biospud wrote:The primary (rational) criticism of passive interleaved 3D displays is the vertical resolution.
Actually, the main drawback is that they have far more crosstalk. They also have a very limited viewing angle. You have to be at a precise angle to avoid an unacceptable amount of crosstalk, and even then, there will be far more than with good active displays.
cybereality wrote:Though I do realize that kind of locks you into Nvidia's proprietary stack, whereas interleaved can be easy coded in any app.
No, it doesn't. Not anymore. You do remember that nVidia unlocked OpenGL quad buffering support with their consumer cards, don't you?
I've included support for OpenGL quad buffering with OpenGL applications I've programmed ever since since I started programming with OpenGL (which was in late 2011). That was before nVidia unlocked support on their consumer cards (which was in early 2013) and before I got nVidia 3D Vision. So I wasn't able to test if it worked. In August 2014, I got nVidia 3D Vision 2 and an ASUS VG278HE monitor. I then tried using it with
my modified version of Wolf4SDL which supports stereoscopic 3D. It worked perfectly.
Before nVidia unlocked OpenGL quad buffering support with their consumer cards, I was heavily critical of them for locking it out. I knew that nVidia had unlocked it before I bought nVidia's system; I would not have bought it if they hadn't.
biospud wrote:Frankly, jumping through the technical hoops necessary to get Nvidia's 3D vision system working is almost never worth it in this environment.
OpenGL quad buffering actually is extremely easy to use.
All you have to do is enable the GL_STEREO attribute and use glDrawBuffer or glDrawBuffers to select the back left and/or back right buffers. That's it.
nVidia 3D Vision currently only supports OpenGL quad buffering in fullscreen exclusive mode, and only if the window is set up a certain way. But it will automatically enter that mode when the window is shown, if it is set up the right way.
It is actually far easier to program than interleaved support.
To properly add support for interleaving, you need to write a post-processing renderer.
biospud wrote:Not just any app, any OS.
OpenGL quad buffering will work with any app, any OS, and any graphics drivers that support it. It is also supported by AMD HD3D. They unlocked it on their consumer cards before nVidia did.
All polarized 3D monitors have been discontinued, including the ASUS VG27AH. Before I bought my new 3D system, I wondered why. Now I know.
biospud wrote:Unlike many folks around here, my primary interest is not in games, but in scientific visualization for biomedical research.
Aren't professional systems, with nVidia Quadro or AMD FirePro, generally used for this type of thing? Polarized 3D isn't generally used for professional applications; it doesn't give good enough quality. It generally is only used for movie theaters and televisions.
Shutter glasses have long been the technology of choice for professional stereoscopic viewing systems.