3D imaging or stereoscopy (a compound word from the Greek words ‘στερεό’, which means solid and ‘σκοπώ’, which means I see/look) is the technique used to create the illusion of depth in an offset image by presenting two slightly different perspectives of the same object to the eyes of the viewer, that are then combined in the viewer’s brain to give the perception of depth. This phenomenon had been known ever since the ancient Greek mathematician Euclid discovered the principles of binocular vision and nowadays the stereoscopy is used in all visual communication mediums such as photography, art, television and cinema. As well, stereoscopy is used in photogrammetry, the practice of determining the geometric properties of objects from photographic images and is employed in the fields of geology, architecture, engineering, meteorology and other fields. 

History of 3D imaging

During the last half of the 18th century and the first decades of the 19th century, stereoscopes (the viewing devices which allow the user to create a three-dimensional image from 2 slightly different two-dimensional photographs or drawings) were one of the most popular forms of entertainment both in Europe and the USA. The first to experiment with stereoscopic drawings (photography was not yet invented) was the British physicist Sir Charles Wheatstone, who invented the first stereoscope in 1838. Drawing on Wheatstone’s invention, Sir William Brewster presented a modified stereoscope to the 1851 London's Great International Exhibition; it was comprised by a small box fitted with lenses and a slot to hold stereographic images (also called strereocards or strereoviews) which were supplied by four-by-seven inches rectangular cards with two stereo-photographs pasted side-by-side. The most common type of stereoscope in the USA was the Holmes Stereo Viewer (named after its inventor), which remained popular until the 1930s when people's interest shifted to the motion pictures, the new form of entertainment. Historian William Culp Darrah estimated that between 1860 and 1890, 400 million stereographs were printed and sold door to door, through mail order catalogues, in stores and at tourist spots by Tru-Vue and View-Master, the two companies that produced stereoscopes and stereographs at the time. Tru-Vue, which held the rights to Disney licenses, used originally 35mm filmstrips containing 14 images. The company, along with the rights to Disney licences, was acquired by View-Master in 1952. Over the years many subjects, from the adventures of Mickey Mouse to the Landing of Apollo on the moon have become popular View-Master reels.

Interest in three-dimensional viewing was revived by Hollywood in 1950, which introduced three-dimensional cinema in an effort to attract patrons back to the theatres that competed at the time with broadcast television which had entered every American home. Between 1952 and 1954 Hollywood produced more than 70 3D films, the most famous one ‘Dial M for Murder’ by Alfred Hitchcock (1954). Special throwaway glasses with one red and one blue lens which permitted each eye to perceive only certain parts of a color-polarized film were introduced for viewing these movies, but the invention was short lived due to technical limitations and the uncomfortable glasses. In the early 1980s, the three-dimensional viewing returned with the horror movies and in the 1990s with the panoramic IMAX 3D movies.


3D imaging and human vision

The human vision uses several processes and optical clues in order to determine depth perception in an image. The processes include stereopsis, which leads to depth perception from the presentation of a slightly different image to each eye, the process of eyeball focus and the process of blockage of one object by another. Visual clues include the subtended visual angle of an object whose size is known, the convergence point of the object’s parallel edges, the vertical position at which the object is located in the image (objects that are position higher in the image seem far away), haze, de-saturation and a change to blue colour and a change in the size of the details in a texture pattern.

Foto LARKO  produces high resolution panoramic photos. Only one, in Cyprus specialized camera for panoramic, wide view shots. 

How 3D images are created

To create a stereoscopic image, two photographs are needed which can be taken with a stereo camera such as the Fujifilm FinePix Real 3D W1 or two cameras set apart at a specified distance from each other. To find the correct distance between the two cameras, the most important things to take into account is the distance from which the image will be displayed and the distance of the subject from the cameras. The distance from which the image will be displayed is called solid base or baseline and results from the ratio of the distance of display to the distance between the eyes (IPD), which in adults is on average 63 mm. For example, if the image will be displayed on a computer screen from a distance of 1,000 mm, the ratio of display to the eye will be 1000/63 or about 16mm. The correct distance between the two cameras in this case will be the distance of the subject from the camera/16.

Macro Photography

Landscape Photography

Interval 3D Shooting

Methods of viewing 3D

3D images can be viewed with the method of free viewing or with a viewing device. There are two ways of free viewing, the parallel and the cross-eyed viewing. The parallel viewing uses two images placed side by side at a distance that is not greater than the average distance between the eyes. In the parallel viewing, the viewer sees the image while keeping his vision parallel, something that can be difficult and unpleasant because normally the focus of the eyes and the binocular convergence work together. The cross-eyed viewing uses the 2 images exchanged, and the viewer sees the image cross-eyed with his/her right eye viewing the left and the left eye viewing the right picture.

Parallax Control

3D viewers include stereoscopes, transparency and head-mounted viewers, as well as a number of active and passive 3D technology viewers such as linearly polarized glasses, circularly polarized glasses, Infitec glasses, Inficolor 3D system and other viewers and systems.