Bendy electronic paper from Fujitsu

[Steve]

I'll start by letting a picture do the talking:



So what is electronic paper? Here's some development background from the Press Release

Electronic paper offers all of the same characteristics of paper such as being thin, flexible, and lightweight. It also boasts low power consumption in that it does not require electricity except during screen image changes, making electronic paper especially suited for advertisements or information bulletins in public places for which paper is currently used.

Is that lower power consumption than normal paper, I wonder?

Anyway, what distinguishes this from other electronic paper efforts is that this version features three layers in different colours - red, green and blue - so electronic paper can now be coloured.

Fujitsu's new wonder-paper doesn't need power to maintain an image either. It has a 'memory' meaning power need only be applied to actually change the image being displayed.

So what will this actually be used for? Fujitsu have a few ideas. They like the idea of it being used in flyers, which can be handed out and of course recycled by updating the image on them. Display tags in shops could also feature this.

One of the best ideas, I think, is the concept of using such paper as a temporary paper based manual for something. We all enjoy the convenience of a pdf based manual, but sometimes you need it on paper, not on a screen. Upload the page you need to the paper and go off and use it. With integrated storage you could possibly store an entire set of manual pages within the electronic paper.

All of this could cut down on the amount of paper we throw away and we all know that's a good thing. I'll leave you with one last picture.

[Dougal]

Do you know what the colour scales are? 0-255 for each colour pixel?

[Steve]

No idea, I'm afraid.