Nintendo 3DS

Johnfp · Post by **Johnfp** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 8:13 am

http://www.tomsguide.com/us/Nintendo-3D ... -6237.html

So if this article is correct then it is basically a lenticular with each of the two sides of the lenticular lens receiving a slice of the animation. Pretty cool if you ask me.

dannybee · Post by **dannybee** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 9:16 am

I have played around with this type of optical setup, you can do it with a lcd monitor and a driver and the right type lenticular and matching the line pairs

favalora · Post by **favalora** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 9:35 am

Hi Johnfp -

I agree, it is a very nice little display!

Sorry to be pedantic, but it's a parallax barrier (or raster barrier) display. Rather than lenslets, there are opaque bars placed above "interleaved" left/right image columns. (You probably knew this and were simply expressing an analogy to lenticulars.)

It looks really cool in real life! Have you checked one out in Best Buy? There's a thumb-slider that adjusts the stereo disparity so that the left-eye right-eye imagery are depicted comfortably. I tried it with a flight simulator and it actually looked really good. http://www.opticsforhire.com/blog/?p=112

g

Dinesh · Post by **Dinesh** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 11:51 am

Actually, it's even more interesting because the parallax barriers are created by another lcd which uses polarisation to switch the barriers.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/08/12/3d_illusion/

favalora · Post by **favalora** » Sun May 01, 2011 12:35 pm

Dannyb -

I'm sorry! I sort of wish I could delete my message now. Some people would say I'm wrong about calling the 3DS screen a "raster barrier" or "parallax barrier" display because it's a little bit different.

Usually, a parallax barrier display is a "sandwich" composed of layers like: (1) backlight (2) LCD with imagery (3) vertical bars.
But in the case of the 3DS, I am hearing that 2 and 3 are swapped, i.e. (1) backlight (2) vertical bars [switchable on/off] and (3) LCD with imagery.

So it might be more correct to think about it as a system with directional illumination. Though in my opinion, photons are photons, and it acts pretty much like a raster barrier display.

Sorry!

g

PinkysBrain · Post by **PinkysBrain** » Sun May 01, 2011 5:20 pm

It might be more light efficient. I'm assuming they stack it like this :

depolarizing reflector - lightguide - reflective polarizer - barrier LCD - reflective polarizer - image LCD - absorbing polarizer

If you put the barrier on top of the image LCD you would no longer be able to recycle blocked light (since it's no longer white).

favalora · Post by **favalora** » Mon May 02, 2011 9:18 am

I'm conferring with a few folks on what to actually call the 3DS display. Parallax barrier, parallax illumination...
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