P3D 3D sightings in OZ

[Andrew Woods <andrew@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi All,

As I mentioned in a previous message, I saw the new Panasonic IMAX 3D
theatre when I was in Sydney recently.  They were showing Across the Sea
of Time and Nutcracker.  This theatre uses the bulky Liquid Crystal Shutter
Glasses with inbuilt PSE (Personal Sound Environment) speakers.  One thing
that confused me was that the projection screen appeared to be a silvered
screen - this isn't needed for the frame sequential systems.  I did
check whether the images were polarised using a pair of polarised glasses
I brought with me but they weren't.
The IMAX building itself is very striking - I'll put up some pictures 
(in 3D) on my web site eventually.

There were 3 other 3D sightings to report:

Also in Darling Harbour, Sydney is Sega World.  One of the attractions inside
sounds like a 3D movie motion platform ride.  Here's the description from
the brochure: "Aqua Nova - Wearing special 3D glasses, strap yourself in
and come on an underwater ride inside the belly of a giant mechanical shark"
Unfortunately I didn't go in to have a look - they wanted A$5 for an entry
only pass (no rides) or A$20 for an unlimited rides pass.  Too rich for me.

Also in the Darling Harbour precinct is the Sydney Power House Museum.
One of the displays within a special exhibit called Cyberzone was a 
mockup mars rover sporting a stereoscopic video camera.  The rover itself
looked more like a mini Dalek (~1m tall) wrapped in gold alfoil than the 
Mars Pathfinder Sojourner rover.  The operator console had a 50Hz field
sequential display which was viewed through a pair shutter glasses which
were mounted into a hood mounted to the display.  They rover could either
be driven manually through the simulated mars terrain using a joystick or
be commanded to autonomously travel to a new location while avioding
obstacles.  The rover was called "Go-2" (very cute) and appeared to
be made by Monash University.

The final sighting was "Marvin the Martian in the 3rd Dimension" screening
at Warner Brothers Movie World on the Gold Coast (about 50km south of
Brisbane).  We were very lucky to catch this attraction as it had only 
opened two days earlier.  The movie is a lot of fun and is 12 minutes 
57 seconds long according to my stopwatch.  Vertical alignment of the 
movie was pretty good but I would say that the range of image (horizontal)
parallax used in the movie was on the extreme side.  Infinity parallax 
was about 25cm and some objects were displayed only about 20cm away from 
my face.  This is a pity because with the whole thing being computer
generated, this could have been relatively easily adjusted (but not now it's 
on film of course).  There is a 5-10 minute pre-show in the foyer where
they show the first Marvin the Martian cartoon "Duck Dodgers in the 24th
and a half Century" and a really dorky interview with the so-called expert
3D animator describing how the whole 3D thing works.

That's all folks!

Andrew Woods                          http://info.curtin.edu.au/~iwoodsa


27 days to go to the Stereoscopic Displays and Applications Conference
      http://info.curtin.edu.au/~iwoodsa/stereoscopic


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