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Has 3D Video Finally Arrived?
pospisil writes to point us to an enthusiastic writeup on Tech.blorge.com about a 3D display technology just launched at the eGames Expo in Melbourne. The technology, from a company called Fountain Consulting, is set to ship in January. From the article: "The Vortex Home Entertainment System isn't just set to revolutionize 3D forever, they have revolutionized it. With a library of 500 current PC-based games titles converted to flawless 3D, and even the ability to convert 2D live television into 3D live television, as well as pre-recorded movies on DVD, Blu-ray and HD-DVD." There is no second source for this story. Exciting news if it pans out.
http://www.itwire.com.au/content/view/7242/52/1/0/
If this actually does pan out that would be very cool. I have my doubts, however it does seem to be reputable. For people who can't see it here, http://www.itwire.com.au/index2.php?option=com_con tent&do_pdf=1&id=7242, is a link to a PDF version of the text.
I'm curious as to whether or not laptops will be able to use this technology. Pretty sure it's no but I can always hope they'll make something available...
There are two kinds of fool One says 'This is old therefore good' Another says 'This is new therefore better'- Dean Ing
http://www.tridef.com/products.html
This one fooled me for a while too, but it is not actually redundant, only poorly worded. Perhaps it should read:
"The Vortex Home Entertainment System isn't just SET to revolutionize 3D forever [in the future], they have [already] revolutionized it [in the present]."
That's 3D data. As for the ACTUAL plausibility of the concept, I should hope the GP doesn't lose all depth perception when he closes one eye. Obviously it's possible to extrapolate 3D from 2D, just difficult.
ResidntGeek
It's not that good. Seriously. I mean yeah, it's cool, you look at it and think WTF?? That stuff looks like its sticking out of the screen like I'm wearing 3D glasses, but I'm not wearing 3D glasses! But after a while you think "geez that's blurry", and you soon notice that it suffers from the same problem as early LCD screens; move a little to either side and the screen goes all dark.
It's a promising start though, I look forward to what they can come up in a few years once all the problems have been worked out. And when they've got a better demo than the Team America DVD!
This is a steaming pile of BS right here.:
"You really need to see a demo of the system playing the latest games, in 3D, with a pair of standard 3D glasses (similar to those handed out at IMAX or Real D cinemas)"
Those IMAX glasses are designed to work with polarized 3D sources. The lenses are designed to only let one orientation of polarized light in, call it 0 or 90 degrees. One lens is rotated 90 degrees to the other, so each eye sees a separate polarization. Two projectors are used, each projecting different polarizations.
So basically, this company has apparently figured out to get your existing monitor or TV to magically display two orientations of polarized light, simultaneously! And the best part is, they are modifying the graphics card, not the display, to do it!
This whole article smells like an elaborate troll.
Technically it's "stereographic" since the eyes are really viewing two flat images - you can't move your head to see 'around' the object. "Stereoscopic" is the way your eyes function when viewing real three-dimensional objects.
"It's time to take life by the cans." ~ Bender ("Bendin' in the Wind", ep. 3-13)
I was at the eGames expo on Friday and tried out the 3d display. My thought was "Oh, someone's still doing the LCD shutter glasses?". It was just the same old technology from years ago as far as I could see. The only new thing was that they'd made a clever driver which hooked into DirectX so existing games could be used in 3d.
Sorry guys, there was no 2d->3d conversion at all.
3D from single photos has been available for a little while, mostly working with geometric content lines to establish likely 3d patterns, then mapping the image onto that pattern. It's possible that they're using color and focus clues as well, though I don't know about that part.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuoljANz4EA
It's a pretty impressive technology. If you could do the analysis 60 times per second, you could have a convincing system for single-perspective 3D in most circumstances.
I wish I could remember the names of the companies, but I know there are "traditional" 3D screen display manufacturers working on upsampling using the additional depth cues of between-frame camera movements, which the above example did not take advantage of.
The ______ Agenda
How can you "upconvert" 2D images to 3D when there is no 3D information to work with, hm?
"Smart" algorithms can make some pretty good guesses based on the same kind of information that the mpeg compression algorithms use to create motion vectors. Yes, the motion vectors in mpeg are 2D in the plane of the screen, but add in some smarts to recognize "objects" that get bigger (approaching) and smaller (receding) and you've got enough info to do some pseudo 3D. If you can recognize rotation then you can do some really nice fake-3D.
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