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Technology from Movies and TV Shows
By Jacob Cohen | November 1, 2007
The sorts of technology and computer interfaces we see in movies and TV shows are, quite often, sensationalized beyond reason. They are designed to provide visual interest and to look cool, but real-world computer and technology would most likely never be implemented in such a fashion, even if it was possible and easy to do so.
The 1995 movie Hackers is often used as an example of over-dramatic, Hollywood computer interfaces, with the characters navigating through a computer’s files using a 3-d interface that resembles flying through skyscrapers. This is a good example of a computer interface that we probably won’t see implemented, even though the average desktop PC has enough power to have such an interface. The 3-d flying simply isn’t an effective mechanism for locating files on a computer. It provides visual interest, but little real-world practical use.
For contrast, consider shows like “24″ and CSI. It is common to see a character on their cell phone talking to someone back at the home office or police station, and they will then snap a picture of something with their phone and send it to the computer next to whoever they’re talking to. This is something that is actually quite useful, and it is a lot harder to do than they make it look. Phones are becoming powerful to the point that you can easily send photos to other phones, but to send it to a computer (perhaps using an e-mail address) while on a call with that person is not a one-button operation.
This is a technology we should have available. There are various ways we could make this work that don’t involve trying to have the picture phone know where to send the photo so that it appears on that computer screen. Suppose, for example, that there was a Bluetooth profile available that would allow any computer to serve as an external display screen for the mobile phone. Then, “sending it to your screen” is more literal, you just send the photo to the phone as usual, and the phone uses the nearby external screen to display it.
Here are some other things we often see in movies and TV shows that I think would be useful (and possible) to have:
- Keyword-based retrieval of files - If it’s that easy for a villain to find information on your computer, it should be that easy for you as well. We have a lot of this technology starting to gain use on desktop PCs already, such as Google Desktop Search.
- Fast in-the-field lab equipment - In shows like CSI, a field detective can feed a sample of something into a small machine and have results ready almost instantly, saying what the material is. We can’t do it that quickly yet, but I remain hopeful that in ten or fifteen years we will have miniaturized and optimized such laboratory procedures to the point that they can be carried out in the field with similar alacrity.
And here are some technologies and interfaces that are probably only ever going to exist in movies and on TV:
- Externally-accessible Government computers - You know, the kind that someone can access from anywhere, and the only trick to getting inside is guessing the password.
- 3-d flying interfaces - As seen in Hackers, Jurassic Park, and others. While it looks cool, it just isn’t particularly useful.
- Task-aware computer interfaces - Messages that say things like “Uploading virus…” or “Downloading secret plans…”. These are intended to help explain plot points in movies and TV shows, but would not be particularly useful to the person performing the task.
So, while most of the time, Hollywood movies and prime-time TV shows contain computer interfaces and technologies that are mostly designed to add visual interest or explanation to the subject matter, there are occasionally some ideas that could give rise to very useful technology for the real world.
Topics: General |
November 1st, 2007 at 3:47 pm
I feel compelled to point out that the 3D computer interface featured in Jurassic Park was actually a real IRIX app - I believe it was called 3D Navigator or something like that.
There’s a slightly more modern rewrite available here: http://fsv.sourceforge.net/
As for the task aware interfaces, “Getting email…”, “Burning CD…”, and “Copying Secret_Plans.doc…” are all dialogs I’ve been seeing for quite some time.
November 2nd, 2007 at 10:32 am
Speaking of 24, it’d also be pretty cool if I could get a live 3D X-ray video feed of a building that identifies the skeletons running around sent to my Sprint phone.
November 2nd, 2007 at 11:53 am
Wow. This is so coincidental. I’ve always had a problem with the hollywoodification of computers in the media.
A few days ago I saw Transformers (2007), and while this isn’t a new thing I had major problems with a lot of aspects of the movie. Note: on a whole, I got over it, and it was a fun movie, but just for arguments sake, here are the things that annoyed me.
1. That small robot made lots audible noises. Not only was nothing around to hear the robot, no one would understand it even if they were around. So why was this “robot” built with speakers?
2. The same robot hacked into the Pentagon with a sound-wave. Ok, this isn’t the 1980’s where blue boxes actually worked. It’s time for Hollywood to upgrade their cultural references for continued realism.
3. When the robot was “hacking” the Pentagon, lots of images flashed on the screen as it performed its task. This is just ridiculous.
Anyway, I realize Hollywood does this for people who haven’t written a line of code in their lives, but this is just so romanticized that its ridiculous.
In parallel, I watched The Recruit (2003) again last night with a buddy of mine, and it was slightly more believable. There were parts in the movie where James is hacking various computers, with code on the screen. Being the geek I am, I paused the movie and stepped through frame by frame reading the code. It closely resembled C/++ with statements such as sprintf, for loops, int char along with a few ambiguous and presumably fictional statements. Just by looking at the code, I know it wouldn’t compile let alone do anything it was portrayed to do, however the fact that most of it was legitimate code, and the process it was describing being fairly accurate was really cool.
On a side note, I’d also be interested to see what the actors are actually “typing” during their “hacking” sessions. There are a few points in The Recruit where I could have figured out what he was typing… that would have just been sad though.
My ¢2
November 2nd, 2007 at 1:52 pm
Yeah, some of that stuff in Transformers was overly sensationalized. I think the part where the robot is “hacking” into a computer, and it is flashing images across the screen, is just done for visual interest. It would be pretty boring to just show the robot sitting there.
I guess that’s part of the reason a lot of this exists. Many computer tasks are performed silently and quickly, with no visual feedback. However, to show that this is happening in the movie, they have to come up with some sort of visual feedback mechanism. Even if there’s a real-world version of the feedback, such as a progress bar or little hourglass icon or whatever, they have to make it bigger and more visually interesting to keep the scene from being boring.
Another example would be from the 2001 movie Swordfish. There are tons of examples in this movie of sensationalized computer interfaces that have no need to exist in the real world. For example, the way the computer shows the money filling and draining from accounts instead of being an instantaneous transfer. Or, the way he writes the “virus” to deliver the software into the bank’s computer, showing a 3-d animated object that is being assembled from smaller blocks.
These sorts of UI effects would have no real merit on a real computer system, but they do make the movie more interesting to look at. I think the “virus writing” scene would be pretty boring if it just showed the guy sitting there typing code onto a small computer screen.
November 9th, 2007 at 2:29 pm
I can understand this standpoint, and considering the majority are average computer users, I can sympathize, but personally, I’d be much more fascinated and appreciative if the “hacker” (actor) was actually writing code. Even if he was just writing a “hello world” program (which would be funny) legitimate code would be nice, otherwise they’re sorta belittling the industry we (assuming the majority of your readers are like myself) work in.
Like I said however. I’m not too upset over it; understanding the issue really defuses a lot of the angst, but it would be nice to see a movie completely nail the concepts. Besides, if people think I play with digital Legos and visual sound-waves all day and make money off it, COOL!
November 11th, 2007 at 12:28 am
True that. Watching a robot sitting there and do nothing would be a tad boring.
I actually have seen a number of old movies that did have real working code, probably didn’t do much but syntactically correct.
November 14th, 2007 at 4:44 pm
I really *hate* this stupidification of computers in movies and TV-shows. A great example is Die Hard 4.
Quotes like “They’re hacking all our IP-adresses simultanously!” doesn’t help either. It can really ruin a movie. Also, computers in TV-shows and movies never run Windows, Mac OSX or Linux.
Other movies comes to mind: The Core, Mission Impossible 1 and Sniper.
November 18th, 2007 at 4:35 pm
Uhh WTF! A conversation that I had on steam chat was found on your site rafb.net/p/OjUr2L72.txt and I would just like to say… WTF! WHY IS IT THERE! How did you get and again WTF! Please email me at youaremea@hotmail.com to explain why it is there and how you got it…. This is so wrong.
November 23rd, 2007 at 12:23 am
Bluetooth is a really mega thing
I can’t imagine the life without it. I’m so happy that I live in times of technical progress indeed!
January 31st, 2008 at 8:01 pm
movies suspend disbelief anywhere they want to, and this is nothing but another example of that. every frame in a movie has to have reason, whether to propel plot, character development, or otherwise. simply using these false computer interfaces adds another way to provide visual detail to other action going on in frame.
it doesn’t “belittle” the computer industry at all, like the previous poster suggested. i somehow doubt the medical industry was up in arms and calling “hollow man” an abomination of science simply because it was so absurdly impossible. hollywood has to employ tons of shortcuts to move stories quickly, this is just another example of that.
July 21st, 2008 at 8:39 pm
Hollywood movies are the best in the world. No one foreign movie can match them in trick effects, sound, and large scale.