Digital display dazzles London

You could be soon playing video games on massive digital displays in city centres against players in another part of the world.

The sign offers a bright, high resolution display

This is the vision of media artist Peter Cornwell, the creator of a giant digital billboard in London's city centre.

The 32 metre-long sign uses new technology to produce bright and colourful images which are close to film quality in real time.

"For the first time, these very high resolution displays are interactive and it is possible to make imagery, advertising material or artwork that responds to people in the public space," said Professor Cornwell.

The new display was unveiled last week by Coca-Cola to replace the company's sign that dominated London's Piccadilly Circus.

The billboard created by Professor Cornwell's company, Street Vision, is the world's widest curved LED display. Weighing three tonnes, it can generate images in 16 million colours.

It is a big change from the previous sign which relied on neon tubes. The new sign has thousands of small lamps spaced 16 millimetres apart, capable of producing bright, high resolution images.

Computing power

At the heart of the display is what Professor Cornwell described as a supercomputer, which controls what appears on the sign.

Here we have huge beautiful filmic displays, linked with high performance dedicated communications, potentially serving a large community of users Peter Cornwell, Street Vision

"It is possible to talk to the computer across the internet and send it imagery or create imagery on it from a remote location that is completely unique," he told the BBC programme Go Digital.

The technology means the sign can be made to react to the people around it or even to rain or sunshine, thanks to built-in cameras and weather sensors.

Professor Cornwell, who teaches at the University of Applied Art in Vienna and the Centre for Media Art and Technology in Germany, sees digital billboards as a way of taking art into the streets.

"These displays are being used in media art," he said. "In Germany and France there are quite large computer art installations that make very exciting interactive imagery in public spaces."

He is excited by future potential uses of the sign, particularly with more and more people taking up online gaming.

"Here we have huge beautiful filmic displays, linked with high performance dedicated communications, potentially serving a large community of users," said Professor Cornwell.

"If you imagine hundreds of kids interacting with one display in one city, communicating in real time through this high performance imagery with another community in another city, you begin to get a feeling of enjoyment and the tangible linking of these spaces."