Ad Agencies Hope Projected 3-D Images Will Sell : Marketing: Technology combines optics and programming to produce holograph-like images in daylight for use in retail displays.

Those eye-catching window displays at fancy department stores are moving out of the window.

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A New York company has created a device that projects three-dimensional images sharply enough to be seen in daylight and without special glasses. It uses a combination of optics and computer programming to achieve the effect.

The device, given the techno-sounding name “High-Definition Volumetric Display,” was recently scheduled for its first public demonstration in the entrance and on the sidewalk of the new Bradlees department store in New York.

It shows holograph-like, moving images of products including jeans, snow boots and personal stereos that seemed to spin in the air in front of moving stars.

The company, Dimensional Media Associates, hopes the technology behind the projection device will eventually be used in all sizes of machines.

“We have a new form of media,” said Jonathan Prince, president of Dimension Media. “We’ve also got the wherewithal and the backing to get out there in a very big way.”

Dimension Media’s first big partner is Interpublic Group, a holding company of several large advertising agencies. In addition to the department stores, they are working on using the device for retail displays in grocery stores, malls, airports and movie theaters.

Executives would not disclose how much the machine at Bradlees cost but said the technology would soon be affordable enough for use in consumer products.

Dimension Media was started by Susan Kasen Summer, who led designer florists that catered big events. She said she came up with the idea “just thinking about special effects and how you can apply 3-D imaging to big events.”

Summer worked with engineers in Germany and the United States and the company now holds several dozen patents on the ideas behind the machine.

The system collects and re-creates light from images on videotape, CD-ROM, laser disc and other digital video sources.

The farther an image is projected, however, the narrower viewing range it has. At Bradlees, the image appears several feet in front of the window but can only be seen by viewers either directly in front of it or 30 degrees to each side.

Dimension Media is experimenting with full 360-degree imaging, Prince said.