February 4, 2009 • 23 mins
3-D glasses have been around for a long time, but recent innovations have redefined the traditionally marginal role of this technology. Check out this HowStuffWorks podcast to learn more about the future of 3-D technology.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With
tech stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hi, everybody,
welcome to the podcast. My name is Chris Pullette. I'm
an editor here at How Stuff Works. Sitting next to
me in all three dimensions as usual as senior writer
(00:23):
Jonathan Strickland. I'd like to point out, it's actually four dimensions.
The dimension of time is also in play. Oh, I
was just thinking, you know, height was just not in there. Oh,
burn not like I'm taller than it's about to say.
I think I'm actually a little taller than you are.
So moving right into our topic today. We we touched
(00:44):
on this on a recent podcast when we talked about
c E S and then we realize that, you know,
three D technology. It's something that has been around for
for many decades actually, but it's starting to come back now.
It's like it seems weird. It's like every like the
nineteen fifties it got really big for a little while
and then it kind of died away. And then in
nineteen eighties it got big for a little while, and
(01:06):
then it kind of died away. And this looks like
it's another one of those, um those moments sort of
like the Yo Yo where it just comes back in
vogue and who knows, maybe this time it's here to stay. Well. Um, yeah.
We we have an article on the site how three
D glasses worked that was written by our site founder
Marshall Brain and it's it's really fascinating. The according the article,
(01:29):
the Power of Love was the first movie to be
done in three D and that was it's a curious thing.
Thank you, thanks for the news. So, you know, we're
coming up on a century of three D you know,
video technology, which is uh, you kind of think about it.
I always thought of it as a fifties and sixties
singer and it's been around for quite some time. And
(01:51):
you sit there and you think about that, like, okay,
so if it's almost a century old, why is it
still relatively rare? Um As it's a pain in the
neck to actually make it work, right, and I'm bring
on the eyes as well as it turns out. Yeah,
that's one of the problems is that it's there's no
for longest time, there was no real easy way of
doing this that didn't result in after you know, maybe
(02:12):
watching something for about forty minutes feeling like your eyeballs
were on fire. Um, it's a little better now, but
we'll we'll we'll get to that. First. We should kind
of talk about why we're able to perceive why or
why three D is important, and how we're able to
perceive it. It all goes down too, comes down to
binocular vision. You know, I have a pair of binoculars
(02:34):
and it doesn't look like I'm looking in three D. Right,
that doesn't know what it means. So we're talking about
using both eyes to see objects and then perceive depth
using both of your eyes, there's this, Um, what's It's
what's called parallax. It's where you're looking at objects and
(02:55):
because your eyes are not located in the exact same
spot on your head, go figure, Um, you can actually
your brain uses the difference in the angles that you're
perceiving to create the perception of depth. So if you
were to close one eye, or if you were to
lose an eye, uh, you would not be able to
perceive depth the same way someone with two eyes can.
(03:18):
You could still do it. Um, You mainly pick it
up from visual cues at that point, and your your
perception is not as accurate. Most humans have pretty accurate
depth perception to at least up to twenty feet or so.
But if you only had one eye, then you would
you know, some things that you might think, oh, well,
that's closer to me than that other object over there.
You might be surprised to find out hoops, I was
(03:39):
wrong because you didn't have this the second eye to
you know, to verify the information. So three D movies,
three D images, uh, they have to be able to
create this sense of of parallax in order for you
to to perceive them as you know, three dimensional as
opposed to two dimensional to give you that illusion of depth.
(04:00):
You know, like a view master for example, exactly takes
advantage of that because it shows you slightly different versions
of the same image, right, which creates the illusion of death.
And that's how those red and blue three D glasses work, right,
It's called anaglyph images um, which uses red in a
different color rights usually blue, but could be green or yeah,
(04:22):
it's usually it's usually red and blue. Those are the
classic three D glasses that a lot of us think
about when we when we hear the three D glasses thing. Um,
So you you have an image that you're showing on
a screen, and it's got to say, kind of like
a reddish overlay on top of it, and then you
have the identical image superimposed or are shown just slightly
(04:45):
off to the side. Looks a little weird if you're
not wearing the glasses, which is usually in a blue
or perhaps green overlay. And then you have glasses with
corresponding lenses. Now, the red lens happens to block the
red light. It absorbs it straight through. You don't see it.
You just see the blue and the blue it it
lets through the red light. And uh, your your eyes
(05:06):
see these two images separately, and your brain puts the
information together to create the three D image. So your
brain is doing all the work really uh. And once
they figured out, hey, if we just put these two
images side by side really close together and do different
colors and have each I perceive a different color, then
we can create the illusion of depth. Uh. Then that's
(05:29):
that's when the three D movie craze really took off. Yeah,
that's um, that's why if you take off the three
D glasses and look at the movie one of the
classic and a glyph style three D Uh, movies. You'll
notice that there's a red version of the image and
there's a blue version of the image, and it looks
like it's out of register. Like if you've seen a
color picture where the printing was just off and everything
(05:53):
seemed to be shifted in one direction and it's just
the red or just the yellow. Um, that means that
the printers didn't line up. The College's sort looks like
that because one of them will be just a little
to the left and one will be just a little
to the right, and you're gonna what's up with this? Well,
because they're slightly different, it allows your brain to make
up that there's a three D version of that. But
that's not how the newer version of three D works.
(06:15):
The newer version uses polarized lenses. That's right, now, That's
that's interesting because polarized lenses is all about the angle
of the light waves, right, true, But it achieves the
same effect because um, the images are slightly different in direction,
and by shifting the polarity and using the polarized glasses
it uh. It also fools your eyes and you don't
(06:35):
have to have red and blue version of the the
image on the right. They look more like, you know,
kind of dorky sunglasses. Um. In general, I guess you
could really if you wanted to make a very stylish pair,
but every pair I've ever seen looks kind of geeky. Well,
if you're gonna go watch Captain EO, it doesn't really
matter anyway, because you know, the glasses sort of went
with the movie anyhow. Don't be talking smack about my
(06:55):
Michael Jackson. Um. So yeah, So these polarized lenses in
the same sense that the red and blue only allow
the blue and red respectively. Uh, those light waves through
the polarized lenses are kind of the same way. They're
aligned so that the light uh, the the angles of
the light waves will only go through one side or
(07:16):
the other. And usually you have two projectors projecting at
the same time. They're projecting. Each one's projecting a different
of what's projecting the same image at the same time,
but in a different angle of light waves. So you're
getting both sets of images at the same time, but
only one eye receives each image and then your brain
does the work again. So it's based on a very
(07:38):
similar principle as the red and blue. Now I've heard
that people tend to experience less eye strain using this
method than they did when they use the red and
blue Um. Have you ever seen a three D movie
like a full three D movie with the red and
blue glasses like a full length feature film. I haven't
ever watched anything that long. The longest thing I have
(08:00):
in three D is Captain EO. Now that you mentioned, Okay,
well I have um as and this is one of
my childhood memories. So sit back and grab a coke.
I went to see Jaws in three D. Jaws three
in three D and the theater with my dad. Uh. Hi,
Dad and dad and I. Um we sat there and
(08:21):
watched this movie and by the end of it we
each had splitting headaches. And uh. Also, by the way,
just so you know, terrible movie. Uh. The only three
D effect that was really effective was when someone held
a syringe out towards the screen in the way that
absolutely no one does and then pushed the plunger. Um.
That was actually pretty effective. The shark stuff not so
(08:42):
much at any rate. But the terror didn't stop at
the edge of the screen. Oh my gosh, you knew
the tagline so um So anyway, anyway, it was it
was it definitely did cause eye straight Now I've warned
the polarized glasses uh for shure demonstrations, but nothing for
really any length of time. So I'm kind of curious
(09:04):
to see if if it really, if it lives up
to the hype. Um. And of course there's one other
kind of three D glasses we can talk about, the
active glasses. Oh, yes, those are the ones that you
actually saw at CES. Yeah, I saw a couple of
different instances of active glasses. Now, with these other versions
we're talking about, you usually, like I said, have two
projectors projecting the images at the same time. Um. Really,
(09:26):
the you know, that's the best way to show these images. Now,
with active glasses, you can have one projector showing or
one screen whatever showing these images. Um altogether. But the
difference is in this case, rather than the glasses just
being a piece of paper or plastic with the lenses
in front of your face, the glasses are doing all
the work instead the projectors. Right, The glasses have a
(09:48):
shutter where they turn on and off a polarization effect,
and they do it at such a fast speed that
you would never be able to to see it. You can't,
you know, consciously notice that they're shuttering on and off.
Um I mentioned that the vidio ones I saw shuttered
(10:09):
at a sixty hurts refresh rate for each eye. So
the screen, what it's doing is it's alternating the image
at the same rate that your glasses are shuttering on
and off, and you're getting these two different images, uh
at at a rate of speed that's so fast that
your brain essentially thinks it's the same it's happening at
the same time. You know from your perception it's all
(10:31):
happening at the same time, even though in reality it's
switching back and forth at this incredible rate of speed.
So the effect again is that your brain puts it
together and says, hey, there's depth there. It's not just
a flat surface. And the effect really is pretty interesting,
and that you know, you look at the screen and
it looks like you can actually see beyond just that
(10:52):
flat surface. Um it's it's there's some effect of the
you know, oh, it's coming out toward me. But that's
kind of minor in comparison to just this amazing depth
of vision that you get in these screens. And um
you might wonder like, well, okay, so we've got all
this technology. Where's the big deal? Well, Hollywood is really
(11:14):
kind of experimenting with this technology recently. There's been there's
been quite a few movies that have come out with
that feature this three D tech and UH, and not
only just movies, but also sporting events and concerts that
have have shown up either in theaters or on television
that use three D and UM. Part of that is
(11:36):
made possible by the use of digital video technology. I mean,
film really didn't give us the opportunity to use it
as much as digital does, so that just makes it,
you know, easier and cheaper for the studios to do. UM,
which is you know, probably a good thing. And UM
actually is a good transition in the next part of
(11:57):
what I was going to bring up, although I think
you may have answered my option because there's so much
three D at c e S. It was one of
the big themes of this year's show. UM, I was
going to ask you if you thought three D was
the next big living room phenomenon. But from what I understand,
most TVs that use three D technology use the anaglyph method,
(12:18):
use the red and blue glasses and if it's a
big eye stream and maybe it's that such. I mean,
people are not going to sit there and watch TV
for four hours a night and get splitting headaches. If
you if you wanted to use uh like the active glasses,
you would need a special display or special television um,
something that's called three D ready. And there are only
(12:38):
a few sets, relatively few sets out there that are
three D ready, either as computer monitors or television sets
like the like mis Mitsubishi laser View. I keep bringing
it up, but that's one of the ones that's three
D ready. Um. If you don't have the television that's
capable of doing that, then you're kind of stuck. You've
got a really expensive pair of glasses that don't really
(12:59):
work very well make you look like a big dork.
So um, hey congrats. But if you do have one
of those sets, then you can take advantage of this technology. Now,
of course, that means you also have to find content
that was optimized for that technology. It's not gonna just
work on anything. It's not like you could turn on
any television like, oh way, yeah, I get full House
(13:20):
in three D um. That's that might have been scarier
than the Jaws, but they're there. There's a lot of
three D stuff that's just starting to uh to creep in. Like,
for example, this year's Super Bowl, which was you know,
absolutely amazing. Um, we say as we record a few
days before that, but um, from what I from what
(13:43):
I understand, Pepsi and UH and Universal both took out
ads for the Super Bowl. Um, Pepsi for Sobey's Life
water and UH the movie Monsters and Aliens from Universal
both had three d ads and UH, NBC was so
excited about that. They're even advertising the ads that they're
(14:05):
coming up so you can actually get the glasses and
watch the three d ads in time. It's getting a
little too meta for me now. The Monsters Versus Aliens.
That's a movie that's coming out later in two thousand nine,
and actually in three it will be in three D. Yeah,
it's it's a computer graphics animated film and I saw
clips of that when I was at c E S.
(14:27):
That was one of the demos they did with the
three D technology and it looks pretty good. Um. There
are several other movies that are coming out either this
year or in coming years that are going to be
using three D. That includes James Cameron's Avatar, not to
be confused with the Nickelodeon Nickelodeon cartoon show which my
wife loves. Hello wife. Uh there's uh, there's a rumored
(14:51):
version of a Christmas Carol that maybe in three D.
It's going to use the same creepy technology as Polar Express.
I bet it was a Dickens to make. I'm sure
it was. Then there's a There's How to Train Your
Dragon Crude Awakening Alice in Wonderland, which is Tim Burton's
take on the classic tail. Um Johnny Depp will be
(15:13):
in that. I think he's the Mad Hatter if I'm
not mistaken. Um, he should be if he's not. The
next Trek film is supposed to be in three D Mastermind.
Also the one that we Are you and I will
be waiting for with bated breath. Yes, the remastered three
D version of Star Wars. I saw clips of that
while I was at c E S and it was
(15:33):
one of the two times I came close to crying.
Good tears are bad, Oh, just tears of joy to
see to see the Karelian starship being chased by that
star destroyer and it's looming at me right there. And
then R two D two is right in front of
my face. Oh man, okay, wait wait, I'm back. I'm back.
(15:57):
So that's okay. It'll it'll be twenty more years before
Orge Lucas decides on the final, final, final three D
versions and you know, with the refinements in it, and
then of course we have the video games that could
come out. Um that Navidia is really pushing for. Navidias,
the graphics processing card manufacturer, they have the g Force classes. Um,
(16:19):
they have a whole list of video games that are
already prepared to go to three D. I mean, everything
is there. You just have to have the right display,
the graphics chip and the glasses and then you're ready
to go. And among the games that they say are
optimized for this include Age of Empires three, Battlefield to
Call of Duty, for Civilization for for you, said Meyer
(16:42):
fans out there, Burnout Paradise, for you race card driving
fans out there, World of Warcraft. Um, if you're a
World of Warcraft fan, you're not listening to this. You're
playing World of Warcraft, Half Life two, Left for Dead,
roller Coaster Tycoon. Yeah, roller Coaster ty Coon. Okay, you
know you may be laughing at that, but if you
(17:05):
think about it. You know, that could be pretty pretty cool. Yeah.
You get to ride the rights and you get to
see your your your amusement park in three D. There's
some pretty nifty things out there. So yeah, it's it.
I think they're pushing for it to be the next
big thing. Now here's the question. Are people going to
adopt it? And specifically, are people going to be willing
(17:27):
to spend money on it, especially in an economic downturn?
Oh well, I imagine that this is the kind of
thing that would cost a lot of money, even not
in an economic downturn. Yeah, because this is not I mean,
this is using brand new technology that is different from
the technology would see in a standard LCD display right right.
The glasses alone can cost you like two D bucks. Yeah,
(17:49):
so that's that's before you even get a graphics card
or the display or television. So it makes the three
D super Bowl party kind of expensive. Yeah. I think
the laser view was around seven grand. Um, So yeah,
that's uh, that's an expensive toy. So it may be
beyond our reach for a few more years. Time will tell.
(18:09):
I mean, if enough early adopters do go out and
buy this stuff, that will drive the price down, and
then the rest of us can can enjoy stuff in
three D as well. And of course you can still
go to the movie theater and see a lot of
these films in three D. I mean, even movies that
weren't made completely in three D, you can sometimes see
parts of it in three D. So now it's at
(18:30):
least the film industry is really trying to push forward.
I think that's partly in response to UM piracy. Actually
when you think about it, because if you can't recreate
the experience at home, you have to go to the
theater to get the experience. But when you can recreate
the experience at home, then they're trumped again. Yeah, you
just pirate the heck out of it. Not that you
(18:52):
would or I would, but you know, those nefarious people
who are not our listeners because we're all well behaved,
we're we're good ones in this in this podcast. Yeah, well,
that's a good discussion. I do have one other thing
to add. Oh yes, that would be listener mail. That
(19:13):
was great. So uh so this listener mail comes from
Mike Linderer from Grayling, Michigan, and Mike wanted to give
us a few more UM suggestions. When we did our
Tech Toys episode talking about the sort of things that
keep us saying at work. He had a few more
to suggest, so I was just gonna run through some
of the ones that he listed. He listed Slacker, which
(19:34):
is another internet radio style site. You can talk a
little bit about that, right, Chris, you know, Oh yeah, yeah, Slacker. UM.
Slacker sort of like a cross between last FM and
UH and ANDORRA because you do get to select your
stations UM. And when I say it's across, it's sort
of tool wise the things you get to do with
(19:55):
the songs UM, as far as tagging them and things
like that. You have some more control, more so than
you might in Pandora UM. But you have more control
over the station like you would in last NFM. But
it's it's one of very many. There are lots and
lots of other stations out there, like Django is another example, UM,
and just various radio radio one. Mama. You know, there
(20:18):
are there are lots and lots of music sites out there,
and each one of them is a little bit different.
They offer something that you can't do with the others.
Fine Tune is an example of that because you actually
get to listen to a specific song, but you can
only put you know, three You create playlists and you
can only put three songs by a particular artist or
(20:38):
three songs by on a particular album on your playlist.
So there are still restrictions and things that might You
might listen to one for a couple of hours ago.
You know, this is driving me crazy. There restrictions on
the site. And then you go in another, um, well
this is cool. Oh, but there are these different restrictions,
so and maybe something it might end up turning onto
something like the whole Twitter Pounce plerk battle and you
(21:00):
see which one ends up surviving. True, hopefully they all will.
They all have something different that they bring in the party. Yep.
And then some others that Mike mentions are he mentions
line writer, which is, you know, it's kind of a
game and kind of an art project thing. Have you
ever seen this? I've seen it. I haven't used it myself.
It's uh, I've tried to use it, but I'm a terrible,
terrible artist, so I can't make the little guy ride
(21:21):
his line for very long. He always ends up wiping
out spectacularly and then falling for about you know, forty
forty five minutes. So um, but it's it's for the
people who are really talented. I mean there's some amazing
line writer of courses that people have created that are
really fun to watch. He also mentioned Homestyle Runner. Uh.
This is actually kind of cool because we're talking about
(21:42):
some some neighbors of ours in the way, the Brothers Chaps.
I mean they they're here, they're Atlanta locals. And actually
some of the people in the office know some of
the know the Brothers Chaps. Um I do not. I've
seen them perform live, but I don't know them. But yeah,
that's a great, great site, very amusing. Uh mentioned jib
Jab as well, also pretty funny site, very famous in
(22:04):
the elections exactly. Uh mentioned the Darwin Awards, which can
be entertaining. I do recommend that you cross reference the
Darwin Awards with Snopes dot com because not every story
on the Darwin Awards is actually true. And then the
last one he mentioned was the Daily Onion, which we
should mention is not necessarily safe for work, but very funny,
(22:30):
extremely funny. So thanks, Mike. We really appreciate your email,
and if you would like to write to us, you
can write to us at tech Stuff at how stuff
works dot com. We love hearing from you guys. If
you want to learn more about three D technology, we
have plenty of stuff up on the website that's at
how stuff works dot com. And we'll talk to you
again really soon for more on this and thousands of
(22:52):
other topics. Is it how stuff works dot com, brought
to you by the invented two thousand twelve cameras. It's ready,
are you
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With
tech stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hi, everybody,
welcome to the podcast. My name is Chris Pullette. I'm
an editor here at How Stuff Works. Sitting next to
me in all three dimensions as usual as senior writer
(00:23):
Jonathan Strickland. I'd like to point out, it's actually four dimensions.
The dimension of time is also in play. Oh, I
was just thinking, you know, height was just not in there. Oh,
burn not like I'm taller than it's about to say.
I think I'm actually a little taller than you are.
So moving right into our topic today. We we touched
(00:44):
on this on a recent podcast when we talked about
c E S and then we realize that, you know,
three D technology. It's something that has been around for
for many decades actually, but it's starting to come back now.
It's like it seems weird. It's like every like the
nineteen fifties it got really big for a little while
and then it kind of died away. And then in
nineteen eighties it got big for a little while, and
(01:06):
then it kind of died away. And this looks like
it's another one of those, um those moments sort of
like the Yo Yo where it just comes back in
vogue and who knows, maybe this time it's here to stay. Well. Um, yeah.
We we have an article on the site how three
D glasses worked that was written by our site founder
Marshall Brain and it's it's really fascinating. The according the article,
(01:29):
the Power of Love was the first movie to be
done in three D and that was it's a curious thing.
Thank you, thanks for the news. So, you know, we're
coming up on a century of three D you know,
video technology, which is uh, you kind of think about it.
I always thought of it as a fifties and sixties
singer and it's been around for quite some time. And
(01:51):
you sit there and you think about that, like, okay,
so if it's almost a century old, why is it
still relatively rare? Um As it's a pain in the
neck to actually make it work, right, and I'm bring
on the eyes as well as it turns out. Yeah,
that's one of the problems is that it's there's no
for longest time, there was no real easy way of
doing this that didn't result in after you know, maybe
(02:12):
watching something for about forty minutes feeling like your eyeballs
were on fire. Um, it's a little better now, but
we'll we'll we'll get to that. First. We should kind
of talk about why we're able to perceive why or
why three D is important, and how we're able to
perceive it. It all goes down too, comes down to
binocular vision. You know, I have a pair of binoculars
(02:34):
and it doesn't look like I'm looking in three D. Right,
that doesn't know what it means. So we're talking about
using both eyes to see objects and then perceive depth
using both of your eyes, there's this, Um, what's It's
what's called parallax. It's where you're looking at objects and
(02:55):
because your eyes are not located in the exact same
spot on your head, go figure, Um, you can actually
your brain uses the difference in the angles that you're
perceiving to create the perception of depth. So if you
were to close one eye, or if you were to
lose an eye, uh, you would not be able to
perceive depth the same way someone with two eyes can.
(03:18):
You could still do it. Um, You mainly pick it
up from visual cues at that point, and your your
perception is not as accurate. Most humans have pretty accurate
depth perception to at least up to twenty feet or so.
But if you only had one eye, then you would
you know, some things that you might think, oh, well,
that's closer to me than that other object over there.
You might be surprised to find out hoops, I was
(03:39):
wrong because you didn't have this the second eye to
you know, to verify the information. So three D movies,
three D images, uh, they have to be able to
create this sense of of parallax in order for you
to to perceive them as you know, three dimensional as
opposed to two dimensional to give you that illusion of depth.
(04:00):
You know, like a view master for example, exactly takes
advantage of that because it shows you slightly different versions
of the same image, right, which creates the illusion of death.
And that's how those red and blue three D glasses work, right,
It's called anaglyph images um, which uses red in a
different color rights usually blue, but could be green or yeah,
(04:22):
it's usually it's usually red and blue. Those are the
classic three D glasses that a lot of us think
about when we when we hear the three D glasses thing. Um,
So you you have an image that you're showing on
a screen, and it's got to say, kind of like
a reddish overlay on top of it, and then you
have the identical image superimposed or are shown just slightly
(04:45):
off to the side. Looks a little weird if you're
not wearing the glasses, which is usually in a blue
or perhaps green overlay. And then you have glasses with
corresponding lenses. Now, the red lens happens to block the
red light. It absorbs it straight through. You don't see it.
You just see the blue and the blue it it
lets through the red light. And uh, your your eyes
(05:06):
see these two images separately, and your brain puts the
information together to create the three D image. So your
brain is doing all the work really uh. And once
they figured out, hey, if we just put these two
images side by side really close together and do different
colors and have each I perceive a different color, then
we can create the illusion of depth. Uh. Then that's
(05:29):
that's when the three D movie craze really took off. Yeah,
that's um, that's why if you take off the three
D glasses and look at the movie one of the
classic and a glyph style three D Uh, movies. You'll
notice that there's a red version of the image and
there's a blue version of the image, and it looks
like it's out of register. Like if you've seen a
color picture where the printing was just off and everything
(05:53):
seemed to be shifted in one direction and it's just
the red or just the yellow. Um, that means that
the printers didn't line up. The College's sort looks like
that because one of them will be just a little
to the left and one will be just a little
to the right, and you're gonna what's up with this? Well,
because they're slightly different, it allows your brain to make
up that there's a three D version of that. But
that's not how the newer version of three D works.
(06:15):
The newer version uses polarized lenses. That's right, now, That's
that's interesting because polarized lenses is all about the angle
of the light waves, right, true, But it achieves the
same effect because um, the images are slightly different in direction,
and by shifting the polarity and using the polarized glasses
it uh. It also fools your eyes and you don't
(06:35):
have to have red and blue version of the the
image on the right. They look more like, you know,
kind of dorky sunglasses. Um. In general, I guess you
could really if you wanted to make a very stylish pair,
but every pair I've ever seen looks kind of geeky. Well,
if you're gonna go watch Captain EO, it doesn't really
matter anyway, because you know, the glasses sort of went
with the movie anyhow. Don't be talking smack about my
(06:55):
Michael Jackson. Um. So yeah, So these polarized lenses in
the same sense that the red and blue only allow
the blue and red respectively. Uh, those light waves through
the polarized lenses are kind of the same way. They're
aligned so that the light uh, the the angles of
the light waves will only go through one side or
(07:16):
the other. And usually you have two projectors projecting at
the same time. They're projecting. Each one's projecting a different
of what's projecting the same image at the same time,
but in a different angle of light waves. So you're
getting both sets of images at the same time, but
only one eye receives each image and then your brain
does the work again. So it's based on a very
(07:38):
similar principle as the red and blue. Now I've heard
that people tend to experience less eye strain using this
method than they did when they use the red and
blue Um. Have you ever seen a three D movie
like a full three D movie with the red and
blue glasses like a full length feature film. I haven't
ever watched anything that long. The longest thing I have
(08:00):
in three D is Captain EO. Now that you mentioned, Okay,
well I have um as and this is one of
my childhood memories. So sit back and grab a coke.
I went to see Jaws in three D. Jaws three
in three D and the theater with my dad. Uh. Hi,
Dad and dad and I. Um we sat there and
(08:21):
watched this movie and by the end of it we
each had splitting headaches. And uh. Also, by the way,
just so you know, terrible movie. Uh. The only three
D effect that was really effective was when someone held
a syringe out towards the screen in the way that
absolutely no one does and then pushed the plunger. Um.
That was actually pretty effective. The shark stuff not so
(08:42):
much at any rate. But the terror didn't stop at
the edge of the screen. Oh my gosh, you knew
the tagline so um So anyway, anyway, it was it
was it definitely did cause eye straight Now I've warned
the polarized glasses uh for shure demonstrations, but nothing for
really any length of time. So I'm kind of curious
(09:04):
to see if if it really, if it lives up
to the hype. Um. And of course there's one other
kind of three D glasses we can talk about, the
active glasses. Oh, yes, those are the ones that you
actually saw at CES. Yeah, I saw a couple of
different instances of active glasses. Now, with these other versions
we're talking about, you usually, like I said, have two
projectors projecting the images at the same time. Um. Really,
(09:26):
the you know, that's the best way to show these images. Now,
with active glasses, you can have one projector showing or
one screen whatever showing these images. Um altogether. But the
difference is in this case, rather than the glasses just
being a piece of paper or plastic with the lenses
in front of your face, the glasses are doing all
the work instead the projectors. Right, The glasses have a
(09:48):
shutter where they turn on and off a polarization effect,
and they do it at such a fast speed that
you would never be able to to see it. You can't,
you know, consciously notice that they're shuttering on and off.
Um I mentioned that the vidio ones I saw shuttered
(10:09):
at a sixty hurts refresh rate for each eye. So
the screen, what it's doing is it's alternating the image
at the same rate that your glasses are shuttering on
and off, and you're getting these two different images, uh
at at a rate of speed that's so fast that
your brain essentially thinks it's the same it's happening at
the same time. You know from your perception it's all
(10:31):
happening at the same time, even though in reality it's
switching back and forth at this incredible rate of speed.
So the effect again is that your brain puts it
together and says, hey, there's depth there. It's not just
a flat surface. And the effect really is pretty interesting,
and that you know, you look at the screen and
it looks like you can actually see beyond just that
(10:52):
flat surface. Um it's it's there's some effect of the
you know, oh, it's coming out toward me. But that's
kind of minor in comparison to just this amazing depth
of vision that you get in these screens. And um
you might wonder like, well, okay, so we've got all
this technology. Where's the big deal? Well, Hollywood is really
(11:14):
kind of experimenting with this technology recently. There's been there's
been quite a few movies that have come out with
that feature this three D tech and UH, and not
only just movies, but also sporting events and concerts that
have have shown up either in theaters or on television
that use three D and UM. Part of that is
(11:36):
made possible by the use of digital video technology. I mean,
film really didn't give us the opportunity to use it
as much as digital does, so that just makes it,
you know, easier and cheaper for the studios to do. UM,
which is you know, probably a good thing. And UM
actually is a good transition in the next part of
(11:57):
what I was going to bring up, although I think
you may have answered my option because there's so much
three D at c e S. It was one of
the big themes of this year's show. UM, I was
going to ask you if you thought three D was
the next big living room phenomenon. But from what I understand,
most TVs that use three D technology use the anaglyph method,
(12:18):
use the red and blue glasses and if it's a
big eye stream and maybe it's that such. I mean,
people are not going to sit there and watch TV
for four hours a night and get splitting headaches. If
you if you wanted to use uh like the active glasses,
you would need a special display or special television um,
something that's called three D ready. And there are only
(12:38):
a few sets, relatively few sets out there that are
three D ready, either as computer monitors or television sets
like the like mis Mitsubishi laser View. I keep bringing
it up, but that's one of the ones that's three
D ready. Um. If you don't have the television that's
capable of doing that, then you're kind of stuck. You've
got a really expensive pair of glasses that don't really
(12:59):
work very well make you look like a big dork.
So um, hey congrats. But if you do have one
of those sets, then you can take advantage of this technology. Now,
of course, that means you also have to find content
that was optimized for that technology. It's not gonna just
work on anything. It's not like you could turn on
any television like, oh way, yeah, I get full House
(13:20):
in three D um. That's that might have been scarier
than the Jaws, but they're there. There's a lot of
three D stuff that's just starting to uh to creep in. Like,
for example, this year's Super Bowl, which was you know,
absolutely amazing. Um, we say as we record a few
days before that, but um, from what I from what
(13:43):
I understand, Pepsi and UH and Universal both took out
ads for the Super Bowl. Um, Pepsi for Sobey's Life
water and UH the movie Monsters and Aliens from Universal
both had three d ads and UH, NBC was so
excited about that. They're even advertising the ads that they're
(14:05):
coming up so you can actually get the glasses and
watch the three d ads in time. It's getting a
little too meta for me now. The Monsters Versus Aliens.
That's a movie that's coming out later in two thousand nine,
and actually in three it will be in three D. Yeah,
it's it's a computer graphics animated film and I saw
clips of that when I was at c E S.
(14:27):
That was one of the demos they did with the
three D technology and it looks pretty good. Um. There
are several other movies that are coming out either this
year or in coming years that are going to be
using three D. That includes James Cameron's Avatar, not to
be confused with the Nickelodeon Nickelodeon cartoon show which my
wife loves. Hello wife. Uh there's uh, there's a rumored
(14:51):
version of a Christmas Carol that maybe in three D.
It's going to use the same creepy technology as Polar Express.
I bet it was a Dickens to make. I'm sure
it was. Then there's a There's How to Train Your
Dragon Crude Awakening Alice in Wonderland, which is Tim Burton's
take on the classic tail. Um Johnny Depp will be
(15:13):
in that. I think he's the Mad Hatter if I'm
not mistaken. Um, he should be if he's not. The
next Trek film is supposed to be in three D Mastermind.
Also the one that we Are you and I will
be waiting for with bated breath. Yes, the remastered three
D version of Star Wars. I saw clips of that
while I was at c E S and it was
(15:33):
one of the two times I came close to crying.
Good tears are bad, Oh, just tears of joy to
see to see the Karelian starship being chased by that
star destroyer and it's looming at me right there. And
then R two D two is right in front of
my face. Oh man, okay, wait wait, I'm back. I'm back.
(15:57):
So that's okay. It'll it'll be twenty more years before
Orge Lucas decides on the final, final, final three D
versions and you know, with the refinements in it, and
then of course we have the video games that could
come out. Um that Navidia is really pushing for. Navidias,
the graphics processing card manufacturer, they have the g Force classes. Um,
(16:19):
they have a whole list of video games that are
already prepared to go to three D. I mean, everything
is there. You just have to have the right display,
the graphics chip and the glasses and then you're ready
to go. And among the games that they say are
optimized for this include Age of Empires three, Battlefield to
Call of Duty, for Civilization for for you, said Meyer
(16:42):
fans out there, Burnout Paradise, for you race card driving
fans out there, World of Warcraft. Um, if you're a
World of Warcraft fan, you're not listening to this. You're
playing World of Warcraft, Half Life two, Left for Dead,
roller Coaster Tycoon. Yeah, roller Coaster ty Coon. Okay, you
know you may be laughing at that, but if you
(17:05):
think about it. You know, that could be pretty pretty cool. Yeah.
You get to ride the rights and you get to
see your your your amusement park in three D. There's
some pretty nifty things out there. So yeah, it's it.
I think they're pushing for it to be the next
big thing. Now here's the question. Are people going to
adopt it? And specifically, are people going to be willing
(17:27):
to spend money on it, especially in an economic downturn?
Oh well, I imagine that this is the kind of
thing that would cost a lot of money, even not
in an economic downturn. Yeah, because this is not I mean,
this is using brand new technology that is different from
the technology would see in a standard LCD display right right.
The glasses alone can cost you like two D bucks. Yeah,
(17:49):
so that's that's before you even get a graphics card
or the display or television. So it makes the three
D super Bowl party kind of expensive. Yeah. I think
the laser view was around seven grand. Um, So yeah,
that's uh, that's an expensive toy. So it may be
beyond our reach for a few more years. Time will tell.
(18:09):
I mean, if enough early adopters do go out and
buy this stuff, that will drive the price down, and
then the rest of us can can enjoy stuff in
three D as well. And of course you can still
go to the movie theater and see a lot of
these films in three D. I mean, even movies that
weren't made completely in three D, you can sometimes see
parts of it in three D. So now it's at
(18:30):
least the film industry is really trying to push forward.
I think that's partly in response to UM piracy. Actually
when you think about it, because if you can't recreate
the experience at home, you have to go to the
theater to get the experience. But when you can recreate
the experience at home, then they're trumped again. Yeah, you
just pirate the heck out of it. Not that you
(18:52):
would or I would, but you know, those nefarious people
who are not our listeners because we're all well behaved,
we're we're good ones in this in this podcast. Yeah, well,
that's a good discussion. I do have one other thing
to add. Oh yes, that would be listener mail. That
(19:13):
was great. So uh so this listener mail comes from
Mike Linderer from Grayling, Michigan, and Mike wanted to give
us a few more UM suggestions. When we did our
Tech Toys episode talking about the sort of things that
keep us saying at work. He had a few more
to suggest, so I was just gonna run through some
of the ones that he listed. He listed Slacker, which
(19:34):
is another internet radio style site. You can talk a
little bit about that, right, Chris, you know, Oh yeah, yeah, Slacker. UM.
Slacker sort of like a cross between last FM and
UH and ANDORRA because you do get to select your
stations UM. And when I say it's across, it's sort
of tool wise the things you get to do with
(19:55):
the songs UM, as far as tagging them and things
like that. You have some more control, more so than
you might in Pandora UM. But you have more control
over the station like you would in last NFM. But
it's it's one of very many. There are lots and
lots of other stations out there, like Django is another example, UM,
and just various radio radio one. Mama. You know, there
(20:18):
are there are lots and lots of music sites out there,
and each one of them is a little bit different.
They offer something that you can't do with the others.
Fine Tune is an example of that because you actually
get to listen to a specific song, but you can
only put you know, three You create playlists and you
can only put three songs by a particular artist or
(20:38):
three songs by on a particular album on your playlist.
So there are still restrictions and things that might You
might listen to one for a couple of hours ago.
You know, this is driving me crazy. There restrictions on
the site. And then you go in another, um, well
this is cool. Oh, but there are these different restrictions,
so and maybe something it might end up turning onto
something like the whole Twitter Pounce plerk battle and you
(21:00):
see which one ends up surviving. True, hopefully they all will.
They all have something different that they bring in the party. Yep.
And then some others that Mike mentions are he mentions
line writer, which is, you know, it's kind of a
game and kind of an art project thing. Have you
ever seen this? I've seen it. I haven't used it myself.
It's uh, I've tried to use it, but I'm a terrible,
terrible artist, so I can't make the little guy ride
(21:21):
his line for very long. He always ends up wiping
out spectacularly and then falling for about you know, forty
forty five minutes. So um, but it's it's for the
people who are really talented. I mean there's some amazing
line writer of courses that people have created that are
really fun to watch. He also mentioned Homestyle Runner. Uh.
This is actually kind of cool because we're talking about
(21:42):
some some neighbors of ours in the way, the Brothers Chaps.
I mean they they're here, they're Atlanta locals. And actually
some of the people in the office know some of
the know the Brothers Chaps. Um I do not. I've
seen them perform live, but I don't know them. But yeah,
that's a great, great site, very amusing. Uh mentioned jib
Jab as well, also pretty funny site, very famous in
(22:04):
the elections exactly. Uh mentioned the Darwin Awards, which can
be entertaining. I do recommend that you cross reference the
Darwin Awards with Snopes dot com because not every story
on the Darwin Awards is actually true. And then the
last one he mentioned was the Daily Onion, which we
should mention is not necessarily safe for work, but very funny,
(22:30):
extremely funny. So thanks, Mike. We really appreciate your email,
and if you would like to write to us, you
can write to us at tech Stuff at how stuff
works dot com. We love hearing from you guys. If
you want to learn more about three D technology, we
have plenty of stuff up on the website that's at
how stuff works dot com. And we'll talk to you
again really soon for more on this and thousands of
(22:52):
other topics. Is it how stuff works dot com, brought
to you by the invented two thousand twelve cameras. It's ready,
are you
TechStuff News
Hosts And Creators
Oz Woloshyn
Karah Preiss
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