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3D TV For The Masses?
scubacuda writes: "Technology Review has an article on new software that could make 3D television a reality. Previously encumbered by an expensive process that takes up to nine cameras per scene, a company called DDD now takes existing 2D film and creates a "depth map" for each frame. A TV that can handle this sort of software rendering currently costs $25K, but DDD estimates that in a few years, a 3D TV could only cost only 20% more than its 2D counterpart."
You can probably go to a lot of theaters and get those goggles to watch a 3D movie. And I'm pretty sure those paper goggle thingys are dirt cheap, and the 3d movie is just made with 2 cameras & projectors instead of 1, so why would it cost $25k to make a funky little algorithm that can handle 2 CRT's and a dime store goggle set?
I'm the Devil the Windows users warned you about.
Imagine being able to import such images. It would require either work to edit the 3-d shape so it had a "back" & smooth the shape a little, or else software to interpolate multiple images from different angles into one high resolution 3-d shape - but the opportunity to get a wide variety of shapes to start the process of modelling would be of great benefit to many artists and designers.
Of course, the flip side to all this would be that individuals and organizations may start copyrighting shapes in addition to images. The first court cases over something "shaped like" a copyrighted object will be very interesting.
:^)
Ryan Fenton
Now my favorite pr0n star's cup size is REALLY gonna matter!
Sorta adds a new dimension that TV will poke your eye out, or was that the red rider bb gun?
When viewing stereo images in the lab (3D displays of biological molecule structures) we wear special goggles. They work fine; none of that red and blue crap. If you're trying to find early adopters for a new tech, I'd think that 3D goggles plus software to display these movies on a computer would net you much more market penetrance than $25,000 dual-display televisions (or other expensive hardware gimmickry) which are only going to become cheaper if people start buying them, which they'll only do if content is available for them, which will open happen if there's some cheaper way to view the things. One of them vicious things, only good.
Of course, they're using MPEG format. That may mean nothing, or it may mean that they're tied to the MPAA somehow, so encouraging people to watch movies on their computers may not be their business plan. I'm just spouting, I know nothing about "DDD".
In fact, since it looks like HDTV is not going to be a vehicle for DRM, the movie/TV industry could try to develop and deploy some 3D display standard that shut out computers (using patents on the underlying technology), and move all new content into it. Frightening possibility.
The good and new comes from no quarter where it is looked for, and is always something different from what is expected.
Ok, its been.. what? 15 years? since they started talking about HDTV? And you expect the people who can't even agree on a simple hi-def format to adopt and commercialize this?
Hehe.. ok. I'll put this in the pile with all of the other schemes that are "only 5 years away".
http://www.masturbateforpeace.com/
my tv already is 3-D.
I want it to get more 2-D !!!
:)
Having spent the last 8 years developing content preparation technology for 3D presentation systems, I'd like to add my 2 cents.
The problem with 3D TV, apart from all the viewing paraphenalia, is that it's not wide enough. Even in Imax 3D, with a field of view approaching 80 degrees, directors have problems composing shots that fit in the "viewable pyramid" formed by the viewer's nose and the four corners of the screen. (It's fairly well established that anything in 3D projection that clips this pyramid destroys the illusion of 3D, because one eye view clips before the other, causing the audience to be subconsiously disturbed in their viewing). In any case, the 3D effect only operates within this pyramid.
This company has been pumped on and off for some time on various message boards that cover 3D - especially Imax boards. AFAIC, maybe their technology will do well on good 3D presentation systems, but TV-sized screens just won't cut it - all the tests I've seen of 3D on a TV are pretty much limited to novelty value.
/stillconfused
No. Well...maybe. Actually, yes. It really just depends.
---- El diablo esta en mis pantalones! Mire, mire!
I saw 3D lenticular displays exhibiting DDD's work at SIGGRAPH 2001 and SID (Society for Information Displays) 2002.
I was not that impressed. Basically you see a large moving stereogram but the stereo separation is no where near as good as your average ViewMaster. Most of the time it doesn't look 3D at all. And your depth of field is very limited when it is 3D.
I talked to them for a while about how their technology works. Basically, they attempt to interpolate around the edges of objects in the foreground. Sometimes they can't and that limits how close to the viewer an object can appear. For example, imagine a camera moving by a tree only a few feet in front of it and with a complex landscape in the background. Around the edges of the tree there should be new landscape that one eye would see and the other would not. There is no way to recover this image data because in the original film it was blocked by the tree. Thin objects, like wires or poles or window frames are also especially difficult. Most of the time it requires an artist to do some hand tuning of the images.
I don't see what is special about their technique. Even if they do have some novel ideas for getting 3D out of 2D, I don't see how the data would be useful considering how bad 3D lenticular displays look - eg. limited depth of field, incorrect focal length for objects at different depths, very limited viewing angle.
Video game manufacturers have yet to realize how difficult it is for those with even slight red/green colorblindness to tell the difference between saturated yellow and saturated green. Super Puzzle Fighter is a perfect example.
Web designers are also bad. You know how often I've seen red text in front of a greenish background? Or cyan in front of white?
Even people like me who didn't realize that they had any color defiency until they started using computer and playing video games run into trouble when color is used to convey important information in the digital world.
3D is the same way. There are a sizable percentage of people who are "monocular" and thus are unable to use goggle or lenticular based 3D solutions.
Thats why we should all use:
www.actuality-systems.com
The main optical depth cues are relative motion, depth of focus, and binocular stereo. If you can provide all three, it looks real, but if you can only provide one, it looks fake. The spherical-mirror illusion, even with projected 2D images, looks more real than binocular stereo. High-end flight simulators have displays that are focused at infinity, which gives you the feeling of looking out at the world, not at a screen. (Low-cost focused-at-infinity displays would be great for gaming, if the optics weren't too bulky.)
Scaling of binocular 3D, where there's far more separation than the usual eye width, is a dramatic effect which is cool for about a minute, then is a pain. This is why the concept died in moviemaking.
Call me a pessimist, but I don't think 3D TV will ever become popular. Something like a holodeck might, where you're inside the simulation, but a 3-dimensional set that you look at from outside probably won't.
I say this because 2D and 3D images are really very similar unless you move your head around, and most people don't want to move their heads around. When people sit down to watch TV, they generally want to just sit there and do nothing.
All it takes is nukes and nerves.
I just plain don't believe it. If the information isn't there to begin with, nothing's going to put it there. The "graphic artist" isn't going to be any better than the artists that tint pictures. Splodging an even flesh tint onto a black-and-white face doesn't reproduce the color variations of a real face,and nobody working at commercial pace is going to do more than a slapdash job of "painting" depth into a 2D picture.
Colorized movies look impressive for about five minutes, then you gradually become aware of a sense of dissatisfaction. Your brain knows you're not getting much color information. These "solidized" movies will just as unsatisfying.
In my humble opinion, of course... and not having seen any of the actual product.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
Also, to show some respect for illiterates, let's stop using written language. And not use speech so as not to exclude the deaf. And draw everything in black and white, for the colour-blind.
While 3d would be a blast for games, or cartoons, has anyone ever SEEN 3d holograms of people? You have a suspension of disbelief when seeing a flat 2d screen -- you don't think of them as 5" tall people. People rendered in 3d break this little fantasy the brain has worked up for itself, and you wind up seeing little moveable dolls.
Maybe this effect goes away after a while, and someone with experience watching people as 3d holograms for days at a time (if anyone like that exists) can comment.
We can define the depth of everything on the screen by setting a start point and an end point and letting the algorithm interpolate everything in-between? And if it's off? You're either going to end up with a stretched, pixelated mess, or a bunch of anorexic midgets flying out of your TV.
The idea that so many people have missed is that 3D for its own sake is just a gee-whiz widget.
:)
What they need to be aiming for is immersion.
Immersion is the experience of being inside an environment rather than being an external viewer.
You can get the immersive effect in 2D, and in fact this has been done with great effect by Disney on some of their rides.
What factors influence the experience of immersion? Foremost is a wide viewing angle; this is where most 3D simulators fail. You must see 'reality' everywhere, not floating in box in front of your face. Also very important is proper audio cueing, as much of a human's experience of spatial orientation is from subtle echoes and pitch changes. Other things that I think add more to the experience than 3D is view tracking, an engaging plot line and breeze control. Also, odor control, as in it cant be stinky
Porn tends to be the one of the first industries to pick up on new technology (video, multiple camera angles in DVDs etc). They are looking for anything that gives them an edge in a very competitive market. Admittedly at $1M/feature it's probably too high, but if the price does drop, expect it to appear in porn well before it arrives in a holywood blockbuster.