Types of 3D Televisions

It has been hard not to notice the rejuvenation of 3d movies recently, although 3d pictures and 3d films have been around for quite some time due to limits in the methods used to produce the 3d effect the idea of 3D has so far been more fun than serious.

There are plenty of DVD’s available right now that are in 3d and you may even catch the occasional show or special on T.V that is shown in 3d, each of these will more than likely use the old anaglyph method to create the appearance of three dimensional viewing, it is easy to tell this is the case because you will be required to wear red/blue glasses when viewing. Any T.V is able to display 3d in this method because all that is required to achieve it is two different colored images shown at once which are filtered out in each eye. Although this successfully creates a 3d effect the result is not as high quality as many would like, the overall image suffers and colors are hard to show because it is colors that are used to create the effect in the first place.

Recently however there have been new attempts to corner the 3d market with different more effective methods, each of these however will require the viewer to own different types of 3d televisions, none of which are particularly cheap at this moment in time. These new types of T.V’s create 3d in three different ways, polarizing, active shutter and lenticular.

Polarizing technology is the same methods used for newer movies at the cinema, if you have been to watch a 3d movie recently this is the way it was created, you are required to wear clear glasses to watch which are polarized in each lens to allow one of two images through, for 3d televisions to work with this technology it has to be able to produce two different polarized images at once which is why a regular TV cannot create 3d in this manner. To buy a TV with this capability will set you back around $9,000 although this method is more popular for making 3d images than the old one because it does not rely on colors to produce the effect and therefore offers better quality color images.

The second method available right now uses active shutter technology; you do not necessarily require a new T.V to use this method however you will likely need to buy one because for it to work the T.V needs to have a refresh rate of above 120 Hz. This method is popular amongst manufacturers because it can display movies in high definition with little modification required to current technology, for it to work the user is required to wear battery powered 3d glasses which block alternate images displayed at high speed by the T.V. The main downside to this technology is the cost of the glasses, you are looking at around $180 for a pair and each person viewing the T.V will need one for the 3d effect, so for a family to watch a 3d showing at home with this technology it could prove pretty expensive, not only that but you will need to continually charge or change the batteries in the glasses which is inconvenient.

The final method incorporates lenticular technology to produce 3d, these 3d televisions use a method reminiscent of those small plastic pictures you would get as a child that when viewed at one angle would move as you viewed at a different angle. This method is known as auto-stereoscopic due to the fact you do not need to wear any special glasses for the 3d effect to work, the special lenticular 3d televisions have a unique transparent sheet of cylindrical lenses which reflect light at differing angles and therefore send two different images to each eye, as you can imagine you need to watch the T.V directly head on for the best results but the fact that no glasses are required could mean this is the future of 3d T.V. The cost of such a T.V is pretty steep and you can expect to pay around $10,000 and a wait of at least 3 years before there is regular 3d content available to view.

As you can see there are a number of improved options for 3d viewing over the past when you needed to wear different color glasses, each will require different types of 3d televisions and it is yet to be known which method will end up more popular with manufacturers, it is like the HDDVD – Blu-ray war all over again.