MIT develops ‘Tensor’ compressive displays for glasses-free 3D
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First, an algorithm works out which two slices of the image the viewer needs to see from any angle in the room to view a complete 3D image.
Light is sent through an array of small lenses, which refract it over a viewing angle that is about 50 degrees wide and 20 degrees high, and through an LCD screen that carries part of the final image. The light then passes through two additional LCD screens, which also contain elements of the final image, and in which the pixels switch between transparent or opaque at 120 frames per second, producing patterns that channel the correct 2D image slices to your eyes.
Move your head to one side or the other, and two new slices of the original image come into view. ...
"It shows you strange-looking frames at very high rates," says team member Gordon Wetzstein. The individual frames flicker and contain noise and artefacts as the pixels switch on or off, but the eye responds too slowly to see the flaws in individual frames, and the brain simply blends the sequence of frames together. ...
"It is a great project, and a lovely piece of science, but I really can't see it being the 3D TV of the future," says Nick Holliman of theVisualisation Laboratory at Durham University, UK, who thinks the algorithm required to run the patterns will be too computationally intensive to be practical. He suggests that it might be best used for multiviewer advertising displays in airports and shopping centers. ...
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