3D Displays

Anyone that knows me knows that I'm really excited about the Nintendo 3DS handheld system that will be released to the US market next March. Nintendo has a history of staying one innovative step ahead of other game companies, and the 3DS marks a major jump with its built-in 3D screen. It's not your father's 3D screen, though...it looks convincingly three-dimensional without any sort of glasses or extra eyewear required (Nintendo). 

Many people know how traditional 3D movies and games are shown, but how did Nintendo manage it without glasses? The process is called autostereoscopy. While there are several different types f this technology, we're focusing on the 3DS for now. The method Nintendo chose to use was a parallax barrier display. What do all of these big words mean, though?

Think back to your childhood (or, if you're like me and forever a child on the inside, think back to last Tuesday). Remember those really neat lenticular pictures that seemed to move or animate as you tilted the image side-to-side? Do you also remember that the surface of those pictures was rough and had a bunch of vertical grooves in it? Underneath those grooves the image you were seeing was actually broken up into a bunch of thin vertical slices and the plastic grooves on top of the image acted like tiny prisms. These tiny prisms redirected corresponding slices of the image in the same direction, while other paired slices were shone in other directions, so that only one set of slices would be shown at one time. Generally, the groves are vertical for 3D images and horizontal for moving images, to take full advantage of the way our eyes work.(Photo Illusion)

(Photo Illusion)

As you might have guessed from the name, the 3D screen on the 3DS works just like these old 3D images. There are rows of vertical grooves above the display, and each vertical row of pixels shows a slice of an image (BBC). The overall effect turns out like this for the human eye:

RLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRL

RLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRL

RLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRL

RLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRL

RLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRL

RLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRLRL

First, as displayed on the screen without the lenticular lens.

(L's are slices for the left eye and R's are slices for the right eye)

LLLLLLLLLL - RRRRRRRRRR

LLLLLLLLLL - RRRRRRRRRR

LLLLLLLLLL - RRRRRRRRRR

LLLLLLLLLL - RRRRRRRRRR

LLLLLLLLLL - RRRRRRRRRR

LLLLLLLLLL - RRRRRRRRRR

Now, after passing through the lenticular lens.

There are some drawbacks to the technology, such as the case of the 3DS in which the screen can ONLY be viewed from one angle effectively (unless the 3D feature is turned off) (BBC). This makes the technology less viable for larger screens (the Nintendo can get away with one viewing angle, as the device is handheld) although implementations of face-tracking and creating a variety of angles on the lenticular lens help stem this problem.

Somehow, knowing how these works does nothing to affect the wonder of the experience for me...even if it's using a decades-old concept. You can't count on e to be buying a 3DS the day they come out.

==========================

Nintendo E3 Network: Nintendo 3DS. (2010). Retrieved October 04, 2010 from Nintendo, Nintendo E3 Network: http://e3.nintendo.com/​3ds/.

Photo Illusion: ANNA. (2009). Retrieved October 04, 2010 from Photo Illusion, Photo Illusion: http://www.photo-illusion.com/​howlenticularworks.html.

Emery, D. (2010). BBC News - Nintendo unveils 3DS handheld games console. Retrieved October 04, 2010 from BBC, BBC News: http://www.bbc.co.uk/​news/​10323971.