Slashdot Mirror
NEC to Introduce 3D Laptop Next Year?
Hoon Mihn Fao writes "For those of you for whom 2D laptops are not awesome enough, next year NEC is coming out with a 3D laptop. No, you don't have to wear those retro red and blue glasses, but the monitor is actually an LCD screen placed on top of a conventional monitor. The company is currently seeking gaming software companies to produce games for its technology. Each unit will cost an estimated $200 more than a conventional laptop."
I dunno the exact method used.. but found this on my fav dutch hardware site : "The monitor contains two TFT panels separated by a parallax barrier, which directs pixel images to two separate regions so that each eye receives a slightly different image. In the end, the brain formulates the signals so that the image appears to be a three-dimensional object, Nakagawa said." So it seems that it is possible to project 2 slightly different images to both eyes without shutterglasses.
Lenticular images
Remember those little stickers, covered with ridges, where you turn them and watch the image change to one of 5 or 6 possibilities? If a computer screen is covered with verticle ridges, you could control the flow of light to left and right eye from limited viewing angles.
Such a monitor would only work if the person's head was in certain positions.
Other technologies are possible which would allow the viewer to be in any position and orientation. Think tiny lenses instead of long ridges.
Basically, this is correct. Here in Japan, Sharp (at least) has been doing these for a while; my current keitai even has one! I don't know the grisly details offhand, but from what I can tell, there are two layers, each of which are angled towards one of the two eyes; displaying stereoscopic images, one eye's worth on each layer then gives you essentially the same result as those old red+blue+purple displays with the red-and-blue glasses. It's certainly not perfect, but it's an acceptable imitation.