Anyone using PS3 for 3D gaming and blu-ray?

[Chiefwinston]

It kinda looks like your getting a nice entertainment set-up for you and your family to me. I've also spent loads of money on gear for my family. Your family will get years of high quality entertainment and be together. So it looks to me like your a good family man taking care of his family. Enjoy the equipment.

Cheers everyone

[DmitryKo]

been unsuccessful trying to learn how the DLP sets handle any incoming 720p signals (i.e. how it handles the upconversion, the framerate, etc).
2) Since the DMD is 960x1080, you could upsample the 720 frames (120 of them/sec)

Have you ever heard of the checkerboard picture format used in 3D DLPs?

DLP.com/3ddlp
DLP® 3-D HDTV Technology (PDF)

First of all, the DMD is 960x1080, where pixels are arranged in a "sparse checkerboard" pattern, and individual mirrors are rotated 45 degrees to resemble a rhombus; such arrangement means that in the initial state, the mirrors only cover "black" pixel positions; when the matrix wobulates, the mirrors shift to "white" pixel positions. So the whole 1080p60 picture is rendered in two steps.

This is what TI calls "SmoothPicture" and "offset-diamond pixel layout"; it wasn't originally intended for stereoscopy, it was just a way to make better quality DMDs which could do wobulated 1080p.

More details below:
Re: Mitsubishi 2010 3D DLPs
Information Display 7/2009 - Andrew Woods. 3-D Displays in the Home (PDF)


720p stereo definitely needs to be upsampled to the native resolution of 1080p, just like it goes with every fixed-pixel display. Then half of the pixels in each L/R view then need to be dropped according to the checkeboard arrangement above, to match the physical resolution of the DMD. I believe this is what Mitsubishi 3DC-1000 adapter and latest Mistsubishi 738/838 DLP TV series basically do with 720p60 HDMI format.

[GoldChain]

I have to leave work now but will reply with more later.......

But your 4th link (which I've seen before) illustrates the DMD is 960x1080, not 960x540. A 960x540 DMD would require 4 subframes for a complete 1920x1080 image.... (look closely at Figure 1 b and c..... there are still 1080 unique lines in each subframe, just vertical columns are shifted for display per subframe....... it's essentially interlaced sideways is what it is! hahaha!)

GC

[GoldChain]

Okay........

Lemme think this through.......

The DLP chip is 960x1080, and draws the frame in 2 120Hz subframes..... This can be verified with a quick Google search. A DMD of 960x540 would require 4 subframes to display 1920x1080. (and according to my reading, only HP ever made a display that did this.) Here's a quick reference to an article talking about the 960x1080 DMD:

http://www.hdtvmagazine.com/columns/201 ... me-but.php" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The checkerboard format, according to the link (4th one) you posted, displays 1/2 resolution frames (Left 1/2, then right 1/2 on each wobulation cycle). Is that right?

We've discussed in earlier threads that the DLP TV takes the incoming checkerboard format, and uses an algorithm to recompute the missing pixels (i.e. average the 4 pixels around the missing pixel) to regenerate a full 1920x1080 image for the left and the right. Why would the set "explode" the checkerboard left/right images back into full 1920x1080 frames, then turn around and chop it into half-resolution 960x1080 checkerboards to display? (is our assumption that it even "explodes" the L/R images back into full resolution 1920x1080 frames incorrect? If so, that would imply that ALL 3D that is displayed on these sets is half resolution all of the time??)

Given 1080i/p @ 30, it'd be a shame to display 1/2 rez 3D every 120th of a frame instead of letting the wobulation display the full 1920x1080 frame for one eye, then a 60th of the sec later, switch eyes and display a full 1920x1080 for the other....... that would yield full 1920x1080 per eye @ 30fps, which is what almost all broadcast 1080i/p media is in.... There's also 24fps media like BD, but that can be upconverted to 30fps via a pull-down..... (I'd love to know what pull-down is being used to play 2D BD on the set........ 5:5 with 1 of each of the 5 frame being 1/2 rez?)

I dunno........... if it indeed is displaying 1/2 resolution images for left and right eye every 120th of a sec, then my original consideration of how it would "down convert" 720p60 frame packed is moot...... it would simply convert the 720p frames into 1080p checkerboard @60Hz.

Anyway......... sorry for rambling....... I'm a tech architecture guy, so it's in my nature to understand how these thing work from start to finish, and unfortunately that info isn't published as freely as I have access to architecture documents for the systems I have to work with at in my job.......

In the end, as I've said before, tech discussion aside, I'll use the force..... as long as it looks good, I'm good.....

GC

[GoldChain]

Furthermore, it would suck to take any non-frame-packed format (i.e. top/bottom, side/side or interlaced) that's already lost 1/2 the resolution per eye, then have to artificially explode them out (presumably in the adapter in my case) to 1920x1080, so then you could checkerboard them into a single 1920x1080 L/R image.

I just hate the concept of multiple digital massages of the image.. never is a good thing for overall image quality.

GC

[cybereality]

Yeah, its the same problem with interlaced monitors. You feed it a broadcast, side-by-side image (960x1080 per eye) and then it gets stretched up into 2 1080P images, then interlaced horizontally. So you are effectively getting 960x540 worth of data, one-forth of HD, which sucks. That is assuming the broadcast is at full 1080P. If its at 720P, then the situation is even worse. Quality is not even standard def.

[GoldChain]

If its at 720P, then the situation is even worse. Quality is not even standard def.

Yeah....

In the case of gaming on the PS3, they're sending frame-packed (so full rez) 720p L/R images @ 60Hz. In that case, the adapter (or processor in the 738/838) is taking the 720p frames, upscaling them to two individual 1080 frames, then checkerboarding them at 1920x1080p@60Hz. According to the documentation of the 3DA-1 adapter, no matter what 3D format is input, the output for 3D is always checkerboard 1920x1080p@60Hz.

http://www.mitsubishi-tv.com/pdf/specsheet-3DA1.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

So frame-packed 720p@60 should actually look pretty good.

Having said all of that, we were discussing broadcast, which includes side/side or top/bottom.... in which case, yeah........ particularly 720p top/bottom would really suck, as each eye is getting 1/2 of 720 (360) which is getting blown up digitally to 1080 (which I hate non-integral scaling of digital images anyway), to then be checkerboarded..... LOL What a mess.........

GC

[DmitryKo]

your 4th link (which I've seen before) illustrates the DMD is 960x1080, not 960x540.

My fault, sorry. Post corrected.

We've discussed in earlier threads that the DLP TV takes the incoming checkerboard format, and uses an algorithm to recompute the missing pixels (i.e. average the 4 pixels around the missing pixel) to regenerate a full 1920x1080 image for the left and the right.
Why would the set "explode" the checkerboard left/right images back into full 1920x1080 frames, then turn around and chop it into half-resolution 960x1080 checkerboards to display?

Well, it doesn't. Seems like our assumption turned out to be incorrect - there is really no need for this filtering stage, since the DMD imager displays the checkerboard pattern natively.

AFAIK, 1080p DLP TV sets only accept 1080p checkerboard, i.e. they can not properly upconvert 720p checkerboard into two 1080p stereo frames, even with the adapter or firmware update. Likewise, older 720p DLP TVs only accept 720p checkerboard and can not properly downconvert 1080p checkerboard (according to Blitz Games support). All in all, applying "SmoothPicture" to stereocopy was just a hack.

letting the wobulation display the full 1920x1080 frame for one eye, then a 60th of the sec later, switch eyes and display a full 1920x1080 for the other....... that would yield full 1920x1080 per eye @ 30fps

Shutters need at least 50-60 Hz per eye to operate, or the flicker will be unbearable. We've been through this before with CRT-based solutions.

Even movie projectors employ double/triple exposure of the same frame to display 24 fps film at "pseudo" 48/72 fps.

if it indeed is displaying 1/2 resolution images for left and right eye every 120th of a sec, then my original consideration of how it would "down convert" 720p60 frame packed is moot...... it would simply convert the 720p frames into 1080p checkerboard @60Hz.

In the case of gaming on the PS3, they're sending frame-packed (so full rez) 720p L/R images @ 60Hz. In that case, the adapter (or processor in the 738/838) is taking the 720p frames, upscaling them to two individual 1080 frames, then checkerboarding them at 1920x1080p@60Hz. According to the documentation of the 3DA-1 adapter, no matter what 3D format is input, the output for 3D is always checkerboard 1920x1080p@60Hz.

This is correct.

sorry for rambling....... I'm a tech architecture guy, so it's in my nature to understand how these thing work from start to finish, and unfortunately that info isn't published as freely as I have access to architecture documents for the systems I have to work with at in my job.......

No problem, all this stereoscopic stuff is certainly not for the tech-oblivious, at least not yet...

non-frame-packed format (i.e. top/bottom, side/side or interlaced) that's already lost 1/2 the resolution per eye, then have to artificially explode them out (presumably in the adapter in my case) to 1920x1080, so then you could checkerboard them into a single 1920x1080 L/R image.
particularly 720p top/bottom would really suck, as each eye is getting 1/2 of 720 (360) which is getting blown up digitally to 1080

Yes, these "frame-compatible" broadcast formats will be just marginally better than anaglyph.

I'm hoping for the eventual start of 1080p60 broadcasting, at which point stereoscopic broadcasting should move to "HD service compatible" level, employing something like H.264 "Stereo High" profile based on Multiview Video Coding extension, like Blu-ray 3D does. This would probably take another 5-10 years to launch however, as it would require new STBs and TV sets and probably next-generation High Efficiency Video Coding standard.

LOL What a mess.........

Exactly, HDMI badly screwed it all up by making 1080p60 stereo optional.

[GoldChain]

Wow........... seems like we're in agreement all around now.

To your final point about broadcast......... what would be nice is if they used checkerboard for broadcasting.......... Obviously, my comments seem biased at first... since I am going the DLP route........ but hear me out.

Although technically speaking 1/2 of the information is lost with any of the 3 techniques (top/bottom, side/side, checkerboard), I believe there is distinct advantage to using checkerboard for transporting stereo frames in the space of a single frame. (Let's take the case of a 1080p 3D broadcast @ 30fps). That is that (as we saw with our analysis when we assumed the DLP sets recreated 1080 frames from the L and R checkerboard images), the resulting 1080 frames generated using the "average the 4 pixels around the missing one" technique was very close to the original 1080 frame. Top/Bottom or Left/Right is losing exactly 1/2 of the information either horizontally or vertically, and essentially you're into line doubling to get back to 1080, which makes more lines but doesn't generate any more unique data (you could average 2 adjacent lines to have something 1/2 way in between, which would be "new"/"unique" data, but not recreating any detail from the original frame that was lost)..... at least with the checkerboard you're able to somewhat recreate a decent approximation of what information was taken out.

So essentialy, IMHO, aside from Frame packing (which delivers the full rez L/R images in a single double-bandwidth frame), checkerboard format with an algorithm to replace the missing pixels yields a far superior resulting full frame compared to the other methods and should be used by broadcasters....... at least until they offer 1080p@60 Then other TV vendors will have to make a box to convert the checkerboard over to frame-packed or whatever format they need. HAHA! Wouldn't that be an ironic twist of fate? Honestly, tho, the broadcasters could probably care less what actual format they send it, since they all use the standard channel bandwidth, so why wouldn't they opt for the one that allows the highest quality of resulting stereo video to come through?

GC

PS: I've dealt with the fact that my new DLP TV (which is to arrive this afternoon) is half resolution in 3D. The reality is, I saw 3DBD on it, and it looked fantastic. If games are 720p@60, I think I'd rather have 720p frames upped to 1080p then checkerboarded and played at half rez and maintain the 60Hz than to have the full rez and have to drop to 30fps or something..... for movies you MIGHT get away with it, but not with gaming.

[Chiefwinston]

I already know your set-up will deliver what you want. 1080p and 720p are both high definition. Everything is gonna look sweeeet. some of these dudes will just have to stick to 21-23" screens, which to me gaming at that size- sucks. it could be 1280P 23" screen and it would still suck. big screen gaming rocks.

cheers everyone

[DmitryKo]

Top/Bottom or Left/Right is losing exactly 1/2 of the information either horizontally or vertically, and essentially you're into line doubling to get back to 1080, which makes more lines but doesn't generate any more unique data (you could average 2 adjacent lines to have something 1/2 way in between, which would be "new"/"unique" data, but not recreating any detail from the original frame that was lost)

Yes, half-res formats will lose quite a lot of fine details, even with checkerboard coding.

But what's really bad about stereo broadcasting is interlace and much less bitrate than Blu-ray 3D allows, so it has the potential to become a bugfest of interlace artifacts and compression noise brought into the 3rd dimension.

Hopefully it won't be as bad as those anaglyph DVDs...

[Chiefwinston]

Hey I hope your TV shows up today. Post if it does.

cheers everyone

[cybereality]

Checkerboard can't work on broadcast because the compression would kill the encoding. It would probably be more technically feasible to just broadcast the full dual 1080P streams at a low bitrate than to use the high bitrate needed to preserve a checkerboard encoded image. And quality would not really be much better than current SBS/OU, anyway. Its still the same amount of data any way you slice it. We do have SENSIO and RealD formats which are a mix between side-by-side and checkerboard and will work for broadcast. They might be marginally better, but its still not going to match a 3D Blu-Ray no matter what.

[GoldChain]

Checkerboard can't work on broadcast because the compression would kill the encoding. It would probably be more technically feasible to just broadcast the full dual 1080P streams at a low bitrate than to use the high bitrate needed to preserve a checkerboard encoded image. And quality would not really be much better than current SBS/OU, anyway. Its still the same amount of data any way you slice it. We do have SENSIO and RealD formats which are a mix between side-by-side and checkerboard and will work for broadcast. They might be marginally better, but its still not going to match a 3D Blu-Ray no matter what.

You're right about the compression used for broadcast killing it........ deal killer right there. If it weren't for that, checkerboard, although an equal # of pixels as SBS/OU mathematically, I still maintain that you can "rebuild" a 1080 frame for each the L and R eyes that is MUCH closer to the original frames than you could ever hope to do from SBS/OU........ perhaps when I tired of my new TV I'll take some time and so doing image comparisons......

GC

[cybereality]

Yes, checkerboard has a perceived greater resolution, even though technically its the same amount of data.

[Fredz]

If it weren't for that, checkerboard, although an equal # of pixels as SBS/OU mathematically, I still maintain that you can "rebuild" a 1080 frame for each the L and R eyes that is MUCH closer to the original frames than you could ever hope to do from SBS/OU........ perhaps when I tired of my new TV I'll take some time and so doing image comparisons......

As Cybereality said, that's probably what RealD and Sensio have done already, ie. encoding a checkerboard image into a frame compatible image. But since they've filed a patent for that, if it's accepted I guess you won't be able to release any code on this subject without some problems.

[GoldChain]

So.............. it's all said and done. I've received my 73" DLP set........ connected the PS3 and using UltraClear DLP Link glasses. IMHO, it looks fantastic. 3DBD look quite impressive on that large screen. Half-resolution checkerboard or whatever "half-resolution" discussions aside, the end result is a very nice looking, HD 3D experience that is on par with going to the theaters. Gaming is also smokin'. Again, aside from technical discussions of 720p@60 being converted to 1080p@60 checkerboard, etc, the end result is playing 3D games on the PS3 on the DLP is awesome.

This isn't saying that movies/gaming on, say the VT25 plasmas isn't better (perhaps crisper, sharper?), but for the price, the DLP sets and the quality 2D/3D experience they provide is unmatched.

As an aside, I do really like the UltraClear glasses. As others have noted, the earpieces are very flexible plastic, which lets them effortlessly conform to your head. My wife's can wear them over her prescription glasses, which have lenses that aren't as "tall" or "round" as some lenses. Like so:



Also, I let the boys (one is a couple of months shy of being 5, the other is around 3 1/2) watch MotorStorm 3D Rift, then some Despicable Me in 3D. They were a bit big, particularly on the 3.5 year old, however, we secured them with adjustable lanyard-style glasses holders (we bought for our sunglasses when we went white-water rafting this summer). Like these:



So that's a very cheap, comfortable way to adjust them for kids. It also gives some insurance against accidental drops, and little greasy fingers smudging the front lenses trying to push the glasses up on their noses. We're going to leave them on the glasses, even while in their bag... so they're always "ready to go".

I will be ordering 2 (maybe 3 since now I'm in "spending" mode) more pairs to have.... that way the family can have our own, with a spare set if there is a guest, etc.....

So far, quite happy with the rig........ could see how the 82" would be nice to have.

Thanks to everyone in the forum that gave input/feedback, and likes to talk about this stuff..... the MTBS forums have been a wonderful place to learn and I will, of course, continue visiting to talk, discuss, and argue about anything 3D.

GC

[Chiefwinston]

Hey thats great news. Try the new VUDU sevice with your PS3. You can get one free 3D movie for 48 hrs. It looks like a winner of a service to me. I'll be keeping my eye on this one for new movies to rent. And yeah 3D rift is awesome. And its only the beginning. 1080p, 720p its high definition and looks awesome. I don't care what anybody says- 720p60 gaming is awesome. Those that think differently- well they clearly are not seeing what I'm seeing.

Have a great 3D weekend.
cheers everyone

[xiphas]

gonna have to agree with you, i have 0 problems playing 720p60. 720 smooth 3d> 1080 laggy 3d.

[ancjob]

can anybody tell me

1)if PS3 purchased from US [region locked to US,Canada] , would play region free [decrypted DVDs] and region ABC blu-rays [aka region free blu-ray] without issues ?

has anybody tried the above ?

[GoldChain]

Ya know, I read the same thing. Actually, I believe that I read that the PS3 was region-free from a Blu-Ray perspective. I looked into this briefly when I was looking to get some 3D Blu-Rays from the UK that aren't out in the US. But I never bought one nor tried it. I'd be interested in hearing if anyone can verify this info.

GC