Holography: A Window into the Future

Year Published: 1970s

Description: "Holography: A Window into the Future" (early 1970s) features Tung H. Jeong, Ph.D.

At the time, Jeong was an international leader in the field. He worked with Hans Bjelkhagen on technology to make true-color holograms and assisted in the development of the three-dimensional moving holograms. His research led to simple and economical holograms.




The film explains the science and promise of holography, beginning with the development of lasers and the discovery that interference patterns from coherent waves can store three-dimensional images. Demonstrations using water, sound, and light show how holograms capture the full light field of an object, allowing it to be reconstructed even if the plate is broken. The film explores holography’s ability to store massive amounts of information, create moving or multiplexed images, and reveal stress or deformation through interferometry. It concludes by highlighting future medical uses, including anatomical teaching, prosthetic testing, tissue imaging, and real-time study of biological growth, arguing that holography will become a major tool in scientific and medical research. The film was directed by Charles Glazer and shot by Ronald Stangl.




0:00 – The narrator introduces a new scientific tool—holography—and explains that the film will show how it works and its medical potential.

1:19 – A scientific principle is stated: nature is unified and can be described through rules; waves are introduced as universal phenomena.

2:10 – The invention of the laser makes coherent optics and practical holography possible, building on earlier theoretical work.

3:43 – A demonstration begins, explaining wave interference using water, sound, and light.

4:41 – A ripple tank shows how coherent water waves create stationary interference patterns, the basis of holography.

7:00 – Two coherent speakers and an oscilloscope reveal an interference pattern in sound waves.

7:37 – A helium-neon laser produces two coherent light beams that form visible interference fringes.

9:17 – The film explains that interference patterns can be recorded on film and reconstructed, forming the simplest hologram.

11:03 – Instead of recording a single beam, a three-dimensional object is placed before the plate, creating a complex interference pattern.

13:28 – When illuminated with the reference beam, the hologram reconstructs all points of the object, recreating its 3-D light field.

14:48 – Holographic images can appear fully three-dimensional and projected onto surfaces.

16:09 – A cylindrical hologram is created by surrounding an object with film.

16:31 Multiplexed holograms allow different images to appear depending on viewing angle, similar to multiple radio channels.

18:09 Holograms are extremely durable—breaking the plate still preserves the full image in every piece.

19:47 Holography can store vast amounts of information, and even tiny fragments retain the whole image until light transmission becomes impossible.

20:11 – Holographic interferometry is introduced, showing movement-based interference lines that reveal stress or deformation.

21:01 Real-time interferometry shows movement instantly by placing a hologram back in front of the object.

22:31 Researchers discuss a cracked pressure cell that still produced a working hologram, illustrating scientific trial and error.

23:25 – The narrator describes the future of VA medicine using holography to teach anatomy and study microscopic structures.

24:03 Holography could measure stress in prosthetics and generate accurate 3-D medical imagery non-destructively.

24:21 Future holographic systems may produce safe three-dimensional organ images using coherent ultrasonics and lasers.

24:34 Holography may record biological growth patterns in real time, down to cells and neurons.

25:01 The film concludes that holography’s medical uses will multiply, including microorganism identification and new diagnostic tools.

Online Copy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJ_jtdlCj74

Metadata Source:YouTube