A Lesson in Dimensions

The cultivation of three-dimensional technology has been going on since the 19^th century and certainly seems like it has no intention of halting.

With the advent of 3D televisions, movies, and Nintendo's upcoming 3DS, it would probably be a good time to learn about what has already begun overtaking your movie theatres and will soon invade your homes.

The Beginning – Stereoscopic Images:

All technology has a starting point, and Charles Wheatstone first described 3D images as a re-creatable possibility as early as 1838. Stereopsis (from “stereo” meaning solid and “opsis” meaning sight) was described by the English inventor as “the mind’s perception of a three-dimensional object by means of two dissimilar pictures projected onto two retinæ”.



Essentially, it’s the illusion used to give two-dimensional pictures depth and disparity by tricking your eyes. A stereoscope – a unique type of spectacle – is required to actually view the trick correctly. The images used in order to induce stereopsis are typically called a “Stereo Pair”.

In the Victorian era, after David Brewster invented the prism stereoscope (the first consumer-grade stereoscopic spectacles) and photography became a popular hobby, viewing stereo pairs became a regular pastime and thousands of “Stereo Cards” (cards with Stereo Pairs on them) were created.


Today stereoscopic technology is still in place with Anaglyphs. Those funny glasses you paid an extra ten dollars for at the theater are a more modern version of the stereoscopes your great grandfather (and his great grandfather!) had. If you don’t mind a bit of a headache, the next time you go to see a movie lift the glasses up; that blurred, slightly off-color image is an anaglyph, which consists of an overlay of two different pictures that are used in conjunction with the glasses.

Each of the lenses in those glasses are polarized and meant to see one of the two images that appear on screen. There was a reason the older glasses were red and green or red and blue – the colors polarized your eyes to see the related picture onscreen that matched with those colors.



Before new anaglyphic technology came out, the two-color glasses were your best bet for having an image pop out at you. Now, the glasses actually take advantage of three colors in order to give you a clearer, more realistic image – while red is still the de-facto color for the left eye, cyan is now used for the right This not only gives you a clearer image but also more accurately portrays things like skin tone or the skyline.

Certainly we must have a better way by now than crappy, cheap glasses in order to see 3D, right?

Current Technology - Autostereoscopic:

While stereoscopic technology allows for a cheap and convenient way to enable three-dimensional viewing, autostereoscopic technology is slowly becoming readily available for home use. Called “Auto 3D” in the industry, this technology eschews the iconic glasses and instead makes the hardware produce the illusion itself.

Auto 3D works by employing a lenticular lens (essentially an array of different magnifying lenses used to produce multiple images) to produce, at certain angles, the stereo pairs required for three-dimensional viewing. A number of these lenses are employed in order to bring you a continuous image at multiple viewing angles.

This technology is being used in an array of different products. Phillips and Sharp are producing Auto 3D televisions, Hitachi is producing a mobile phone, many companies like Acer and Sharp are developing autostereoscopic laptops, and Nintendo’s recent announcement of the 3DS is said to use this technology as well.

Many companies are also beginning to employ some form of eye tracking that allows the lenses to shift and change inside the displays as you move your head. This cuts down on the cost of the monitors and also allows for an array of varied angles that you can view them from.

This new technology sounds amazing, doesn’t it? Well, like most new technology, it certainly comes with some risks for all parties involved.

The Problem with 3D:

The major hurdle that Auto 3D suffers from is that they need insanely high resolutions in order to produce high definition images. The snapshots produced by the lenses are completely separate to your eyes, so in order to view them at a high definition quality the television must be able to produce resolutions in excess of 1080p. This requirement for a higher resolution, just like when standard high-definition televisions arrived, drives the price up drastically until those numbers become a more acceptable standard.

Just to give you an example: The Philips television mentioned earlier has a whopping 2160p resolution and goes for $10,000. Also, that’s just for the 42-inch model.

Another hurdle is that many people either become ill from viewing three-dimensional images or simply can’t see them at all. These people, who have issues with what is called “Stereo Vision” suffer from either a physical eye problem – a lazy eye, the lack of an eye, etc. – or some form of heterophoria (where your eyes cross either outward or inward) which affects your depth perception and doesn’t allow you to see it at all!

Though the percentage of people is small, it is certainly a demographic that may need to be taken into account as more and more companies make this technology a major stable in their lineup. They are a group of people who will see -- sadly, quite literally -- absolutely no value in this upgraded technology. Also, as far as the price goes, the cost of new technology always lowers as producers find more efficient ways to present the same idea.



While I’m not the biggest fan of the movies and gimmicks that are typically employed with this idea (sadly, I'm of the small percentage that has problems with his stereo vision), I’m certainly excited to see what the future may hold for our entertainment -- and more specifically our gaming -- lives.