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From: hlab@milton.u.washington.edu (Human Int. Technology Lab)
Newsgroups: sci.virtual-worlds
Subject: Japanese stereo TV/computer terminals
Message-ID: <1991Jun18.161206.19250@milton.u.washington.edu>
Date: 18 Jun 91 16:10:35 GMT
Sender: hlab@milton.u.washington.edu (Human Int. Technology Lab)
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
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From BUSINESS WEEK, June 24, 1991:
 
 
        THREE DIMENSIONS, NO FUNNY GLASSES
 
                Watching 3-D movies wasn't always fun.  For years, 
        you had to don glasses with red and green lenses that
        promised crude images and a cross between a popcorn 
        hangover and a migraine.  Lately, companies such as Imax
        Systems Corp. in Toronto have refined this approach with
        liquid-crystal goggles.  But Imax's short films are costly
        to produce, and they've been relegated to science museums
        and exhibitions.
 
                Now, Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp. is
        developing 3-D liquid-crystal displays (LCDs) that don't
        require special glasses.  Like earlier systems, NTT's
        prototype simultaneously transmits separate images,
        recorded at slightly different angles, to each eye.  But
        instead of using colors or shutters to keep the sets of
        images discrete, the system employs an outer screen,
        known as a lenticular lens, which fits over a 15-inch
        color LCD panel.  This lens is lined with hundreds of
        vertical ridges that divide and direct the twin images
        to the eyes.
 
                Others have tried lenticular lenses.  But in
        earlier versions, a slight sideways movement could mix
        the signals and shatter the effect.  NTT's display has
        two infrared sensors that track a viewer's head position
        and adjust for these movements.  NTT hopes to produce
        its screens for computer terminals and video phones but
        says commercial systems are still two years away.
 
                                        (Edited by Robert Buderi)