The Computing Department's Dr Enrico Rukzio and Andrew Greaves gave pupils from Carnforth High School an exciting crash course in the joys of new projector phones on Thursday.

Projector phones show whatever the screen is displaying, including photos, films, games and even text messages.

Instead of viewing a film on the small screen, the phones have the ability to project images onto walls as big as 50-inches.

Footage of the Year 7 kids enjoying the new phones was filmed in the University's InfoLab building on Thursday morning and was screened on television on Monday, March 23. "I thought the kids really enjoyed it," said Andrew Greaves.

"They seemed to really like the fact that they were able to personally project movies onto walls. The technology has allowed the creation of
personal projection devices that we can carry with us all the time and personally project our media any place, any time.

"It is the big viewing experience we can enjoy all the time.

"The kids I spoke to said they'd really like a projector phone for Christmas!"

Andrew and Dr Rukzio will continue to research the impact of sharing media using mobile phones.

The pair were also recently praised in the New Scientist, due to their research on the pros and cons of projector phone technology.

"Viewing and sharing media is just one aspect of my research," continued Andrew.

"We are currently researching into the viewing and sharing of media when using the projector phones, specifically focusing on the benefits the large projected screen provides for group-based viewing and how we can seamlessly support group sharing of media."

* You can read the New Scientist article at www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126975.300-projector-phones-cool-app-or-visual-pollution.html

* For further details about Lancaster Univer-sity's computing department, go to www.comp.lancs.ac.uk.