remember, all of the content is the same. Anything you searched or found in the old blog over the years exists here (exact same posts and comments), things just look different.

I thought we'd begin our new blog with an RPI History Revealed Mystery Image tradition. We have this wonderful box of photographs labelled "laboratory."  I grabbed this box a few weeks ago in anticipation of finding some really great header images to incorporate into the new blog when I found one in particular that I just loved.

What is happening in this photograph? Which department would this activity have taken place in? Is it an experiment? I see a guy, an image of a gal, a black tube, a piece of plastic taped onto the black tube, a cement wall, a cardboard box and an outlet.

Can anyone tell us what technology (or forthcoming technology) this is!! And of course can anyone identify these individuals?

Comments

Jen Kuba
Fri, 06/29/2012 - 08:19 Permalink

Russell, you've provided great background information here. I was hoping we could attach a professor's name to this image as well as the discussion. Thank you!

Paul Yergin
Wed, 06/27/2012 - 18:06 Permalink

It looks very much like someone looking at a hologram image. No idea of identities.

David Nichols
Thu, 06/28/2012 - 09:31 Permalink

Yes, the image of the woman is created by a hologram, a white light hologram. The incandescent lamp is beneath the image. The display was available from Edmund Scientific Company several decades ago and was a common hallway display in many physics and engineering departments in the US. I do not know the identity of the young man nor of the model who winks and blows a kiss as the viewer moves from left to right, or right to left.

John Erickson '84
Thu, 06/28/2012 - 09:42 Permalink

The hologram is "The Kiss II" (1976), a "multiplex" hologram on film (12 x 23 cm) by the great Lloyd Cross (with Pam Brazier). See e.g. and

If this is an RPI photo, then either the hologram visited RPI or a class made a "field trip" to MIT, where it was eventually displayed.

Russell Kraft
Thu, 06/28/2012 - 15:17 Permalink

I can add that this was something Prof. Pankaj Das got for his optics lab in the JEC and set up for demonstrations. I remember seeing it there.

Add new comment

Name
Email
Comment

Restricted HTML

  • Allowed HTML tags: <a href hreflang> <em> <strong> <cite> <blockquote cite> <code> <ul type> <ol start type> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd> <h2 id> <h3 id> <h4 id> <h5 id> <h6 id>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Web page addresses and email addresses turn into links automatically.
Your name
Back to top