Panasonic's 3D Lens Makes Third Dimension Dabbling Painless

[Silversurfer]

We've seen Panasonic's 3D camcorder, but the company is also releasing a standalone lens that will allow otherwise stock still cameras to shoot 3D.

It's a lens of Micro Four Thirds proportions, built specifically for the LUMIX G line of cameras...though the nature of the Micro Four Thirds standard means that this lens may very well work on similar cameras from Olympus as-is, and even brands like Samsung with proper adapters. Impressively, it manages to shoot 3D content even onto a single CMOS chip without retrofitting the internals of the camera. That's good news in that, even if you don't like 3D, at least the industry knows better than to require a whole new camera to have it.

We have no price, and in terms of a date, all we know is that it's coming by the year's end. And sadly, rumors of each lens coming with a personal-sized bucket of blue body paint are still unconfirmed. [Panasonic via CrunchGear and DigitalCameraInfo]

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[ssiu]

Loreo (http://www.loreo.com/) has 3D lens for DSLRs (and SLRs, before DSLRs exist) for many many years already.

[Likay]

Seems like the Loreo is heaps better than this as well. The lenses are very small and the separationbase a joke (if it is the lenses that are visible....). The loreo isn't ideal but good for those with a fitting slr.

[cybereality]

What is with these macro separation lenses? Do the engineers have no idea what they are building?

[yuriythebest]

is this like a joke? unless the purpose for purchasing this is filming small insects or miniature figures or something this is completely silly. this looks worse than loreo 3d lens in a cap.

[BlackShark]

I believe the contrary : these engineers know perfectly what they are doing : thay are doing products for consumers.

Consumers do not care about the ideal separation for each scene
Consumers do not want to be told they cannot shoot at certain distances

Small separation is GOOD for consumer devices : it allows point and shoot behaviour with 3D cameras.
Want to be able to tune your settings like a pro ? get a proper dual cam + mirror rig.

[Likay]

You definitely got a point. It's of course on cost of the 3d-depth on longer ranges though. You may say they actually decreases the range of stereopsis by making it possible on shorter ranges. If this really is desireable i don't know.

[BlackShark]

Well in order to convince yourself you should consider what you usually shoot with a 2D camera and then compare how it looks like with a fixed interaxial 3D camera system like the Fuji Real 3DW1.

I don't have the data but when seeing the photograph habits of my parents I know that freinds and family pictures shot from up close represent a huge amount of them, and most importantly : they are definitely the #1 type of pictures that my parents want to print and keep with them or display everywhere in the house.
Now this is the exact type of pictures which look awfully bad on the Fuji camera, because the interaxial distance is way too big.
I guess Panasonic just did the math and set the interaxial distance for the setting they believe is the most important for their target market.