[DIY] "Passive Projection , How To" updated + imag

Tutorials on how to create your own rigs, pics, movies, and everything that has to do with S-3D at home!
Jahun
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[DIY] "Passive Projection , How To" updated + imag

Post by Jahun »

Yes, I am aiming for the record on "times edited" here :)


Since I just finished my passive setup at last, here an overview that hopefully may help someone and promote the use of Stereo 3D. This is an attempt to sort of giveback for all the good advices people have given me. Maybe someone will have good use for the info herein.




Passive 3D:

- Necessary parts

-Projectors
-Silverscreen
-Filters
-Frame
-Cables

- Software

-Nvidia Stereo driver
-Nhancer
-Dragontools


- Applications

-Games
-Movies

- Absolute must reads

-Advisol page by Yitzhak Weissman

- My pc



Let's start with the necessary parts:

Projectors

There is quite some info on the net about projectors. the most blatant error quite commonly seen is that all LCD's won't work. This is quite wrong. Even though LCD is pre-polarized, usually this is in a way that doesn't inhibit further polarization in 2 distinct angles for the projectors. Just make sure to check it by using 2 cheap polarizers (see shops). Furthermore, special filters (SIlverFabric.com) can be applied to LCD's that use the internal polarization in order to reach very high throughputs (normal filters cut intensity to ~40%). Thise filters are expensive though, and will probably not decrease percepted crosstalk much.

Make sure you use the exact same projectors. It will look better for a whole range of reasons. (Color, signal delay, intensity etc) Wide screen projectors are preferable imho, for stereo 3D 2 images get placed on top of eachother and displaced in the horizontal plane. Widescreen results in less % of problems at edges. Hard to explain, trust me on this? :) Hmm wait, a way to see it is, take a 10 pixel high and 2000 pixel wide projector (I know they don't exist ofcourse), S-3D would work on this, no problem. Other way around, a 10 pixel wide and 2000 pixel high projector would give crappy S-3D results.

I used a Hitachi PJ-TX 100 and the newer but highly similar Hitachi PJ-TX 300. 16:9 widescreen, 1280-720 pixels native, lense shift, super short throw range.

Mounting issues depend on the specific projectors used. If you have "lense shift" on the projector, life becomes a whole lot easier. There is no need for tilting the projector etc anymore to make both projectors project at the same spot. Lense shift will just, errrr... shift the lense in the beam which will move the projected image nicely without any keystoning. Works perfect and takes away alignment issue. So I managed to get away with this very cheap and easy solution:

Image

Getting rid of the heat of the projectors was an issue for me, since my 3D setup is in the attic. (we are renting the place for just a few years btw, so I don't care about looks and style etc, I may do it nicer later)

But there was a super solution just 2 meters away, the built in air refreshing system usually built in newer houses. It had one not connected inlet, so I just took a flexible hose, a plastic corner end, and voila, all the heat my projectors manage to output, gets sucked away right at their exhaust (on the side, not visible) :) Perfect :)

Image


Silverscreen

I wrote a bit about my experience with Silverscreen samples earlier, a short summary:

Silverfabric, Harkness Hall and Stewart all produce good screens. A very crude estimate of prices is: Harkness is 2x more expensive than Silverfabric and Stewart is 2x more expensive than Harkness. (yes I asked for prices). I personally think Harkness and Stwart are highly similar products, both in materials used (hard to keep them apart) and in optical properties. In games and I suspect movies as well, the crosstalk or "ghosting" from all screens will be small to unnoticable. However, Stewart and Harkness are the best. My main problem with those 2 are the price, and the type of material. It if quite prone to for instance denting.

However, stupid me, managed to drop my Silverfabric screen, and ow yes, that left quite an amount of marks. (imagine me cursing for quite a while). Stretching it quite tightly got rid of all of them though, and I'd think that perhaps this will also be the case for the Harkness and Stewart..

My main issue with the Silverfabric is the structure or relief of the material. It is not really noticable in games or busy backgrounds, but very noticable in similar color areas. I will never watch a movie on this screen because of this, it sparkles way too much. The Harkness and Stewart are waaaay more silky smooth.

Example of SilverFabric (left) vs Harkness (right), you can see the difference in smoothness, and it does show in even color areas, but especially in games, it doesn't disturb me at all. And I must say now, that movies are not as bad on it as I thought, it does show a bit.. but again, only on even color areas.

Image

I paid ~300 euro for my Silverfabric, it will do for quite a while. But my eye will be set on a Harkness, and I will more thoroughly test the material soon. If you got the money to spare, get the Harkness imho. Otherwise, SilverFabric will do fine also!

Ow and btw, here a picture of the backsides of those screen samples. You can maybe see that the SilverFabric is really like fabric, and the Harkness is more of a smooth stretchy material..

Image

Filters

Now, getting correct filters is quite a hassle. I tried photocamera filters, ordered from de-Wijs.nl, Berezin.com and from Polarization.com. The photocamera filter was superior, the polarization.com filters were extremely cheap and definately sufficient, from de-wijs.nl were quite bad and the ones from Berezin never arrived :| After more than a month... odd, since the company is often quoted. I e-mailed them 4 times now.

The filters I got were cheap. Like 30 dollar for 2 A4 sized sheets. And they are perfect with extinction factors in the thousands. (say 3000:1, so when 2 are crossed only 0.3 promille is transmitted.) If you want fancy glass ones with rings etc around them.. expect to pay 100's of $'s. The thing to remember though, is that the silverscreen sucks big time in polarization respect. It will be like 100:1 extinction factor, so there is only so much you can do with filters. Yitzhak Weissman has a great few articles on this, see my must reads part.

Unless you want the high throughput filters from Silverfabric, I'd go for the ones polarization.com offers with the 3 mil backing or so.

Ow and by the way, linear polarized is fine. The whole 3d effect is not gone if you slightly turn your head and who games with his head tilted all the time anyway. Circular is also worse on the extinction ratio side, and you can't tilt your head that much more with those anyway.

Glasses wise I only tested the "Theme Park style", since the fancier ones never arrived from Berezin. They work fine, albeit not so fancy looking as the ones IZ3D is going to ship soon I hope. :)

Image

Mounting the polarizers seemed troublesome but I stick with my dirty quick solution of the first day. Those are pvc pipe wall mounts it is in. I just cut the polarizers into shape, and put the in the mounts and put them on the hardwood of the projectormount. Bit of rotating and voila.. works fine. :)

Image


Frame

Mounting the screen will need a frame. If you won't move it, I'd stretch and fix it onto a board (maybe strengthen the edges of the material with a stitched on black cloth). I needed it mobile so I ordered custom aluminium profiles and materials from Rexroth / Bosch (Rimas.nl is the supplier in the Netherlands). It cost me around 250 euro's but it is a very nice, light and pro looking frame now. I think I'll be able to demount it in minutes if 1 person helps.

Image

Shaky cam closer up view of my custom ultralight frame :)
And yes it is not against the wall, also because I forgot to check if my projectors could manage to project so small, the couldn't so I had to move the frame closer by. Ops :)

Image

(Ok the attic is a mess, I just spend a full day stereo gaming with my brother there.. :))

Then again, if it doesn't need to be mobile, stretch it onto a triplex plate or so and look for instructions on how to properly stretch material on a frame.


Cables

Another one of those things I was very unsure about. In the end, I had 1 supercheapo DVI to HDMI cable for 13 euro's, and a quite expensive ProfiGold one for 110 euro's. Both 10 meters long. I was afraid of the so called digital noise, and bad pixel throughput on the cheap one. But they both give a perfect image! (another 95 euro's wasted I guess)

(check cable differences in the first projectors image at beginning of post)

In the future, I won't be so hasty with "pro" cables

Also, my pc is not on the attic, it is one floor below. To do that I use bluetooth long distance mouse and keyboard, a hole in the floor for the surround sound wires and these 10 meter DVI cables.

Software

Not yet written, but there is alot of info floating around. Take some time to find it all..

Applications

Ok, passive projection is amazing. I had some doubts about ghosting etc etc.. but this setup works perfectly. Ghosting is really not an issue at all, and assuming you did your homework on "correct stereo viewing" no eye strain etc at all. I must admit though, that I can't game as long in stereo 3d as in normal 2d. I am not sure what the reason is, but it may just be the immersiveness. I am not sure if the human brain is supposed to cope with nonstop warfare, zombies, aliens, shelling etc. :) So I can't do it for 8 hours straight :) 4 - 6 hours or so is not really a problem for me..

Also, your brain may pick up the "problem" that even though the 3D is quite good, your are always, focussing (lenses of your eyes) on the screen, whether the eyes are rotated inward or straight. This is a bit unnatural I guess to them (I suppose a brain usually links rotation of the eye to more or less depth..) but well, nevermind all this. It is awesome.

So don't spend you very last dime on S-3D, but if you want a super gaming experience, this is it.

Games I tried and work perfect (copied from best games thread):

AOE3: just perfect 3D, no problems anywhere. For some reason, this one gets the strongest response from on-lookers. "It looks like playing with clay figures!"

Half Life 2 Episode 1: Ow man, real great 3D here. No HUD, no crosshair (not even the Nvidia one, doesn't work at correct depth for me). However, this is no sniping game anyway. Rock solid! I just aim with the tracer bullets. (ps: someone should mod this game, so that more guns use the bazooka's laser to aim. Would work like a charm.. and the idea applies to more games)

Call of Duty 2: Great 3D, nice snow effects etc too when enabling DX 9. Nvidia crosshair not spot on, but workable. Great title! (no HUD for me again btw)

Far Cry: HUD, crosshair etc all work flawless here, as if it was made for S-3D. What can I say.. most perfect FPS I played with S-3D.. but the other 2 are close

Oblivion: Cool 3d, but still water is either pink or 1995 style and the sky is rendered at the wrong depth (so never look up, looks weird :) ). Still, very cool gaming!


In these games I am changing convergence so it matches my real world setup. So I converge a point in the scene like 4 meters away. Then decrease seperation to something very small and increase convergence somewhat more (the it deviates from real world, but gives more out of screen effect). This is imho the best, when playing on a widescreen. It matches the real world thing the most and gives best 3D "fill".


Absolute must reads

For now just this one, if you want to understand passive projection better. (the numbers and details, very good read!)

http://www.advisol.co.il/Technical%20memos.html


My pc

I am running all games (no movies tried yet) smoothly with quite some options on on a:

Intel Core 2 Quad 6700 (but often single core mode on in Nhancer program)
7950 GT Nvidia card
Nvidia 94.something drivers?

I hope somebody finds a use for all this!
Last edited by Jahun on Fri Sep 28, 2007 2:46 pm, edited 12 times in total.
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Post by Freke1 »

Great stuff :D
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Post by Likay »

Using a polarized rig the silverscreen is the most crucial part regarding ghost rejection. However ghost rejection is actually not a crucial part either. After you said you had a ghost rejection of about 1:80 i made some measurements myself and the ghost rejection in my rig is not that good though. However it doesn't seem to matter somehow. At most there could be some sharp lights in games that may cause ghosting but that's about all.
I also have to correct myself regarding the cheap camerapolarizers i use at first. I attached them directly to the projector lenses and as told before managed to fry one of them. (The other one is sligthly damaged). When one of those spar-filters gave up on me i put that camerafilter to the projector and ran again. But now the distance from the lense was about 8 cm's instead of 1 cm. I could use the filter all the way until the spar-filter after quite some turns arrived. Maybe 50 hours of projection time. Strangely though: The temperature of the filter never rised to more than a maximium of 50? when attached directly to the lense so i guess that they are quite temperature sensitive. This should at least be good news to you Jahun :)

Now: I've ordered som QW-retarding foil and polarization foil at polarization.com cause i'm curious of making some own experiments regarding filters. When using ordinary polarizers for lcd's you will have quite an amount of light loss since they're already polarized too. (maybe 35% output instead of 45% using DLP's). Also different wavelengths will "turn" their polarization different much when passing through the filter causing a slight difference in the color. This is only noticeble by a direct comparison. Since the right eye only see the right eye image and vice versa, the eyes quickly adapts and practically there will be no fysically experienced difference.
I made some tests on my lcd-projectors regarding polarization/colors and found out some interesting things: The colors are not aligned at the same polarisation.
The red and blue are aligned the same and if assumed they're alligned to 0? then the green color is aligned at 90? (at least with Hitachi CP-X260). Is it the same with yours? I used paint to make a picture with one red (255,0,0) one green (0,255,0) and one blue (0,0,255) square using own definitions to get clean colors. I believe the green one turned out to be more kinda yellow though.. After that i put a polarisation foil in front of the beamer and checked what happened with colors when i turned the foil.
(Regarding colors I assume projectors works likes crt-screens with the base colors red/green/blue to make all possible color-combinations).
Silverfabric obviously solved this problem cause their spar-filters are outstanding with their 75% of light throughput. And i'm not able to see any difference in color reproduction either. It would be fun if i could reach some results through experiments though. It doesn't look that easy as i first thought but now the foil arrived and i'm still curious. :lol:

ps: Dropping the silverscreen material seemes to be common practice here! :oops: Myself i was to eager to get things going and made a temporary settlement for the silverscreen... To all others: DON'T DO THAT!!! I had my screen for quite some time now but the marks on it won't go away. :(. When make it: Make it right directly!

No matter what: Had some hazzles before getting it to work properly and the expenses on the rig kinda rushed away a bit. But now it's x-mas every day! . Having friends at home we no longer rent and watch movies. We all play, and in 3D! :D . The effect with 3D with a big screen and in games is awesome!
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Post by sharky »

this is what i call "GOOD JOB SOLDIER!" (americas army.. :lol: )

moved it to the DIY section! finally someone creating tutorials! love that.. :D
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Post by Lucky »

How did you mount your projectors? Any chance for pictures? Is it only the top projector that needs to swivel up and down?
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Post by Likay »

Still in progress of building a rack for the monitors. The best (i think) is if one of the projectors is fixed within the rack and the other one's adjustable. Then if the whole rack itself is adjustable it's only a big plus! The closer the projector lenses are to each other the better result you'll have. For now i use keystone correction (unfortunately digital) on the projectors to adjust "dept varieties" that makes things on the screen looking like on different depts. The most ideal is to not using any keystone correction at all but it requires that the beamers are aligned exactly right in front of the screen and that (theoretically) the lenses are at the same place. Mounting the projectors further from the screen also decreases this phenomena. Remember: the filter holders might also have to be adjustable though. I'm fitting mine in the same cabinett that holds the projectors since the filters cannot be mounted on the beamers directly.

Cheers
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Post by Jahun »

Ah hey I was on vacation..
I replied a bit in your thread too, but some more info on the mounting here..

I should be able to get some pictures and find a hosting space somewhere..

But the idea is really simple since my projectors (Hitachi PJ-TX 100 and the newer but similar 300) have lense shift. That is really really really handy afaik.

Without lense shift, you must tilt the projectors to get them to project at the same exact spot, that unfortunately gives keystone effect, where for instance the image is broader at the bottom, sort of like a trapezoide. With lense shift, you just errr shift :) the projection lense in the beam. This gives a shift in the projected image without the keystone effect.

So in effect, I just put my projectors sort of on top of eachother, without thinking much about aligning really, then I made 1 projector correct on the screen and just lense shifted the other slightly untill it was at exactly the same spot. (ok it is not EXACT, but very very close and by far enough for stereo viewing, I think with some tweaking the Stereobright option will work also with this.. but that is another story).

Ok, the only thing I had to do is put the prjectors somewhere. I took a plate of hardwood, cut it into 2 nice pieces, picked up some cheapo wall brackets, usually for making easy bookshelves and it was done in 15 minutes.

I admit, all this is highly dependent on the lense shifts.. without those, you'll want better control over projector tilts etc. I knw mine had the option, but never figured it was this cool.



ps: one major mistake I made in projectorplacement, is not checking if the projected image is too big (it is) :) So my silver screen is 50 cm in front of the wall... otherwise the screen is too small :P


I'll make some pics now... will be easier :)
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Post by sharky »

WOW! THIS is what i call a good thred! great job!

i like your colling system..... :)
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Post by Tril »

Jahun, what projectors are you using?
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Post by Jahun »

Doh did I forget to add that?

It is a Hitachi PJ-TX 100 and the newer but highly similar Hitachi PJ-TX 300

16:9 widescreen, 1280-720 pixels native, lense shift, super short throw range.

Added this into the above
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Post by Likay »

Jahun wrote: "I must admit though, that I can't game as long in stereo 3d as in normal 2d."

This probably depends on too much separation. Try to lower it a bit. Myself i also want to play with higher separation cause of the greater 3d-effect. Lowering it will reduce the 3d (it'l be more like the real world) and your eyes will stop hurts. :)

You've done quite more with your system than i have lol. I like it quite a lot!

Cheers
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Post by sharky »

for the best effect you have to put convergence to the max, and then increase separation until the images are NOT MORE than 1.5 Inces away! if you do it taht way you will have the part popping out at more or less 1.5 inches away, then a point where the two images cross each other and after that the rest wich goes into the screen wich can also have a very big separation.

it is importatn the the part wich comes out of the screen is not separated more than 1.5 inches even on a giant screen becuse also if screensize increases the distance between your eyes stays the same.

try and let us know.. :)
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Post by Jahun »

Thanks guys :) And it was also help from here that made it possible to get it to work! yay


Actually I usually play with extremely little seperation. Like just 1 notch. And then increase convergence alot. So alot of the scene is in front of the screen... that may be the problem perhaps, since for instance the gun is quite seperated. Like, I would get sort of tired too IRL, if I would have to hold a gun close to my face all day :)

First I played with convergence on say the gun and then increase seperation, so most of the scene is behind the screen but I prefer the high convergence option by far.

But it is not really eye strain... at least it doesn't feel like that. May just as wel be lack of nutrition really. My gf tells me a person needs fluids and food once in a while :)

Don't know what you mean Sharky, I definately want for instance my gun, close to me, seperated more than 1.5 inches, otherwise the 3d will be minimal on my 2 meter wide screen.. If you mean far away seperation less than say 1.5 inch, yes perhaps.. but I can handle a bit more than that. I guess my eyes don't mind being pointed outward a little. But again, I don't play like that anymore. And with high convergence things seperate alot close to you, but that is no issue, eyes can rotate inward no problem..

I don't mind 4-6 hours of non stop gameplay though, since it is so immersive, I need a break :) I guess I am getting old! :P
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Post by sharky »

hi Jahun! im sorry my english is not that good, and it isn't easy to explain too...

what i said, gives you A LOT of popping out things. even IMAX, wich has things coming up to 3'' to your face uses the same settings. the maximal separation for the popping out things has to be 1.5/2 '' actually it depends from the eye distance of every person.

bye the way, i made a little picture to explain what i mean. (below)

the vertical red line is the silverscreen or whatever you use
the two violet lines are the "lightbeams" wich hit your eyes.
the two red dots are your eyes.. so, if you set the separation to that point then you can play around with the convergence. in the case of this image you would have the WHOLE gun outside of the screen, and maybe if a bad guy is near you then you have his fun into your face and the other guy flying around in your room...the image show rappresents the absolute maximum setting of stereo because in this case you already would have the elft eye seeing a part wich the right eye don't see. bye the way, if you play aroudn with that you could get a impressive image... i think that the crossing line should be aroun 1/4 of the distance between you and the screen at the sceens side. by the way, those settins are the ones used by imax too because they rappresent the natural life and without those settings you are not able to see objects CLEAR near you. the absolute best setting for you is if you measure your eye distance and use that as front distance of the gun.that willl (theorically) let you have things touching your nose. in imax cinemas it is not possible because there are childrens too.. so they ust keep the front separatin low else childrens would not see anything, but at the moment childrens have MUCH better effect in imax cinemas then adult ones. i hope that it was helpful...



Image

bye

sharky
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Post by Likay »

"May just as wel be lack of nutrition really. My gf tells me a person needs fluids and food once in a while :)"

No poop? :lol:

Myself i must attend to work sometimes and i try to eat at the breaks! More time for other things! :P

I don't know if you noticed but the Nvidia-driver has a setting for monitor size. I set mine to 40" to better match mine. It gives better oppurtunities to fine adjust the separation.

Cheers!
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Post by Jahun »

Hmm Sharky I still don't get what you are saying...

"the absolute best setting for you is if you measure your eye distance and use that as front distance of the gun.that willl (theorically) let you have things touching your nose"

My eye distance is not that big, if I would use that the 3D effect won't be that huge, remember I am gaming on a 2 meters wide screen, that matters alot. I assume a Imax screen has enormous shifts, many times the eye seperation (not talking about parallel distance viewing ofcourse).

If you would use your eye distance, your eyes would cross exactly halfway between your eyes and the screen I guess. So hardly your nose.. the 3d effect would be minimal, well unless you are 10 cm from your screen :p

Btw, I can't focus on my nose, actually it is 2x further than that. There is quite some theory on stereovision (whether using intricate machines like us, or just your own eyes IRL) and it is not super easy.
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Post by sharky »

ok maybe i expressed myself bad... i try it again... let me fix 3 points inside the game... point A: deep inside the game , point B: where lefteye image and righteye image cross each other.. the point where no separation at all exists. point C: the nearest point inside the game.. usually the back of the gun.

ok in point A you can have aLOT of separation.. its not a problem ebcause it is far away, and you get that point by crossing your eyes a littel bit...

point B has no separation

point C should have no more than Eye distance...

now what you say is correct, if you have a low convergence setting.. if you have a higher convergence setting you can have things outside even without having a high separation at point C.

bye

sharky
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Post by Jahun »

:|


Sharky, what you are saying is exactly the wrong way around..

Point A, far into the game should be your eye distance! Your eyesmust look parallel into the distance and thus eye distance wide seperation for long distance viewing.

Point B is the crosspoint.

Point C is the closest, for this your eyes must cross quite alot indeed. But this crossing is for a close by point (as back of gun etc).


Yours is the wrong way around.. (now your last post makes sense).. sorry to say this (I highly applaud your DIY posts) but do you have your L and R the wrong way around?
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Post by sharky »

at the moment i feel a bit confused.... at one side mine is totally logic for me and i saw it at the cinema, at the other side yours is totally logic too... but the two things cant live toghether..

by the way, whats up with your tutorial?! it was one of the best and now it is gone.... are you going to repost it in the future?
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Jamie Hyneman: "It's really cool, but really unusual."

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Post by Jahun »

Don't be confused, look at it this way:

If point A, far in the game, would have a seperation bigger than your eye seperation, your eyes would have to rotate outward, this is completely non standard and for some would hurt quite soon. Also, this would not be similar to any real life situation (at least any I have been into :P)

On the other hand, if you make the seperation eye distance, then your eyes would look parralel into the far distance, as they would in real life.

Closeby though, your eyes have extremely shifted images. Hold your finger in front of your nose with your tft say 30 cm behind it. If you look with your right eye to your finger, and beyond it to the monitor, it would for instance be located on the left side of the monitor, now use your left eye. In this case your finger is in front of the right side of the monitor. This is what the seperation would need to be, to make something feel very closeby, huge seperation.


Concerning the tutorial, I have it saved and will repost it pretty soon... sorry bout that.
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Post by sharky »

ok you convinced me.. but now i don't understand why at the 4d cinema the separation was very low in a popping out part.. boh.. nerver mind.. not important.. by the way, could you please explain why you removed it, maybe if it is a problem for you then not with to many details.. dunno have kind a feeling that it is related to our convergence discusison.

ehm i don'T want to go into your private life, so don't misunderstand this post.. my english isn't the best so its easy to misunderstand what i say.
but even if i don't have a projector setup, i really would like to have your topic on the forum because its one of the best in here...

bye

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Post by Jahun »

*bump* to notify that the guide is back up. Tril saved it, so I could repost.
(I lost the saved post..)

Thx Tril
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Post by Likay »

Nice to have it back! One of the best! :D

cheers
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Post by sharky »

yeahhhhhhh great! this is a good one! i post ist as sticky.. :D
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Post by KrisRoberts »

I want to do a project like this. But it seems like the driver support issues would force me to use old graphics cards. Is there really no option for contemporary cards (9800gx2) that will work with a passive stereo projection system? I would totally be willing to pay for drivers that would let me use my own rig.
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Post by LukePC1 »

I think Iz3D is going to release a new driver, which supports two output formats. They call it 'HMD' or dual output, this would be the driver you'd need. However it won't be for free and it's not released jet.

The pros are, you can use every video card and don't have to turn out eyecandy.
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Post by nubie »

I did this once with a couple LCD projectors, one mirrored to flip its inherent polarization. I used a Da-Lite silver matte screen, they are surprisingly affordable, here is a 100" diagonal 4:3 for $63

http://www.provantage.com/da-lite-90618~7DALI094.htm

I don't remember where I got mine, but I think it cost under $150 for a bigger square screen, possibly 100" square.

If you search around you can find direct-from-factory sellers that offer the matte in these older free-standing mounts for a very good price. http://www.google.com/products?q=dalite ... t&start=20

You can leave them in the tripod, or drill out the rivet and use them on a wall.
CAVE, see what all the fuss is about:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6NN5JKlIi0
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Post by Tril »

I ordered a polarized screen at http://www.buydalitescreens.com
I got the Deluxe Model B, 43" x 57", Silver Matte.

My second projector broke down while the screen was getting shipped to me so I never tested it with polarized glasses. I did test a sample of the material before buying the whole screen. If you send an email to Da-Lite asking for a sample of a material, they'll send you one for free. Their silver vision and silver matte materials keep the polarization.

The second projector was out of warranty so I gave up on the dual projector stereo rig and I have a spare bulb for the working projector. I'm now using the remaining projector with the Da-Lite screen to play on the Xbox 360.

Before ordering the screens, I did some tests by projecting on the wall and on samples. I was never able to perfectly line up my two projectors pictures. I made a stand with adjustable tilt and I used it to try to line up the two projectors pictures. The problem was the keystone effect because the projectors were not projecting from the same height. It's probably best to do as Jahun and get projectors that have lens shift. You won't have the keystoning problem that way but the projectors might be more expensive as it's something usually found on the higher end models.
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Post by nubie »

I wear eyeglasses, and they can distort your vision like out of adjustment keystone will, so I can handle a bit of misalignment between my eyes.

You for sure need real keystone (fresnel lens) adjustment, that is what I had on my projectors. That software keystone is very bad for picture quality.

Ouch, I bought a Versatol, they are quite a bit cheaper, especially in the square formats. I looked on ebay and the used Silver screens were pretty bad looking, and the material alone was pretty expensive, so I did as you and bought new :).

Now I am looking at these rear projection DLP Mitsubishi screens with shutterglasses support, pretty nice for ~$2000 you can get a 57" model: http://www.google.com/products?q=WD-578 ... &scoring=p

I don't like flicker, but they claim it is 60hz per eye, it might do the trick.
CAVE, see what all the fuss is about:

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Post by Tril »

The newer 60" model is even cheaper. $1,799 MSRP.
http://www.google.com/products?q=WD-607 ... &scoring=p
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Post by nubie »

Oh man you are so right, that is pretty darn cheap for a 60" DLP, and you don't have to stash a projector anywhere, or worry about people blocking the light from it, or purchase a silver screen.

If only I could test one of these out to see if I am bothered by the refresh rate. I wonder what the bulb life and cost is in these?

Edit: Amazon.com looks cheaper by $70, they don't charge $250 for shipping, it is free. (I don't know about tax)
http://www.amazon.com/Mitsubishi-WD-607 ... B00166BNFS

Of course the question becomes what sort of shutterglasses solution you would need, and how they would connect.
CAVE, see what all the fuss is about:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6NN5JKlIi0
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Post by StereoGaming4Me »

So let me get this right.. with a passive pojection rig you have little to zero ghosting and the screen size is big enough that you literally feel right inside the games 3D environment? The z800 just lets you see a 3D window view, shutterglasses and the iz3d seem to have some ghosting issues. The iz3d seems to run really hot as well while turned on. The samsung 50 HDTV I got has stereo and a port for IR glasses, but I haven't had more luck then being able to see google maps in 3D.

So.. there is *NO* ghosting at all with a passive projection rig? If that's what they used at Universal Studios at the Shrek show then that 3D should be flying into your face or all around you since that little pixie zoomed into the center of the seating at the end, and giving the appearance it crashed into the exit sign at the left of the seating.
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Post by Likay »

You can check the special "Ghosting" thread where i posted images of my polarized rig. The ghosting rejection seems to be somewhere in between 85-90% according to the ghosting scale on that first testpicture. See Here. It need to be a very high contrast before ghosting even is noticed but the crosstalklevel never gets disturbing.

Nowadays when i game i have totally darkness in the room because the screen itself becomes (more or less) invisible. It's just me and the gameworld in an almost natural size environment. Nothing really beats that!

cheers
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Harkness

Post by epsen83 »

Doeas anybody know where to get a hold of a harkness svreen on the net. Ive only comed across sellers who sell to other companys.
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Post by smoothy »

Hello Guys,

It's great that I stumbled upon this thread

I don't know if you have been following my other thread on here. But I am currently building a curved screen passive setup. I hope you could help me.

I have got in touch with a company that can build me the curved screen on a custom made metal framing. The total cost is £750 including delivery from Da-lite. I am based in the UK and that's an incredible price. The screen is 3 feet tall and about 4.5-5 feet wide. You sit in the middle and the screen curves right around you in an arch covering your full field of view. Your peripheral vision is covered all the way around on the horizontal. Now the idea is I am after doing a passive setup, so I am going to be using two projectors. For cost what would be the best projectors to use? DLP or LCD? I don't want any ghosting and I want objects to fly out of the screen and go into the screen creating amazing depth. I am on a budget, originally I wanted the whole setup including projectors to only cost me £1000. I now see that's not possible. I was looking at 1024x768 DLP beamers, As for such a screen I need a lot of vertical resolution. I seen I can get two 1024x768 beamers for about £920 total. But 1080p would be a much more combined vertical resolution but then far more costly unless I use a 1080p DLP beamer which I can get for £950 and just do active stereo. Then I heard that for a rear projection which is what I need to do for my setup as I cannot have any shadows on screen as I will be sitting about 1.2 - 1.5 meter from the screen, and also brightness from the rear is better on the eyes. Someone said you cannot do active stereo for this kind of setup as the screen isn't a silver screen and the company said it can't be a silver screen for this kind of setup. I don't know what he meant by that. But anyway as I have given you some idea of my sort of setup that I want to build I hope you could help me out. I need projectors that have been tried and tested for stereo 3d for the best performance while being not too expensive. I want this setup to be used with the new Nvidia drivers that are being worked on for their new shutter glasses, I heard these drivers will also being compatible with passive 3d setups using circular polarized glassed like they do now, but they will only be vista only. Is this true? I read in some recent interview with some guyf from Nvidia that they believe with these new drivers active stereo is better than passive stereo, they said that passive stereo is something that may never be very good or at least not for many more years. I hope you can help me guys

Many thanks in advance
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Post by Likay »

I'm no expert but here's some things to check:
Do the projectors work well with curved screen or is there projectors which are tuneable for these kind of screens? (the image will be distorted and you'll also have focusproblems depending on how curved it is)
A passive projection rig ghosts but the phenomena is very light. Rigs with shutterglasses will also ghost independing on what monitorsolution you have because the shutters themselves are not perfectly ghostingfree either. Circular polarization is somewhat said to be better than linear but i disagree on that. I have tried both and circular ghosts a slight bit more and you're not able to turn your head around so much either before ghosting gets unbearable. When you have a stereosetup with shutters/polarized glasses or whatever you're still forced to have your head in a somewhat fixed horisontal position, otherwise the image will not be correct (the image is originally rendered from two views side-by-side, not up and down. :) ).
If you want to know how much a passive rig ghosts (i'm using silverfabric screen, linear filters and lcd-projectors) you can check the link here: http://www.mtbs3d.com/phpBB/viewtopic.p ... c&start=20

Biggest advantages with passive setups is the extra light you get. A dlp/shutter solution (less ghosting yes) is not bad either but you'll of course loose quite an amount of light.

Are you sure they said passive is not good? :lol: Or has it something to do with unwillingness making driversolutions for other setups than their shutterglasses? Personally i've never seen anything better than this so far. Of course it can change in the future.

ps: I can get back with pictures showing how polarization is preserved from sides and angles but that has to be a later matter. I'm in a rush right now but i'll get back with these kind of info or others if you like.

cheers
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Post by smoothy »

Hi Likay,

Many thanks for your great response, lot's of useful information there.

These are some snippets from an interview where I read about the Nvidia guy talking of active being better than passive found here http://www.gamecyte.com/is-your-gaming- ... oscopic-3d

Here's a small cut and paste below

GameCyte: Are there any plans for a polarization solution instead, or is it definitely going to be active shutter all the way?

AF: Right now we truly believe that our solution – the active shutter glasses — provide the best quality for an end-user. The technology that exists for passive polarized is typically only given to you at half-resolution per eye. If you imagine you’re running a monitor at 1680×1050, each eye will only see 1680×525, effectively, because of how the polarization technique has to be done on the LCD in order to show the right eye and hide the left eye. Certainly over time that can be improved; right now, that’s what it is. If you’ve ever seen half-resolution per eye, you know what happens is that the quality of reading text, and the quality of the image, is not as good as you’d like. Some people just don’t think the quality is that good.

With active shutter glasses, the way we’re pursuing the solution right now with ViewSonic, we can enable full resolution per eye.

GameCyte: What do you think of your competitors? You’ve told me already that these glasses are like nothing else out there, and similarly the ViewSonic display. But can you tell me what you think of IZ3D, for example, and their solution?

AF: I can’t really speak much to IZ3D’s solution; the only thing I can say is I’m excited by IZ3D. If nothing else, they work with our GPUs. Not a bad thing. I like them; I like them for that reason. I think if you look at the solution they have versus ours, IZ3D has some pluses. Some people like passive solutions, they don’t like active solutions, so that’s one reason they might choose them. The downside of that is like I talked about earlier, you’re going to get less resolution, less quality for the game. I know that our solution supports NVIDIA SLI; I don’t think their solution supports SLI.

They can do nothing but help, right? Because right now, they’re talking about stereoscopic gaming; they’re using our GPUs.

So there they talk of it being their route and it seems a lot better than passive in their views

I found the software that I was talking about it's called S0L7 it's a warping tool that's blends images from each projector so the image lines up in 1 seamless image with no distortion and focus problems.
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Post by smoothy »

If you have read that interview you would find that the Nvidia guy answers some questions where he says that multiple people can use the shutter glasses and it's flick free for people from any angle, they say people are not limited, you could have 30 people in the room watching and getting the same 3d effect from any angle. Now that's amazing that means they have eliminated ghosting as that means this setup can allow head movements which doesn't ruin the 3d effect.

What I really want is to use my curved screen setup for a head tracking setup for flight sims. I want to use the Track IR 4 Pro with the shutter glasses or polarized glasses and turn my head to the left and right to see around the curved screen is this possible without ruin the 3d effect.
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Post by Likay »

Hmm. when he's talking about passive he means the zalman monitor which does have half resolution. The zalman is also a passive solution.
For a passive rig with dual projectors you'll simply need two different outputs from the graphiccard. The resolution is full and brightness great.
The IZ3D is another example of a passive solution but inspite of the zalman it has full resolution with no interlace lines. It uses two lcd's, one backplane which left and right pictures is drawn on and one front polarizing lcd which handles polarization with help of a complicated algorithm. It ghosts more than the zalman but you have no annoying interlace lines instead.
He's right that shutters might be the best consumerway3d (cheap is consumerfriendly). A passive rig with two projectors, silverscreen and filters is not cheap. So now i get the picture. :D
However making stereodrivers for dual outputs is the most simple way for programmers to make 3d though. Left eye to one output and right eye to the other one. So if we get stereodrivers for dual vga depends only on the goodwill of nvidia.
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Post by Neil »

If you have read that interview you would find that the Nvidia guy answers some questions where he says that multiple people can use the shutter glasses and it's flick free for people from any angle, they say people are not limited, you could have 30 people in the room watching and getting the same 3d effect from any angle. Now that's amazing that means they have eliminated ghosting as that means this setup can allow head movements which doesn't ruin the 3d effect.

What I really want is to use my curved screen setup for a head tracking setup for flight sims. I want to use the Track IR 4 Pro with the shutter glasses or polarized glasses and turn my head to the left and right to see around the curved screen is this possible without ruin the 3d effect.

Hi Smoothy!

I think there are some assumptions being made here - especially since the product hasn't even been released yet! :P

There is a very big different in how polarized solutions versus LCD shutter glasses solutions work. LCD shutter glasses are based on lenses that flash between transparent and black very rapidly between your eyes and in cooperation with the display (e.g. DLP HDTV, CRT, single projector, etc.) to alternate between left and right views. It is not angle dependent because the technology has nothing to do with where the viewer is sitting. While I'm sure the technology will be well received, NVIDIA has a vested interest in backing this because it will be compatible with all fast refresh rate monitors and displays. Little to no cooperation is required from the display manufacturers to make their glasses work, and selling glasses is where NVIDIA's money will be made (in addition to GPU sales).

The ghosting results will be dependent on a combination of the display quality and the ability of the glasses to block out the image from the opposing eye. There is nothing in the interview that spoke to this, and with every display having slightly different characteristics, I'd wait and see how the actual product performs before jumping the gun on expectations. I'm sure it will do well - I just like to see things first.

The polarized solutions are nearly 100% dependent on the display. When NVIDIA participates with this, it is as a software provider for Zalman and other companies as they come to market. NVIDIA can't sell their glasses for these solutions because polarized glasses are already dirt cheap and are not sophisticated enough. Polarized glasses, as demonstrated by Real D and IMAX 3D, are inherently meant for multi-person viewing, but the technology needed to display the content is a bit more complex.

You have a choice for your personal setup. You can have a single projector that is most likely DLP with LCD shutter glasses. NVIDIA would make sense here as theirs is the only LCD shutter glasses software solution right now. If you can do two projectors, then iZ3D is the way to go because NVIDIA doesn't have the output option you need. If you can get a circular polarized solution going with two projectors, that would give you similar head movement benefits as LCD shutter glasses, and the light loss will be minimal.

You will have to talk to our members about the software benefits between the two companies as that's not my place.

Regards,
Neil
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