Category Archives: 3D Tech

Amazon’s 3D Phone may have a stereoscopic lenticular display

It’s not clear whether the phone has stereoscopic 3D or not: Amazon’s Smartphone Is Coming on June 18 with 3D Effects | Digital Trends.

Update: I doubt it has a lenticular display. The online video makes it look more like it is using 3D perspective effects typical of a video game, but in a good way. Its sort of like the well known 3D “wiggle” effect used for 3D still photos, except here, the “wiggle” is generated at 60 fps by tilting the phone and is under the control of the user.

 

But that description implies it uses head (eye) tracking to dynamically create appropriate 3D imagery and positioning through a stereoscopic lenticular glasses free display. It says its similar to the Nintendo 3DS display, which did use a lenticular glasses free display.

However, I heard no mention of a glasses free display (may be those are bad words). In fact, Amazon seemed to prefer “dynamic perspective” to saying 3D, as if the word “3D” is poison.

If it does have this ability, then it can likely play Youtube 3D videos and other 3D content on its 4.7 inch display.

Update: Some of the media in advance of the announcement, and after the announcement, are calling this a “holographic” display. It is not holographic. I stop reading when I see someone use that word to describe a stereoscopic display – they are very different technologies.

3D “holographic” projection said to be coming very soon

The technology is said to fit even in small devices. Just as some Sony camcorders (and others) can project their 2D video images onto  a white wall or screen, this tech could be used in smart phones or tablets to project 2D or, they say, even 3D content. I do not yet understand how the technology works, but there is evidence that multiple companies are working on bringing this tech to smart phones and tablets within 1 to 2 years.

New Technology Emerges to Greatly Advance Pico-Like Projectors & Deliver 3D Holographic Images by Late 2015 – Patently Apple.

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How to: Shooting landscapes in hyperstereo 3D

I like photographing landscapes in hyperstereo 3D because such photos often reveal hidden depth that we cannot see with our eyes or detect with our brain. This gives us an entirely new perspective on a scene.

My wife jokes that 3D photographers can take photographs with depth at any time, unlike 2D “flat photographers” who must wait around for the sun angle to give shadow contrast for enhancing depth features 🙂

When I take hyperstereo 3D, I almost always use a single camera. I start at the left most position and then take photos as I move the camera to the right. The picture of Mt St Helens was taken as a series of about 7 shots over about 70 feet of distance. I took a photo, walked to my right and took another photo. I did not have a good sense of the spacing that would be needed – and what the impact of close in subjects would have on the depth. So I just took many different lens spacings and chose the best later, when sitting at the computer.

For Mt St Helens, I knew I would need very wide lens spacing, which is why I took photos at 10 feet (over 3 meter) intervals. For closer subjects, I might only move the camera 1 foot (1/3d meter) between shots.

To keep the camera roughly aligned, I set the camera to display a grid overlay on the viewfinder. I position the crosshairs of the grid on a specific, very distant feature. As I move the camera, I keep the crosshairs pointed at that distant feature. In the case of the Mt St Helens volcano, which is many miles away, I use a corner of one of the snow fields as my alignment target.

If you think about how 3D works, if I was using a pair of precisely aligned cameras, each pointed off into the distance, at some point a long ways out there, the two cameras are effectively pointed at the same subject – we can’t distinguish, says, 6 inches of lens spacing, on a subject a few miles away!  For really distant subjects, a lens spacing measured in feet is still indistinguishable (in a practical sense).

After shooting, the photos are aligned and processed in Stereo PhotoMaker.