Re: [photo-3d] 3D is the image

[Mike Kersenbrock <michaelk@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Ray Zone wrote:
> 
> Mike Kersenbrock wrote:
> 
> > 3D-ness only allows the image to be captured "better".
> > "3D" isn't the image, it's only an attribute of it.
> > Adding the 3D attribute to an image's recording will
> > improve some images
> 
> Ray Zone responds:
> 
> I couldn't disagree more.

Ahead of time, I'll agree to disagree, but I stand by my philosophy
of photography, but I will discuss it a bit more below because
what I think isn't being being fully understood or "grokked" correctly.

> Mike is propounding the "additive" theory of 3-D in which 3-D, like color,

This is incorrect in terms of me being "additive", as I understand you. 
See a few paragraphs below where I'll explain more.

> is seen as icing added to a cake.  

Not at all true in the sense you mean.

> Some forms of 3-D actually change the
> cake into a pie (or another form entirely).
> 
> For example:  the cover of the new ISU "Stereoscopy" (December 2000).  When
> seen in 2-D the image means one thing.  Seen in 3-D the meaning of the image
> changes entirely.
> 
> Other examples:  (1) the abstract Random Dot Stereograms of Bela Julesz;
> only when you see the image in 3-D does the real (and hidden) meaning of the
> image become apparent.
> 
> (2) The hyperstereo photograph:  This form of stereoscopic image, captured
> from nature (or not), creates a visual dynamic that is solely based on the
> experience of its perception.


Having the 3D attribute be manipulatable doesn't make it a non-attribute.
Attributes are manipulatable.

Let me put it as a question.  Is it hard or is it really difficult to
produce a photograph w/o a substantial 3D effect?  Likewise, is it hard or
really difficult to produce 3D photograph without any image? 

So which is the base and which is the attribute ?

> As Stan White has said:  "The stereo image must never be considered an
> adjunct to the planar photograph, for the essential difference is
> qualitative not quantitative."

I agree with that and it does not conflict with that which I said.  This
statement, however, represents a narrow bottom-up view of the world
if taken as his concept of photography and images. I assume it isn't,
but rather something just written for a 2D photographer audience trying
to characterize 3D photography for them.

This statement takes the world of 2D and 3D photography as being the "top"
of the conceptual ladder.  This makes me understand the
term "additive".  I don't think that way.

Let me explain where my concept is different.  My concept is that
the image *is* that which occurred in real life as modified by (or invented
by) the mind of the photographer.  Things like "3D" and "2D" photography 
are technological terms describing physical means to express that mental
image (which in the typical case contains no modification to real-life).

I don't think in terms of 3D photography as "2D plus icing" but 
rather that 2D photography being an expression of an image with the Z-axis
missing where 3D photography retains it.  Holography, as such, also
has the original image's "multi-angle" attribute not subtracted.

So call my "theory" not the "additive" one, but the "minus theory".
I start at the mind's image and see that different "technologies"
have various attributes "minus'd".

> Stan is so eloquent in propounding the stereoscopic art form as a new visual
> language distinct from the monocular form that I will quote him in full on
> this subject:
> 
> "For those who are fortunate in being psycho-physically vulnerable to its
> spell, the stereo image is magical. Like any worker in the field of visual
> expression, the photographer may fill his images with the real or with the
> surreal, but the stereo photographer is unique in that his medium is
> surreal. How else can we explain the dream-like experience when viewing the
> stereo-image?--an experience that was absent when the reality itself was
> observed. It is this quality of evoking a kind of day-dream that sets the
> stereo image apart from its two-dimensional counter-parts."

This quote is eloquent, romantic, and warming to a stereo photographer's
heart (including mine).  However, it also shows use of an old debate
technique of asking the "how else" question, "assuming" there is 
no other answer than his -- where there are indeed other alternative answers.
I think that would consume another whole photo-3d thread, so I won't go any
further (and because I don't want to be the grinch who dare'd 
disagree with a statement so romantic). But I will say that it's 
written from the point of view of 2D "them" vs. 3D "us", rather than
from my point of view where each is a limited instantiation of "perfection",
where the "minuses" are fewer in the 3D instantiation.


> When you look at a 3-D image, regardless of the subject matter, you are
> using your eyes and brain in a manner that is unique, exponentially more
> complex, and different from, a 2-D image.

Agree completely.

> To consider 3-D imaging as a mere secondary, adjunct to 2-D imaging is
> simplistic and does an injustice to 3-D.  

Not at all what I said.  I hope my meaning is now grokked in fullness. 

Mike K.