Lenticular

[James Smith]

I wouldn't call these "lenticulars" common items, or
at least the name is not common: why was I so clueless
as to what they were until I saw the URLs?    I then
recognized immediately what we were discussing, but
I'd never heard them refered to as "lenticulars".
Notice that the MotionCards.com page doesn't call them
lenticulars, but motion-image-cards. (I didn't find
the word "lenticular" anywhere at that site.)

As to whether or not this meaning belongs in a
dictionary, I say time will tell.  Will these become
everyday items recognized by most people as
"lenticulars", or will such usage of the word be
limited technological or trade jargon, never come into
common usage, and perhaps fall out of use entirely in
a few years as manufactuters search for new
descriptors and names to distinguish their product
("motion-image-cards" rather than "lenticulars") and
to get away from a word with a broad, general, and
perhaps unclear meaning.

JIM

--- davemarc <davemarc at PANIX.COM> wrote:
> > From: James Smith <jsmithjamessmith at YAHOO.COM>
> >
> > Thanks for the URLs!  Now that I see what we're
> > talking about, I think these "lenticulars" fall
> > clearly in the second definition of lenticular as
> > found in my Webster's New Collegiate: "provided
> with
> > or utilizing lenticules", lenticules being minute
> > lenses, corrugations or grooves that are used on
> > films, screens or other surfaces to refract or
> focus
> > light.
> >
> I agree that the definition describes such a
> lenticular, but the
> description seems very generic for such a common
> item.  Wouldn't it be
> difficult to picture a common-place lenticular (such
> as the ones in the
> URLs) just by looking up the word in your Webster's
> New
> Collegiate?
>
> I'd think that another definition, specifying the
> purpose as
> something along the lines of "typically used to
> create the illusion of
> movement, transformation, or three-dimensionality"
> (as opposed to "to
> refract or focus light") would be useful.  But I'm
> not clear about the
> criteria for making such an alteration.
>
> d.
>


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