Drum Corps in 3D?

[Tez]

So has anyone watched the video that actually has red/blue glasses?..... I watched it without them and it looks like it would be interesting..... anybody?

[jhallman]

Yep - I raided the Spykids 3d DVD which included 4 pairs

at full screen @ 1920 x 1200 x 32 it was ok much better in the original window tho I might play with the 3d settings on my nVidia card and see if I can't get it to look better.

Video has snippets of current shows, the Crown shows looks really good - it gives depth to the field and makes the colorguard work really stand out and you see the rest of the corp moving too.

And I tried the "polarized ones" - the glasses that have dark lenses like you use at the digital 3d movies coming out lately but they were worthless.

All in all, a neat novelty - I would not want to watch an entire show like that. I'd prefer to see more open class shows and commentaries

[GoFanGo]

So has anyone watched the video that actually has red/blue glasses?..... I watched it without them and it looks like it would be interesting..... anybody?

I'm sorry but the red/green glasses are so 40 years ago. It was abandon because after a while folks started getting headaches. It also does not work for 25% of the population due to their inverted dominant-eye gene.

Kudos to Box 5 for trying, but it makes you wonder why they did it in the first place. Are they trying to dethrone Tom Blair? (i hope not)

Edited August 1, 2009 by GoFanGo

[Cardman]

Thank you for the "lesson" on how 3D works. As I mentioned before, I manage a movie theater, and we have a digital projector capable of showing 3D (right now we're showing G-Force 3D) and I know how it works (I read the manual!) I didn't feel like explaining the whole thing so thanks for doing it for me.

This fan network video, as you mentioned is the "old" 3D, which doesn't hold a candle to the polarization that we are used to today. The "3D" images look like paper cutouts more than three dimensional objects. It may be interesting to check it out just for old times sake, but the 3D I was talking about not being possible on a standard monitor is the polarization 3D, or whatever you want to call it.

[GoFanGo]

Right back at you.

I think the video people should focus on getting us quality images in HD and good camera angles. (Sorry Box 5, I can see that you’re now using trip-pods but it still looks bando).

I'm glad the Big Loud and Live is in HD, I can't wait!

[perc2100]

So has anyone watched the video that actually has red/blue glasses?..... I watched it without them and it looks like it would be interesting..... anybody?

It was OK: some shots lend themselves better to 3D than others. My seven year old son just got a 'Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs' book that had old school 3D glasses included, so I quickly borrowed his glasses.

Admittedly, I spent last week watching movie panels in HD 3D and it spoiled me completely: this old school stuff looks pretty lame compared to, say, 25 minutes of the new James Cameron movie in 3D. But it was a fun novelty that I would consider watching again.

[shaners]

Hey Guys,

There are different types of 3d viewing technology. The basic premise is that you display 2 images, left and right eye, and have some device that filters each eye so that it sees its respective image. The 2 images overlap, with a slight perspective warp (the closer the object is to the camera, the more it is offset left to right between the left and right eye images).

With a good capture (the image overlaps, lines up vertically, and the objects are offset left to right within a comfortable range), and good viewing mechanism (each eye gets a reasonably clean lf / rt image), your brain will put the two images together as it normally does, and you perceive depth.

Cardman - the technology you speak of is 'polarization', the technique used at the theaters. Two individual images are projected (one for each eye), one is positively polarized, the other negative. You where glasses that have one pos and one negatively polarized lens, therefore one lens sees only the + image, and the other the -. That way, you see a clean stereo image, as each eye sees it's respective view.

The technique used for the drum corps videos is called 'anaglyph'. The means to display and filter 2 seperate image is by using the RGB channels of your monitor (red Green Blue). While you only have one monitor, it has 3 separate color channels. So, you can capture a left and right eye image with 2 cameras, and put the left eye into the red channel, the right eye into the blue, and some data into the green (there are different ways to handle the green, sometimes it's alright to just put the right eye into the green channel).

You wear red / green glasses : the red lens blocks out the red in the image so you only see green/blue (right eye image), the blue lens blocks out the blue so that you only see red / green (left eye image).

Obviously this technique is not as nice and is prone to what we call 'stereo artifacts'. These occur when one eye sees part of the other eye's image - it blows the effect. If the tint of the glasses does not perfectly match the monitor, not all the red/blue color is filtered out. Also, you have the problem that neither lens filters out green, so it's visible in both eyes. Anyway, for what it is, it can still do a reasonably good job of tricking your eyes into seeing depth.

##############

btw - I built my own cheapie 3d camera last year, and brought it on the road with me while touring with the Phantom Regiment. I got some pretty cool 3d videos. The only issue is that they were cheap HD video cams (it was just an experient), with a major flaw of having a low refresh rate. So, each frame only updates about 1/3 of the image. So, it takes 3 frames to refresh a full image. So, when there is a lot of movement, the 3d effect breaks down.

But, despite that, I got some pretty cool footage.

I was really busy last year (working on a movie G-Force, which just came out), so I never got around to processing all the footage. Things are a little slower for me, so hopefully I can finish putting it all together. I was hoping to make a dvd for the '08 corps members, and give the footage to Rick Valenzuela, to see if he wanted to do anything with it.

It's not very professional, as it was a test, but some of it is pretty cool. I was hoping to build a better rig and come back on tour get better footage. But, it looks like someone beat me to it. :)

I worked on my first stereo 3d project in 2006, and all I could think about is how this stereo technology was going to change sports coverage and drum corps. :)

btw - home stereo technology is coming soon! In the next 5 years, this will be very common.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzZZZZZZZOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

MMMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

that was the sound of you flying over my head.... jk... actually a pretty good explanation... just seemed outta left field.

Edited August 2, 2009 by shaners

[Astacoidea]

Wrong, red tinted lens only allows red to go through, it does not block it. Since it is on a white background, the white appears red as all other colors are filtered and the blue appears black.

Edited August 2, 2009 by Astacoidea

[tim_brandt]

Sorry for the long-winded answer, then.

Yeah, the anaglyph is not ideal, but it's all we got to display on a regular screen, right now. The other option would be to interlace the lf /rt eye frames and have shutter glasses sync up with it. But, again, that requires some gear. I still think the red/blue glasses do a good enough job, for what they are. It's a gimmick. Under certain circumstances, the images can still pop.

Also, whether the objects look like paper cutouts or have shape to them is often a function of the convergence used when capturing the footage. If the cameras are pointed inward, they converged at a particular depth. Objects within the 'sweet spot' are captured with more 'rounded' shape. The only issue though is if you are over-aggressive in setting this angle, objects behind the point of convergence (background) can be way off and not line up.

Anyways, I'm rambling, again. It won't be too far into the future that we have stereo viewing systems in the home. There's a lot of stuff in the pipe. As long as both eyes are captured properly, the footage can always be re-formated for different viewing standards.

I think stereo 3d is a perfect fit for drum corps. At least for watching stuff from field-level.

Thank you for the "lesson" on how 3D works. As I mentioned before, I manage a movie theater, and we have a digital projector capable of showing 3D (right now we're showing G-Force 3D) and I know how it works (I read the manual!) I didn't feel like explaining the whole thing so thanks for doing it for me.

This fan network video, as you mentioned is the "old" 3D, which doesn't hold a candle to the polarization that we are used to today. The "3D" images look like paper cutouts more than three dimensional objects. It may be interesting to check it out just for old times sake, but the 3D I was talking about not being possible on a standard monitor is the polarization 3D, or whatever you want to call it.

[tim_brandt]

Sorry, the red lens does indeed filter out the red color, and the cyan lens filters out cyan.

The color of the lens filters out (blocks) the tint of the opposite eye's image. Thus, whatever is in the green channel comes through.

You can try it yourself - load one of the anaglyph images on your computer, and hold your glasses over the monitor. You will see that the red lens only shows the green/blue colors through, and the blue lens only the red/green.

Hey, I found this page that also explains this phenomenon (scroll to the middle). Hopefully, this helps to explain :

http://science.howstuffworks.com/3-d-glasses2.htm

Wrong, red tinted lens only allows red to go through, it does not block it. Since it is on a white background, the white appears red as all other colors are filtered and the blue appears black.