The Technology
Convert23’s Stereo Stream real-time 2D to 3D conversion technology enables any 2D video signal to be converted to stereoscopic 3D, in real-time during video playback.
Convert23 scientists have years of accumulated experience in converting video signals to 3D. This experience combined with innovative algorithms and steady advances in processing power have led to the leading real-time 2D to 3D conversion technologies available on the market.
The Stereo Stream technology analyses the color, position and motion characteristics of objects in a sequence of video frames and uses depth estimation to render stereoscopic views. The approach is generally applicable to any 3D display device including glasses-based and glasses-free systems.
How it works
Human beings feel the 3D impression because each of the left and right eyes recognizes different images. By wearing active shutter glasses that work in synchronization with the television, the viewer is able to experience 3D images formed with twice the volume of information as regular full HD images. The Convert23 Stereo Stream technology enables full HD signal processing on each of the left and right images
Until now, consumer 3D display systems have encountered many different problems, including reduced vertical resolution caused by a 3D display method that divides the scanning lines between the left and right eyes, and picture quality degradation caused by pixel skipping that results from the squeezing of two (left and right) screens’ worth of full HD images into one screen’s worth of data capacity for image storage and transmission. There has not been a system capable of displaying the equivalent quality to original master of Hollywood 3D movies. The new 120Hz LCD televisions solve this problem.
Only a few years ago, seeing in 3-D meant peering through a pair of red and blue glasses, or trying not to go cross-eyed in front of a page of fuzzy dots. It was great at the time, but 3-D technology has moved on. Scientists know more about how our vision works than ever before, and our computers are more powerful than ever before -- most of us have sophisticated components in our computer that are dedicated to producing realistic graphics. Put those two things together with Convert23 Stereo Stream, and you'll see how 3-D graphics have really begun to take off.
That's where 3-D shutter glasses come in. They're designed to convince your brain that your monitor is showing a real, three-dimensional object. In order to understand quite how this works, we need to know what sort of work our brain does with the information our eyes give it. Once we know about that, we'll be able to understand just how 3-D glasses do their job
Seeing in Three Dimensions
Human beings, like most other creatures, are equipped with two eyes, situated close together and side by side. This positioning means that each eye has a view of the same area from a slightly different angle. You can check this out by focusing on a distant object and viewing through each eye alternately -- see how some things seem to change position slightly?
The brain takes the information from each eye and unites them into one picture, interpreting the slight differences between each view as depth. This produces a three-dimensional picture: one with height, width and depth.
It is the added perception of depth that makes 3-D, or stereoscopic, vision so important. With stereoscopic vision, we see exactly where our surroundings are in relation to our own bodies, usually with considerable precision. We are particularly good at spotting objects that are moving toward or away from us, and the positioning of our eyes means we can see partially around solid objects without needing to move our heads. It's easy to see why some people believe stereoscopic vision evolved as a means of survival.
Certainly, stereoscopic vision is vital for seemingly simple actions such as throwing, catching or hitting a ball, driving or parking a car, or even just threading a needle. That's not to say such tasks can't be managed without 3-D vision, but a lack of depth perception can make these everyday tasks much more complex.
A Different Point Of View
The key to stereoscopic vision is depth, and our brain will happily take care of that for us, providing our eyes are given the right information in the first place. This is exactly how those red and blue glasses work -- each color filters out part of the image, giving each eye a slightly different view. The brain puts the two different images together, and those blue-and-red blurry images turned into a fantastic 3-D comic, or movie, or TV show. However the red-and-blue glasses make it difficult to show color in the 3-D image. Nevertheless, the underlying principle is exactly the same: creating and controlling those two different points of view. But just how easy is it to create these two separate images, one for each eye?
The answer is all about how games are created. Not so long ago, the graphics we saw on our computer screens were carefully drawn into the computer -- every single frame of animation, every different view of a character. If you wanted a dinosaur in your game, you sat down and drew the different views of a dinosaur into the computer.
Nowadays, games designers sit down with a 3-D graphics package and design their dinosaur in three dimensions. Once that's done, they needn't worry about the different views -- the computer has a 3-D model of the dinosaur in its memory, and the game simply works out where the player is looking and draws the correct view of the dinosaur using the 3-D model. In fact, everything you see on your screen in a modern 3-D game is produced the same way; the game is like a gigantic 3-D model. The computer works out what it needs to display on your screen and generates the appropriate view.
Since the computer is quite happy to create one point of view, there's no problem shifting the viewpoint slightly and creating another point of view. And after that, all you need is a way to get the correct image to the correct eye.
Getting Synched
It's all down to the power of liquid crystal displays, or LCD. Just like the liquid crystal in a watch can be changed from transparent to black, the lenses of PC 3-D glasses can be transparent or opaque. In other words, the glasses can control which eye sees the image on the screen, and with careful timing you've got perfect 3-D.
Here's how it happens:
The images are prepared by the computer and displayed. Two images are generated, representing the views seen by each eye. Both of these views are presented on the screen in rapid sequence. While the left view is presented, the right eye is blocked by the LCD glasses. Similarly, when the right view is presented, the left eye is blocked.
All of this happens so quickly that the brain is entirely unaware of the two images merging together into a stereoscopic view. This is the same thing as when we watch a film using an old film projector and the sequence of still images flickering onto the screen merges together to form a movie.
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