REVIEW

The conference was again a very successful event and had many highlights. Probably the most enjoyable aspect of the conference was to see all those people discussing all manner of things 3D. For me the most notable presentations of the conference were the Keynote, presented by Peter Anderson, and the presentation by Jay Scarpetti on their process of generating full-colour vectographs using a standard ink-jet printer.

Peter Anderson shined a spotlight onto a 3D world that many people never experience - the filming of 3D movies. There were many aspects which just left me agape - particularly the difficulties of working with the huge 3D film camera rig. To top all that off we were shown some stereoscopic video footage of T2-3D - absolutely amazing! It is a must see - buy that plane ticket to Universal Studios Florida NOW! :-)

Jay Scarpetti's presentation titled "Full Color 3-D Prints and Transparencies" was ground breaking. He detailed a process whereby full-colour vectographs (3D polarised images on a single substrate) are generated using a standard ink-jet printer using special inks and printing on a specially coated transparent substrate. The image is viewed by wearing a pair of linearly polarised 3D glasses. To generate the print, you place the substrate into the printer and print the left hand view of the stereo-pair. Next you reload the substrate into the printer to print the other side and print the right hand view of the stereo-pair (mirrored).

Other interesting presentations included Michael Naimark's presentation "A 3D Moviemap and a 3D Panorama", Craig Adkin's presentation "Stereoscopic Camera System for Live Action and Sports Productions" (he actually started his presentation by walking in all geared up - wearing his stereoscopic camera system), and many others... Have a look at the conference proceedings contents for a full list of all the papers.

As with past year's conferences, we has stereo slide projection and stereoscopic video projection equipment available and a good number of presentations used stereo slides or stereo video. This year's video projection system was based on the "3D black screen" from QD technology which allows crisp rear-projected polarised stereoscopic images to be displayed. The "3D black screen" provides a very low black level and therefore providing a very good dynamic range. Other equipment used in the system were a pair of Runco video projectors, a pair of QD technology line doublers and a field-sequential demultiplexer. Maximum use was obtained out the equipment during the conference as the breaks were also used to play 3D videos - including "Concerto in 3D" from VREX and Animusic and "Escape" from D3P Multidimensional Media.

This year's demonstration session was also a success with 9 individual displays - see the preface of the conference proceedings for a listing of all the demonstrations. The preface is available online. The equipment demonstrations session of the conference is an extremely important aspect of the conference. The ability to actually _see_ stereoscopic equipment is invaluable.

The conference proceedings is available from SPIE. The title is "Stereoscopic Displays and Virtual Reality Systems IV" and is proceedings volume number 3012. contact SPIE for further information "http://www.spie.org". The price is US$99 (US$75 for SPIE members).

Andrew Woods.