More Stereoscopy

Well Sunny ordered me a pair of Edimensional 3D glasses, so when they arrive, I’ll post a full review (maybe even a video review, I haven’t decided yet).

Today’s post is pretty much a reply to Kato’s comment (as he’s the only other blogger I know who’s actually interested in this stuff).

Kato said :

I think it would probably become standard if the game companies decided it was a "must-have" for gaming. The R&D guys over at nvidia and ATI could probably get good 3D stereo to be a reality in games in a few short years if there was a push to develop it.

Well, I did some fairly extensive research and it turns out Nvidia has been fairly serious about stereoscopic 3D since 2001.

Download the right driver (freely available on the internet) and Nvidia cards natively support cross-eyed, red/cyan, shutter glasses and purpose made 3D monitors. (those are the ones that have the screen covered in teeny-weeny lenses that project the different angles to each eye).

Plus, shutter-glasses technology has come a long way. 99.9% of the reviews I read have said that new shutter glasses can produce a flicker-free image at 75hz. While results are obviously better the higher the refresh rates, response times and synchronization have improved to where really high refresh rates aren’t necessary.

The reasons I think 3D stereoscopy hasn’t become standard are threefold:

1) The first generation of shutter-glasses simply weren’t that good. Many used mechanical shutters, and while you got a 3D effect, they resulted in headaches, a flickery picture and looked plain goofy.

Of course, no one ever releases new technology and says “Ok, this is pretty crappy, but we’ll be able to do better soon”. People who bought them decided that they either didn’t work, or were just a novelty. It’s the equivalent of playing a home-brew Commodore 64 game in the 80’s, and then refusing to play ‘Dead Rising’ because you ‘tried video games and didn’t like them’.

Like I said in my original post, Virtual Reality would be amazing today, but when it first came out to play a VR game you needed to wear a 50lb headset, the controls were incredibly sluggish and the games just weren’t that much fun. Had it come out a little later, chances are we’d be wearing trackable VR head-mounted displays instead of monitors for gaming.

2) People aren’t aware of the technology, it’s capabilities or they believe it’s prohibitively expensive.

Say ‘Shutter glasses’ to most people and they’ll have no idea what you’re talking about. Plus, when I wrote my original post, I assumed that Shutter Glasses were a lot less sophisticated than they are, and would cost a couple hundred bucks. Add to that the fact that most gamers believe you can only play certain games with them, and it’s no wonder they’re considered a novelty item.

In reality, you can get a pair for about $70 (or as low as $50 if you have a CRT monitor), and they work with the vast majority of games.

Long story short, people think they’ll be paying $250 bucks to play a handful of 3D games that just won’t be that good. What’s the motivation there?

3) Video card company’s business model doesn’t really allow for ‘new’ things.

Today, only Nvidia cards natively support Stereoscopy. Most others don’t, and are unlikely to do so in the near future.

As I’ve said, right now very few people use shutter glasses or are even aware of them. Because of that, there’s no real demand for support, which starts a vicious circle. People won’t buy them because of the lack of support, and card manufacturers won’t support them because of the lack of demand.

Even though they’ve been around for over a decade, PC shutter-based stereoscopy is still in its infancy, despite the fact that I don’t know of a single gamer who wouldn’t want to play their games in true 3D. In my opinion, it’s just a matter of ‘spreading the word’ and creating a demand for this technology.