The Official 3D Thread - Page 5

Where is that Mitsubishi 3D capable blu-ray deck mentioned at CES 2008 in Jan.?

Currently vapor. Remember, this product is "fake" 3D... it "converts" 2D to 3D.

Not necessarily. It's true the real time 2D to 3-D conversion idea is not going to be effective, but with true 3-D content it would work great.

This idea is not new, it's just the two decades old field sequential idea taken to another level. I've been watching excellent 3-D at home for 20 years first via VHS and then DVD, but this could take it to the HD level.

Samsung and Mitsubishi already have a number of 3-D capatible DLP sets on the market NOW, with Plasmas to come. The problem is that you still have to run the movies/games through 3-D software and connect a PC to these sets. A Blu-ray player with the necessary equipment built in would give us a plug and play 3-D idea, just as the simple field sequential systems work(ed) with CRT sets.

I would imagine it will take time for this idea to catch on at home, but as more and more 3-D movies are made, there will be lots of content. Right now, the movies available are mostly older and would appeal to a niche audience. As more and more Hollywood blockbusters are available in 3-D in theaters, the current mainstream content will be there for the home market as well.

Patience!

I think that's absolutely the watch-word here. Those DLP sets point the way toward HD 3-D in our homes over the next few years, in a way that reflects the growing popularity of theatrical 3-D presentations. After all, the number of 3-D movies in theaters right now is little more a slow trickle, but momentum is building toward 2009, when the increasing number of suitably equipped theaters will coincide with the release of AVATAR, leading to a rush of similar high-profile stereoscopic movies.

Right now, the digital infrastructure still needs to be beefed-up before the so-called '3-D revolution' can begin in earnest. But given the commitment of various studios (and filmmakers), 3-D will soon become THE major draw in theaters worldwide because of the decisions being made today. TV and HD will follow suit in due course.

As Steve said: "Patience".

Can 3D cinemas really take off?


http://www.engadgethd.com/2008/03/28...ally-take-off/

I was wondering if anyone tried this as I did.

Last week my kids opened a box of cereal with those cheesy 3-D glassed in them. I was watching the Planet Earth BD on the Plains. The scene where they talk about Red-billed Quelea being a population of 1.5 billion looked almost 3-D, so I tried on the glasses. It worked! I was looking at a 3-D affect and it is fairly amazing. I experimented a bit and tried it on WOW(World of Warcraft, a pc game) which I know is "3-D" as are many PC games due to capability of the graphics card. It worked on that as well. I haven't tried any PS3 games yet, but that will be my next experiment.

What I am witnessing isn't constant or true 3-D with the red/blue halos around images to give it that affect. It works only on certain scenes or images that already look almost 3-D due to HDTV.

I have a SOny 120hz A3000 RPTV.

Just take a pair of cheap sunglasses (lens color has to be neutral gray) and knock out one of the lenes. Presto - 3D . . . sort of

I have a question about 3d stuff:

I thought there were already 3d video cameras (or something you could attach to a normal video camera and it would give you a z value for every pixel).

If so, what's so great about this camera that's supposed to have 12,616 lenses.
http://news-service.stanford.edu/new...20-031908.html

I mean if a current 3d HD video camera really could have a z value for every pixel, that's millions of pixels worth of z values instead of just a few thousand of them. So if there do exist these z value 3d hd cameras (I'm sure I read about them ages ago), what's so great about the 12,000 lens camera that you couldn't do with the z value video camera? (does the later somehow give you even more 3d info?)

I know it seems hokey, but it really works. What is even more of a joke is you can buy those cheapo cardboard frame 3-D glasses on ebay for .50.

Shipping 5.00.

Doesn't the '3d' effect with those sort of glasses (one eye darker than the other) only work with certain moving footage? eg. if the camera is moving say left to right you get a 3d effect (maybe cos the light takes longer to get to one of the eyes?) but as soon as the camera stops you loose the 3d effect? And the 3d doesn't come out of the screen like the other types of glasses do? (so basically it's not the best 3d effect )

All you are trying to do is to delay the light from reaching your covered eye. It works because of the way humans see.

Does it work all the time? No it doesen't.

My favorite sequence to use the home made 3D glasses is the Waltz of the Spaceships in 2001. I believe it is the stark difference in the contrast ratio for that sequence - the black of space with the white spaceships in front of it.

The black is the background while the white is the foreground as it is moving. Not sure it would work in the opposite.

Just my experimenting from years ago.

And I thought at the time that Circle-Vision was complicated

But they do have 3d video cameras that can have a z value for every pixel don't they? If so that camera doesn't seem that amazing.

The only 3D cameras that I know of for making films have almost always been twin camera setups. The lens's of the cameras are placed the same distance apart as your eyes are.

I must have misread it then, I thought they did mention z values and stuff but it was probably just a second viewpoint (2nd lens) - though the film cameras are probably further apart than people's eyes at least the distance between the centre of each - because the lenses are bigger than peoples eyes.

There is a 3d video camera (30 fps) that uses lasers for the 3d z stuff but I don't think that would be very safe

There is a science to how 3D glasses affect an image that has been treated for 3D. What you're doing is neither science nor 3D. You're just filtering out different colors for your left and right eyes.

Here you will enjoy this .. . . it's a video about the camera system that James Cameron is using for his $190 million production of Avatar:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...32803911842846

I attended the 3D transmission of the Dallas Mavericks vs. The Clippers NBA game this week at the Magnolia Theater in Dallas, which marked the first HD 3D transmission via satellite. It was a resounding success! I had my doubts, mostly due to parallax engineers having to adjust for the z plane on the fly, but they pulled it off! Many of the shots you take for granted in a 2D presentation (a shot of the above-the-floor scoreboard hovering in front of the upper-level stands) become money shots. Also, it opened up options for how a sporting event can be shot. Normally, a basketball game needs to be shot predominantly from angles above the player's heads, so the floor can be seen and used to judge distance between the players and the goals. With 3D, depth perception takes place of that. The game was shot mostly from right on the floor largely to stay out of way of the regular broadcast cameras, but the spatial relationships between the players and the goals were still there because of the added depth perception. There were only two hitches: 1) If something happened too close to the lens, the 3D effect was lost and you end up with a double image, presumably because the parallax couldn't be adjusted that closely, and 2) there were a couple of times the image for one eye froze and the other eye continued. This was just due to a common digital transmission error... we've all seen our satellite signal freeze for a moment. But if your left eye sees a still image and your right eye is seeing a totally different image in motion, the result is indescribable! There were a couple of moments the audience was screaming, as if their brains were being scrambled, but it passed quickly and everyone just found it somewhat comical.

Overall the event was a resounding success. I hope it points to live 3D events in the future: possibly theatrical Superbowl screenings or major music festivals.

I know what you are saying, but I have seen 3-D before. What I am doing isn't science, but beyond a reasonable doubt it is 3-D that I am seeing. Again, it isn't always 3-D like in movies or still images with the red/cyan halos around it or in 3-D all the time, but you do get an actual 3-D affect like in the Planet Earth scene I describe and also with the PC game WOW. There is actual 3-D depth to the images unlike when one is not wearing the glasses.

It does give the same affect as the images do in the following link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaglyph_image

Looks like Hollywood has "discovered" 3D and the extra money it can bring them.

http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/gadgets/h...ure-248074.php

Hughmc, you have discovered the "Pulfrich Illusion". It's an illusion of depth which occurs during some moving camera shots. It's not 3-D per se, as it happens accidentally, but indeed you can see some depth when the camera moves in the correct way.

Many TV producers have attempted to harness this; usually with very poor results. The famous Super Bowl halftime show from 1989 was an example of it NOT working at all, while a music video by The Judds around the same time did it quite well. A Yogi Bear cartoon series had sequences which used this as well to great effect.

You can play around with this "fake 3-D' with any camcorder. Have someone shoot out the passenger window of your car while you drive at about 25 miles per hour. The resulting footage will appear to have depth when viewed with a dark lens over your right eye, or even if you squint your right eye it may work. YMMV. The red/blue anaglyph glasses aren't the best choice, but a cheap pair of sunglasses with the left lens missing will be just fine.

Many action movies will have moments which will appear 3-D at times when the camera movement is correct. TV sports will often work, too. Just keep in mind, this only works here and there, and it isn't true 3-D at all, just a weird illusion in 2-D material.

I understand what you are saying, but that isn't what I am seeing or at least what I am seeing does not happen the way you describe. The scene I am describing in Planet Earth has no camera movement. It is the birds moving that has the 3-D effect of depth while the camera is still. I just read about the Pulfrich effect and maybe it is seen even when the camera is still and objects are moving. Even without the glasses the scene I described almost looks 3-D and that is what prompted me to try the glasses. Also the 3-D effect I am seeing in WOW is with still objects like trees etc. that when wearing the glasses show the true depth perception one experiences with 3D.

Isn't 3-D not really an accurate term anyway for 3-D movies? Isn't 2-D actually one dimension and 3-D two dimensions, because all you are adding or seeing is depth or two different focal points of the same image?


I also noticed something when wearing the glasses and then taking them off. I covered one eye and left the other opened and looked at grass. I then did the same with the other eye. The colors of the 3D glasses change the color or contrast of one's eyes for a short time. The left lens red when removed from the eye makes grass look greener and deeper in color. The right cyan lens when removed from the eye makes grass look more pale or yellow. The effect lasts for a minute or so. I then tested reversing the affect by reversing the glasses and it almost immediately takes away the change one see after removing the glasses. Amazing how our senses can be fooled.

I saw a 3-D presentation by Mitsubishi in their trailer they are pulling around the US. I have always thought 3-D was hokey..........but not now. Films, sports and other live presentations could really be cool. I think I will be sold on this when it goes prime time. I'm just not sure what it will take. A new player? Or would our existing BD players work? Or a new movie format? I'm so confused. The Mitsubishi guys didn't seem all that knowledgable.

BD is capable of Dual Stream 1080 so it is how the disc is formated and how it is read by the display. So far - DLP RPTV's and FPTV's can work with 3D. I have read about an FPD that also can.

And yes you need the glasses.

I have read somewhere on AVS that 120hz tvs were 3D capable, but what would motion have to do with the 3D effect I have no clue.

Yes - Samsung lists "3D Capable" as one of their "bullets" for their 120 Hz DLP RPTV's. The issue has become that there are so few RPTV CEM's left. Mits and Sammy and a few others.

When you say "motion" - are you identifing that with the 120 HZ spec?

The way 3D is supposed to work (using a real 3D encoded BD) is DS 1080 with each stream at 60Hz - one for each eye.

Almost like a dual encode with each the proper distance apart which sync's with the glasses.

Mit's said that they can take current 2D movies and make them into 3D but I heard . . . as usual . . . it was not that impressive.

DS1080 on a 120Hz HDTV would look like what you saw at the theater. No new BD player is required - just an HDTV that can display 3D and the content to go with it.

Just remember you need more light output for 3D than you need for 2D. That is why all IMAX 3D theaters use a silver screen instead of a white screen.

^^yes Lee, you nailed it as far as my question about motion.
60hz per eye = 120hz.

Interesting.

If anyone is interested . . . there is a fascinating book all about 3D movies. It is like a text book - no dust cover.

3D Movies

A History and Filmography of Stereoscopic Cinema
MacFarland
ISBN 0-89950-407-8

The publishing date is Jan. 1989 so nothing past that date will be in it. But it has all the 3D movies with all the pertinent data with each movie - pictures of the camera rigs

Hayes also did the book Widescreen Movies.

Hayes' book is hopelessly out of date, and while it does provide something of a primer for those interested in the subject, it's one of the most badly-written books I've ever read, full of assumptions in place of actual information, and personal reminiscences which are of no interest to anyone but the author. Many 3-D and widescreen historians have derided Hayes' work, because his books contain so many factual errors (technician Daniel Sherlock wrote a massive online riposte to the widescreen book which contains HUNDREDS of corrections to Hayes' info).

Eddie Sammons wrote a much better book on 3-D history in the early 1990's, The World of 3-D Movies, with far fewer mistakes and a much broader filmography. Copies can be downloaded for free at the following URL:

http://www.3d.curtin.edu.au/cgi-bin/library/sammons.cgi

However, the URL in my sig (below) will take readers to a completely up-to-date 3-D filmography (recently overhauled and updated), focusing almost entirely on theatrical releases from 1893 to the present day. Enjoy!

Actually, 4-D would more accurately describe movies. The first dimension is width, the second is height. That gives you the flat 2-D image. The third dimension is depth, which makes it 3-D. As most Jules Verne readers are aware, the fourth dimension is persistency, or time. A 3-D photograph just captures a single moment in time, but since movies show a duration of images, you could argue that a movie image that shows width, height, and depth is actually 4-D.