What Is Stereoscopic 3D?

3D has been used in movies for years. Nowadays, 3D imaging is being used for movies, television and even video games. But how does it all work? 3D imaging is performed through what is known as stereoscopy. Stereoscopy is any means that an image is recorded for three-dimensional viewing. There are several ways that stereoscopy can be performed.

Stereoscopic 3D imaging works by having two separate projectors. Each of these projectors will display two images from two different angles. These images will be shown with just a little bit of space in-between them. When these two images are put together at this angle, the 3D effect can be viewed through special 3D glasses.

There are two kinds of 3D glasses: passive and active. Some active glasses will use liquid crystal to block out light in harmonization with images that are being shown on a computer display. Another technology that uses active glasses are display glasses. With display glasses, a stereoscopic head mounted display shows an image for each eye. This will produce a separate view for each of the eye to interpret. This method works without the need for an external screen and can be viewed at a distance.

The second kind of glasses is passive glasses. Passive glasses come in a couple different ways. The most common version of passive glasses is the traditional red/blue and red/green. These glasses separate the different colors that each eye can perceive. There are other glasses that will use this method, but in a different manner. Instead of separating the colors being viewed, other glasses will invert the wavelengths of the colors going into the eyes.

One side of the glasses will convert the wavelengths to be viewed vertically. The other side of the glasses will transpose the wavelengths to be viewed horizontally. The other version of these kind of glasses will transpose the wavelengths to be viewed counter clockwise in one eye and clockwise in the other eye.

When you view a stereoscopic image without the 3D glasses, the image can seem very fuzzy or discombobulated. Stereoscopic images have been around since the 1920s and are becoming even more popular with technological research being done to allow people to view 3D images without glasses.

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