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Consumer 3D Television Moving Forward
TheSync writes "Hollywood Reporter claims that SMPTE (the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers) will 'establish an industry task force to define the parameters of a mastering standard for 3D content distributed via broadcast, cable, satellite, packaged media and the Internet, and played-out on televisions, computer screens and other tethered displays.' Already, Japanese Nippon BS viewers with Hyundai 3D LCD sets can watch an hour of 3D programming daily. Even your existing DLP TV set might be 3D capable today with the addition of LCD shutter glasses."
Reader DaMan1970 makes note of another developing television technology; telescopic pixel displays. "Each pixel consists of 2 opposing mirrors where the primary mirror can change shape under an applied voltage. When the pixel is off, the primary & secondary mirrors are parallel & reflect all of the incoming light back into the light source."
Porn.
Why else would you want a 3D experience?
Me failed English...
FreeBSD over Linux. If my comments seem odd, this may explain...
Aaargghhh... MBA-speak has invaded my last bastion, Slashdot.
I vote we ban TheSync and put Soulskill on probation (if nothing else but for their nicknames as well).
I wouldn:t buy this until IEEE is on board...
If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
Now Robot Monster can be seen at home the way it always should have been!
Careful What You Wish For....
When I sit down at my computer i am engaged and am accomplishing something(most of the time), but when i sit down to watch TV i want to be completely relaxed and just watch. If this means i will have to be more aware of my TV then im not for it. Also my TV is often on in the background, which means I'll have to wear the special glasses all the time which isn't gonna happen.
I have a pair of e-dimensional 3d glasses (yes, they DO work if you have the right set-up and some patience*), and can say after showing them to a few people, several issues will keep 3d from mainstream:
Motion sickness
Astigmatism
Eye strain
The fact some people just can't plain see it despite having 2 eyes
Battery life of wireless shutter glasses
Looking like a nerd
There's some serious patience required to adjust to it, its not natural to focus your eyes direction at one depth, and change the actual focus to another. When what your looking at is far away (like a movie screen), its a lot easier. When its a TV or computer screen that is just a few feet away, its harder to adjust to, and for a lot of people if they don't instantly "click" with something then its hard to get them to want it.
Speaking of the obvious thought of porn, I'm surprised magazines haven't tried using stereoscopic pictures. This is a really easy 3d trick anyone can do- simply take two pictures of a static object side by side with the camera pointing towards a certain object (make sure its the same object in each one!). Put them next to each other, then slowly cross your eyes until they merge. It'll form a 3d picture, full color, no special equipment required, no red/blue glasses to give people headaches. The further apart the pictures are taken, the more pronounced the 3-d effect. You'll want to use the cross-eyed effect as opposed to the "looking into the picture" effect because it allows for a larger picture.
I will finally be able to watch the Simpsons in all its HD 3D glory.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Why else would you want a 3D experience?
Goatse and Tub Girl in 2D was disturbing enough.
The big news in the movie theater business is that Regal, AMC and Cinemark are closing a deal with Hollywood to pay for digital 3D projectors going into many of their theaters so the big summer movies of 2009 can look better than anything an HDTV can do. But if HDTVs will do stereoscopic 3D in a few years, then Hollywood and the theater chains have just blown a huge amount of money on tech that'll only get customers out of their homes for a few years.
This is why theaters need to stop pushing performance and start pushing features. With digital projection, movie theaters can theoretically show everything that's popular on TV: live sports, live news, talk shows, religious shows, long running scripted dramas and comedies. It's even technically possible for theaters to connect video game hardware to the projector and run controllers down to the audience so people can play a video game on the big screen. Of course, it'll be hairy for theaters to get the rights to show any of these things, but the relentless progression of home market tech, especially when it comes to screen size and picture quality, means it's just too expensive for theaters to stay ahead. Theater digital projectors are big and not mass produced, so even if they only perform a little better than home market projectors, they're vastly more expensive and won't come down in price. The last thing theaters need is to blow a huge wad of cash on a new projector, then have to buy another one in a few years.
What's much smarter for theaters to do is buy the least expensive Hollywood-approved projector they can (Christie's CP2000-M is 2.2 megapixels and is bright enough for screens up to 35 feet wide), then feed it with every conceivable kind of content. News reels died in the 1960s not because people don't want to drive to theaters to watch the news (the communal setting actually improves news just as much as it improves movies), but because only TV could show news live. Now theaters have most of the tech they need to show live news, but it hasn't occurred to them to ask the TV networks for content. Theaters still think Hollywood is the only sugar daddy they have.
It's great news that HDTVs will soon get stereoscopic 3D. I just hope Hollywood and movie theaters don't use it as an excuse to replace their projectors yet again. They need to compete against the home market creatively, not by throwing more dollars at the projection booth.
I want my damn SED TV. Hear that, Canon?
Besides--TVs as they are now are more than sufficient; I don't see a need for 3D any time soon.
... and we were happy!
Engineering is the art of compromise.
After decades of annoying flicker, strobing, and bad pans at 24FPS, we finally got LCD panels that don't flicker at all. Some monitors even time-interpolate to get the frame rate up, and framefree compression is just starting to work. Now people want to crud it up with alternating-frame stereo. Bleah.
Stereo vision doesn't really do much beyond about 4m or so, and it scales badly for anything that isn't its real size.
There are some very cute 3D systems that are sensitive to head position, so you can move your head and have the scene adjust accordingly. But that doesn't work in theaters.
I don't get why people want this. Most real-world 3D perception (the kind of scenes you see in movies) derives from motion parallax, not binocular stereo. Trying to use stereo for those scenes is completely unrealistic and visually disturbing.
Also, flat images are kind of scale free, but 3D scenes are not. If you watch Jurassic Park in 3D on your television, you really do see a bunch of 8 inch toy dinosaurs fighting in a little box. Ooh, scary.
Never thought HD was a big step. Just a concession to the cable companies.
Need to perfect TV before you move onto 3d. Need 'photographic tv with higher resolutions and better colors'. Needs to be magazine quality.
... they'd start supporting AIGLX/Xgl, we may have real-time Compiz-Fusion effects! I mean, consider this: Me: *Checking my email* Brother: *Walks into the room* Me: *Shouts* GET THE FUCK OUT OF THERE!! You have stepped in my message box! NO, NOT THERE YOU DUMBASS, that's my 2nd workspace, here *rotates cube* OH DAMN, now you're in the goddamned file manager *Ctrl+Alt+Backspace* Phew, that's better.
which means that you lived in the hole in the mandelbrot fractal
Is holographic TV. Time and time again we have seen them try to sell 3D that needs some stupid glasses,and time and time again it has failed. there are simply too many problems inherent with the glasses,especially with battery operated ones like this. And can you imagine trying to keep your kids from messing these stupid glasses up? Not going to happen. With a holographic TV I don't have to worry about glasses,my family trying to get these things on around their eyeglasses, worrying about someone losing or sitting on the stupid glasses,etc. I predict this will catch some buzz for awhile and then die out,just like the other times they tried to sell glasses based 3D.
Speaking of glasses based 3D,didn't they try to sell us those things for playing computer games back in the day? I seem to remember somebody selling a decoder card with glasses back when Mpeg 2 cards were still around. You plugged this card into your PC and had a pair of glasses and it gave you a "kinda" 3D effect. It may have used a similar kind of tech,but it has been so long ago I can't remember off the top of my head. But just like this I seem to remember there being a big buzz about 3D gaming,and then the thing just died off. I'm guessing just like that 3D gaming card this will be a toy for early adopters for awhile and then it will just peter out. And as always this is my 02c,YMMV
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
I agree that stereoscopic vision is not going to hit the mainstream big time. It's more of a gimmick than anything else, for all the reasons you name. Television programming isn't nearly as accessible when you have to plunk on some headgear every time you want to see what's on the channel.
True 3D means holographic video, which is existing technology (albeit not in the "help me obiwan kenobi, you're my only hope" sense). What's annoying is that any standard based on stereoscopic vision will be incompatible with holographic needs, assuming we switch to holographic video once the bandwidth reaches the necessary capacity. I would much rather see plain old high definition 2-dimensional TV remain the sole medium for broadcasting until holography is ready to take it's place.
The one advantage stereoscopic vision has for commercial programming is that every viewer sitting in any (reasonable) position will see the exact same picture, from the exact same perspective. That's desirable to directors for framing a shot. However, stereoscopic vision is very limited, and if it doesn't succeed even modestly (which I don't believe it will), pushing it forward now will sour the opinion that both broadcasters and viewers have of 3D media generally. That will retard interest and investment in true 3D technology, which is something that could really reshape our media experience.
In short, holographic video is to current television as the television was to radio. Stereoscopic vision, in contrast, is more like smell-o-vision. Unfortunately, funding for holography is usually split among all other "simulated 3D" technology, and will suffer from the deflected focus.
Still, stereoscopic vision might be a boon for the porn industry, if it doesn't end up making your eyes water.
Holographic TV, that's just what we need. So millions of geeks can watch Star Wars - and chuckle amusingly to themselves when they see a holograph of a holograph. Someone just shoot me now.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Ok, maybe it's just me but i've seen 3D technology on TV screens and in film and the effect of the whole stereostopic way they do it comes off just too damn crude and is somewhat annoying. For that simple reason alone, it's just a little "oh that's interesting" ... and people just move back to regular TV over and over again.
Don't get me wrong, I do believe that we will eventually come to a TRUE 3D design for image rendering, something that doesn't require silly glasses and that you can walk around and look in all different directions for three true dimensions, like that omnidirectional multiprojection device that Microsoft borrowed for a promotion event last year at some sort of consumer electronics show. Now, that was a step in the right diretion.
Re-inventing the failed 50s, "3D drive-in glasses?"
Asinine.
You need:
1. A PC with support for two monitors (most)
2. Two projectors
3. Polarizing filters for the projectors (standard from photography store)
4. Polaroid sunglasses (lightweight and cheap)
I suggest circular right and left polarizes. Now set the two projectors next to each other, and superimpose the two images, put on glasses, and voila, you have a great 3D movie theater.
It it great that video standards are emerging, but it you can also DIY.
Still:You could use two cameras, but one camera in "rapid shoot" from a moving vehicle works beautifully; just take two sequential pictures on the two monitors.
Video: More of a hassle, but basically shoot the scenes with two cameras separated like your eyes, and play them. You will have to use special effect to merge the two videos together to get one that spans both monitors, or use video editing tools to synchronize two separate video signals.
Have fun
The new video 3D video standards will help making this easier.
don't cut it off www.mgmbill.org
Man, those moderators get weirder en weirder...
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
great strides are being made in the use of 3-D DRM. Says Chester Smith of the MPAA, we are now faced with 2 more dimensions to the problem, but I am certain we will prevail.
several issues will keep 3d from mainstream:
{...}
The fact some people just can't plain see it despite having 2 eyes
Colour blindness hasn't stopped the introduction of colour TV. (BTW: Are people lacking stereo vision legally allowed to drive in the USA ?)
Astigmatism
This is a problem of using correct prescription glasses/contact lenses. In short, nothing to do with a stereo screen.
Battery life of wireless shutter glasses
Looking like a nerd
Well, if you have followed the trend on /. recently, it seems that most hardware maker are working toward cheap auto-stereo display (things that look 3D without glasses, just like the lenticular holograms on some DVD boxes). Which just look like plain simple LCD screens.
Motion sickness
Eye strain
{...}
When what your looking at is far away (like a movie screen), its a lot easier.
And the current trend with the recent introduction of HD TV is to have as big screens as possible. I now the average /. geek like to look movies in the privacy of his laptop. But the average joe 6-pack want to look at movies on the biggest possible honking LCD in his living room.
So to sum up, there aren't as much barriers to the introduction of stereo 3D TV.
And with the current trends in hardware it will be the easiest moment to introduce the technologie (unlike for example after several years, once DVB-T and other handheld TV reaches critical market share. Much hard to implement decent, simple and non nerdy stereo 3d on those devices).
Given the market potential for Porn (obvious reasons) and Sports (given the popularities of tech hacks to help joe 6 pack follow the match, or even systems like Hawk Eye - putting the viewer *inside* the match in 3D would probably be very much enjoyable) the demand for this kind of technology could be good enough to justify considering it.
Speaking of the obvious thought of porn, I'm surprised magazines haven't tried using stereoscopic pictures.
...I've seen Japanese hentai comic book featuring all sort of exotic "bonus artwork". Including even random-dot stereograms. I can ask the friend who owns the books if you want some references.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Wow! All that we need is another fistfull of Ds, and then we will be able to visualize String Theory!
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
3D ads!
Can you just imagine this in 3D? *cringe*
Seriously there are so many ads on TV these days[0] that by and large I just don't bother[1]. A gimmick like 3D TV is highly unlikely to change that. Television just isn't a viable use of my time anymore (if it ever was).
Using 3D for movies would work, but I don't buy any these days and these special discs would probably be priced up as double the regular discs or something anyway.
That's a shame because I could see the potential otherwise.
[0] Just yesterday we canceled our satellite subscription because there are just too many ads; so many that we didn't think it was acceptable to be paying to see them.
[1] If there is anything I'm specifically interested in, I tape it even if I would be free to watch it, just so I can skip the ads. I even avert my eyes so I don't have to look at them too much, because doing so reminds me too much of their patronizing me. Sadly even this can't always save you from the Cillit Bang!s of this world.
"Three eyes are better than one" -- Lieutenant Columbo
Of course consumer 3D television is moving forward. Up/down and left/right are already well taken care of by existing 2D television.
I'm still holding out for a set the doesn't require the glasses. I'm not going to put on a pair of 3-d glasses just to sit down and watch TV.
You should use circular polarizes. One with left and one with right polarization. This way they will work independently of angle. If you use linear polarizes you will also get a funny effect when you twist your head while you watch.
don't cut it off www.mgmbill.org
I watch over 100 movies a year -- less than 1% at a theatre, if that. It's just not worth paying 10X what it costs to get it on netflix to NOT be able to piss, pause, smoke, drink, adjust the lighting, sound, or viewing time. My 52-inch HDTV (which is my only computer monitor as well) which I sit about 5 feet away from is quite sufficient. I've seen about 6 theatre movies in 3 years, and mostly regretted them. Many feel the same. It's been covered here before. Movie theatres are struggling. That's why the multiplex ones are so popular.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
I just bought a HDTV a year and a half ago, and already it's been made obsolete by 1080p. And now a fucking 3D set is on the horizon?!?! It's hard to be cutting edge these days.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
A science-fiction author pointed that out in the late 'Sixties, I can't remember the author (the story involved aliens who eat "animals" that look exactly like us, but which/whom they claim aren't sentient).
"Realistic" is largely a function of your brain, and often having _less_ information gets you more involved. [INSERT CANONICAL COMMENT ABOUT RADIO EMPLOYING THE WORDS 'THEATRE OF THE MIND' _HERE_]
The original run of "Star Trek" looked _much_ more realistic to me in black-and-white and with bad sound, because my brain was better at special effects (and acting) than the show; I find it really easy to get infatuated with female DJs over-the-air.
How's this for an idea?
How about all you entertainment and media companies just assume that after a hard day's work, all I really want to do is just sit there and BE ENTERTAINED. Yes, you can have a wedge of my cash for the privelige of doing so and if you make it appealing enough to me then I might just drag my fat lazy ass into the car so I can drive to the local cinema to go see what you have on offer.
But please stop with all this "interactive" and gimmicky shit, okay? I can quite happily sit here in front of my computer for the occasionally half-hour and be thoroughly entertained by a 20-year-old 48kb game called "Jet Set Willy" and then be equally entertained by pounding alien heads in Half-Life 2. I don't ALWAYS need whizzy graphics & 8GB of installed game to be immersed, sometimes simple shit does fine.
Likewise, I don't need to "Pick N Mix" my own songs for my own CD compilation because I'm more than happy to accept that an army of musicians, producers & media types are a whole heap better at that shit than I am - most of the time, I just want to give you some money, take a shiny disk in exchange, throw it into my hifi and let it play, okay?
So please don't think I am sat here waiting for 3D TV because somehow I need to be "more immersed" in your shit, okay? Believe it or not, most of the time a 2D TV, a pizza and a few beers is enough to keep me happy.
How about we make it simple? You keep offering good quality shit at a reasonable price and I will just BUY it so I can watch/read/listen to it.
Just DANCE FOR ME MONKEY BOY! Okay?
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
For reasons others and I have stated above, I don't think this will actually fly that well for home-use, not even for porn---"3D" != "More realistic"
I think a standard would be a great, though, because it would lower the price of 3-D displays used in research and development.
Also, with rising energy prices, I can see this feeding into the video conferencing industry---"Fahrenheit 451"*-style rooms for feeling like you're facing your associates far away as they whine and pointlessly argue just like they were there.
*The live-in soap opera part, not the book burning, though some of my corporate overlords seem like they'd like that part.
Big {1:1 scale} wall units would work well for teleconferencing and video gaming---particularly nice when added to the late Mitsubishi DiamondTouch system or MS's equivalent (rip-off?): imagine you've got two tables "joined" at the wall, like the shared desk in "Brazil" but more benign...you could play virtual "air hockey".
No special glasses necessary. Their resolution isnt too great. See SIGGRAPH in L.A. next month.
NSFW obviously:
http://www.fotofap.com/public/viewset/22269
When the pixel is off, the primary & secondary mirrors are parallel & reflect all of the incoming light back into the light source.
Just remember to make sure your optics are clean.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
Used Costco's DuPont interior latex. Polarization is maintained fine. Use "eggshell" rather than "flat" to get brighter screen. More shiny paint does not give a flat image.
Instead of a gray screen, use a high quality white paint. Remember you are taking away half the light in the polarizing filters.
don't cut it off www.mgmbill.org
LCD is already polarized. Hold a linear polarizing filter in front of an LCD screen and turn it and you can see. So it's just a matter of subdividing each pixel (that is already divided into 3 color subpixels) yet again, and designing the polarizing filter so half of each pixel has one polarization angle, and half at 90 degrees to that. I recommend 2 diagonal polarizations at 90 degrees. The new difficulty is that you can't just use a single flat polarization filter like you can with a plain LCD. But once this is solved, the 3D glasses are trivial.
The next problem is doubling the bandwidth of the HDMI link. 1920 x 1080 x 3 is easily done in HDMI. But twice that is a bit beyond its range. And unlike DVI, HDMI does not have a dual-link feature. One option is to increase the clock rate on it to use the same cable. Another option is an extended HDMI. Or just use a dual-link DVI-I cable and run the audio (digitally) over the analog video wires (the ones around the funny large pin on one side). The final option is to have 2 HDMI cables.
And of course they'll need to double the bandwidth of TV transmissions. That can be done easily enough with over-the-air 8VSB in the USA with a reduced frame rate of 24 Hz at the 720 line resolution. Cable has twice the capacity, so it should be possible to do 3D sports (that needs a faster frame rate) at 60 Hz and 720 lines. Satellite service can probably find a similar arrangement for double bandwidth TV.
This will start to push the limits of even Blu-Ray. But there is new technology on the way in optical media, and solid state flash storage looks like its converging to a usable price/capacity point in a decade or so.
The fun begins when we roll out "super wide stereoscopic cinema" with 5120 x 2160 (64:27) at 120 Hz in 3D. That is sure to be encumbered all to hell with DRM. Try running that uncompressed through your HDMI.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
If SMPTE develops the 3D standard, won't it end up being 2.997-drop-frame-D instead?
No no no, the glasses can GIVE you astigmatism.
Ok, then I don't think you know what the word mean.
The word "astigmatism" is used to represent a very specific type of vision problem, where the eyes doesn't need the same correction between two axis. In other words, you aren't exactly the same short sighted between the vertical and horizontal axis of the eye (or any other 2 perpendicular axis : could also be two diagonals 90Â appart). If one looks a cross-section of you eye from the bottom, one observes one degree of short-sightedness requiring one type of correction, but when looking from a perpendicular cross section (from the side) one sees a different shape of the eye which gives a different needed correction.
The eye in this case isn't perfectly round but has an ovoid shape. And the lenses needed to correct this kind of problem aren't perfectly concave (or perfectly convex for far-sightedness) but also have a somewhat cylindrical component to their shape.
The symptoms are (when tired and the brain doesn't post-process the perceived image) :
you can't never focus at the same time on vertical and horizontal lines. Somewhat there are always lines that are blurry or have a halo.
-------------------
the thing you're probably referring to is "strabism" - crossing eyes or seeing things doubled.
It's something that adapts very quickly and is completely benign. People can spend months with eyes train to focus in a certain way, and then switch to something different as a matter of hours. In fact that happens to people who are heavily short sighted : most prescription glasses for them are *really* thick and you start to see spherical aberrations the edge of the visible field are distorted (lines - or at least lines big enough to be visible even with the short sighted-ness - when crossing the edge of the glasses seem doubled). Whereas, contact lenses don't have this, with them everything looks exactly as if seems through "eyes without problems".
With glasses, when looking on one's side, the brain has the habit to focus both eyes in a certain way (due to the thick glasses) and when switching to contact lenses, the brain has to re-adapt because the eyes have to be positioned differently one respective to the other to focus on the same point - all this is only a matter of minutes.
This is due to the fact the most of the eye focusing is done based on the visual input. The pre-wired reflexes only serves for the gross overall direction and to somewhat stabilise in case of motion. Thus if the image changes, the brain is quick to use new focus settings.
If your 3d stereo glasses (or even worse, your head-mounted stereo display) isn't perfectly aligned, the brain will have to focus the eyes to a slightly different position and you'll experience doubled vision when removing the device. A proper stereo display should be configured in such way that infinitely far image align perfectly when looking straight ahead.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Phillips 3D LCD monitor, no glasses, viewable from all angles.
Have any image of a person turned into a 3D avatar to read you your mail. Shop online with a virtual tour guide. Avoid the Torrent Guide Avatar( sleazy used car salesman offering Warez software loaded with spy ware. ) Duck to avoid military recruitment posters. Dodge the Jehovah's Witless Witness Avatar. All of this is waiting for you online. 24/7 Can you stand to have your senses assaulted on an hourly basis?
Another invention will be instantaneous translations: Goggles presenting you with text of all nearby conversations. "Closed captioning for the real world." And who can forget the Voxel goggle Google search?