P3D Re: Colour Anaglyphs

[aifxtony@xxxxxxx (Tony Alderson)]

>Dale Walsh (P3D digest 3361):
>So if I understand correctly, all polychromatic anaglyphs must be
>calibrated individually to achieve the best colours and the least
>ghosting? In other words, there is no one single step process to avoid
>ghosting while keeping true colours? It is a trial and error process using
>colour manipulation, saturation, brightness, etc.<

Well, if you want to go through that much trouble.  In my opinion, an image
either works or doesn't work as a polychromatic anaglyph.  If you have
sufficient motivation, you can hammer a poorly suited image into the mold,
but there's a price to pay in color fidelity, not to mention time. If a
simple channel swap doesn't do the trick, I'm more inclined to make it a
mono anaglyph and be done with it.  Commercial clients generally won't let
you mess with their product/logo colors, so you have to try other tricks,
like putting the problem at the page plane (i.e., restricting parallax).
And don't forget the common prejudice against anaglyphs--no matter how good
a job you do, some people will think it's junk and unviewable due to the
red/blue glasses.

>I guess the solution lies in the vectograph style printed images which
>contain true colour using the neutral grey of polarizing glasses to
>achieve the 3D? <

Depends on your values and goals. "Vectorgraphs" (using the term
generically) are pretty appealing to me, but you still have to wear
glasses,  are restricted in viewing positions, etc., so it's not the Holy
Grail either. It is more expensive than anaglyphs, and cost is always a
factor. Probably not practical for a lot of applications (like comic books,
for example).

We still have to make contextual judgements on the "best" stereo technique
for a given situation. There is no general solution. Not yet, anyway.

Tony Alderson



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