Hector posted about the launch of ASUS’ new VG236H 3D 23 inch monitor, which brings depth to movies and PC games using NVIDIA’s 3D Vision technology. It marks an entirely new chapter in the story of desktop computing, and I’m just hoping I’ll have one by the time Toy Story 3D gets released on Blu-ray.
If you’ve been to see a 3D film like Avatar at the cinema’s recently, you’ll have used a method of 3D imaging which involves a pair of glasses with oppositely polarised lenses over each eye. The screen is divided into vertical columns, half of which contain the image for the left eye and half contain the image for the right eye. The glasses filter out the correct half and your brain stitches the two pictures back together to create a 3D image.
With the VG236H 3D, however, the lenes are LCD screens which switch between transparent and black at the same speed as the monitor refreshes, 120 times a second. When the left eye is covered, the right eye can see, and vice versa. The monitor alternates between showing the complete picture for one eye and then the other in time with the lens shutters.
It’s a remarkably precise technology, but it works. It has two big advantages over the type of 3D you see in the cinema: firstly it uses the whole screen for each image, so it’s higher resolution and a clearer shot and secondly viewing angles are much better.
Hector’s post talks about the rest of the technology in greater detail, but before you click over there here’s a video ASUS has put together to show off the potential of the VG236H 3D.