TREND IN MOTION:
THE MYSTERIOUS NEW WORLD OF 3D Reaching out and touching the next step in visual technologies. By Adam Sherwin
“...soon advertisers and artists alike will be able to create moving images in 3D and we’ll be able to interact with them in our everyday life.” For some, it’s the nostalgia of one red lens and one blue lens attached to flimsy paper frames and looking at oddly colored comic strips, and seeing images leap from the page. For others, it’s the recent experience of putting on a pair of cheap, black plastic glasses with polarized lenses and watching, amazed, an entire movie screen come alive from all angles. Well my friends, 3D has changed yet again. The growing trend of 3D imagery has leapt off the pages of comic books and the big screen and can now be found in many of the tech gadgets we use everyday. Everything, from consumer grade video cameras to the TV in our living room, as well as computers and smartphones, is now capable of giving you a 3D experience. With a simple movement across our touch screens or a click of our remotes, we can create and view realistic 3D images. While much of this new 3D gadgetry will probably end up on the technology scrap heap, there are some very promising developments. It might not be the same quality as what is available
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to James Cameron, but it’s still interesting to see what manufacturers are doing and what remains affordable enough to produce en masse so that average consumers can get their hands on this technology. While the 3D tradition of anaglyph technology (one red, one blue lens) is dead, it has definitely set the stage. If wearing 3D glasses is an intrinsic part of your 3D experience, you will love the new alternate frame sequencing or passive polarized technologies. The first, AFS tech, makes the glasses do all the work. They have an active shutter and are constructed with LCD lenses and polarization filters. A tiny current is sent to the glasses; it alternates over and over again, making one lens transparent and the other dark, from right eye to left eye and back. All of this happening at roughly 120fps or 60 fps per eye. AFS has quickly become a hit with the gaming set and has been used in such products as NVIDIA’s 3D Vision, which range from home PCs and laptops to an entire pro division that keeps your office living in a 3D dream world (www.nvidia. com). In addition to NVIDIA, there are several companies selling 3D-
ready computer monitors, which cost between $300 and $1,000. 3D laptops will run you anywhere from $500 to $1,000. The biggest downside to this technology is the glasses themselves; they alone cost around $200 a pop. Not bad if you’re a bachelor playing video games alone, but this could easily be a deterrent for an average family, as each user has to have their own glasses. Nevertheless, one great thing about this technology, in general, is its affordability. Current LCD and plasma screen TVs need very little modification beyond a higher re-fresh rate and a sync unit that communicates with the glasses. These models also offer wider viewing angles and normal 2D viewing when the sync unit and glasses are deactivated. I had a good time looking at www.bestbuy. com for all the newest toys. The site has a ton of great educational info about 3D to help you make the right choice. An AFS-ready TV from Sony, Samsung, LG, Panasonic, Sharp or Mitsubishi will run anywhere from $600 to $1,200 for smaller sets, and $1,500 to $4,000 for larger sets with HD upgrades. These prices should help you keep
a couple of extra dollars in your pocket to spend on that new 3D camera you’ll want to produce your own 3D content. If you’ve seen a 3D movie lately, you’ve had first-hand exposure to the other current favorite, the passive polarized 3D technology. Two images with different polarizations are simultaneously displayed on the screen; they are viewed through a pair of glasses with a different polarized filter for each eye. This difference in polarization creates the 3D effect. No need for sync unit, somewhat more affordable, and the glasses are less bulky and don’t need batteries or charging. Sounds like the way to go, doesn’t it? Hold on a sec. Unfortunately, this technology is not the be-all-to-end-all answer to your 3D viewing problem. While manufacturers like LG and Vizio are making great passive TVs like the 47” LG 47LW5600 ($1,700) or the 65” Vizio XVT3D650SV ($3,190), the polarized image appears blurry when you take the glasses off (you can buy passive 3D glasses for around $15). Not all manufacturers have decided to produce passive polarized products, thus keeping our home viewing solu-