RealD 3D is a digital

stereoscopic Stereoscopy (also called stereoscopics, or stereo imaging) is a technique for creating or enhancing the illusion of depth in an image by means of stereopsis for binocular vision. The word ''stereoscopy'' derives . Any stereoscopic image is ...

projection technology made and sold by RealD. It is currently the most widely used technology for watching

3D film 3D films are motion pictures made to give an illusion of three-dimensional solidity, usually with the help of special glasses worn by viewers. They have existed in some form since 1915, but had been largely relegated to a niche in the motion pic ...

s in theaters. Worldwide, RealD 3D is installed in more than 26,500 auditoriums by approximately 1,200 exhibitors in 72 countries as of June 2015.

Technology

RealD 3D cinema technology is a

polarized 3D system A polarized 3D system uses polarization glasses to create the illusion of three-dimensional images by restricting the light that reaches each eye (an example of stereoscopy). To present stereoscopic images and films, two images are projected s ...

that uses

circularly polarized In electrodynamics, circular polarization of an electromagnetic wave is a polarization state in which, at each point, the electromagnetic field of the wave has a constant magnitude and is rotating at a constant rate in a plane perpendicular to th ...

light to produce stereoscopic image projection. The advantage of circular polarization over

linear polarization In electrodynamics, linear polarization or plane polarization of electromagnetic radiation is a confinement of the electric field vector or magnetic field vector to a given plane along the direction of propagation. The term ''linear polarizati ...

is that viewers are able to tilt their head and look about the theater naturally without seeing double or darkened images. However, as with other systems, any significant head tilt will result in incorrect

parallax Parallax is a displacement or difference in the apparent position of an object viewed along two different lines of sight and is measured by the angle or semi-angle of inclination between those two lines. Due to foreshortening, nearby object ...

and prevent the brain from correctly fusing the stereoscopic images. The high-resolution,

digital cinema Digital cinema refers to adoption of digital technology within the film industry to distribute or project motion pictures as opposed to the historical use of reels of motion picture film, such as 35 mm film. Whereas film reels have to be sh ...

grade

video projector A video projector is an image projector that receives a video signal and projects the corresponding image on a projection screen using a lens system. Video projectors use a very bright ultra-high-performance lamp (a special mercury arc lamp), X ...

alternately projects right-eye frames and left-eye frames, switching between them 144 times per second. The projector is either a

Texas Instruments Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) is an American technology company headquartered in Dallas, Texas, that designs and manufactures semiconductors and various integrated circuits, which it sells to electronics designers and manufacturers globa ...

Digital Light Processing Digital Light Processing (DLP) is a set of chipsets based on optical micro-electro-mechanical technology that uses a digital micromirror device. It was originally developed in 1987 by Larry Hornbeck of Texas Instruments. While the DLP imagin ...

device or

Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

's reflective LCOS (

liquid crystal on silicon Liquid crystal on silicon (LCoS or LCOS) is a miniaturized reflective active-matrix liquid-crystal display or "microdisplay" using a liquid crystal layer on top of a silicon backplane. It is also referred to as a spatial light modulator. LCoS was ...

). A push-pull

electro-optical Electro–optics is a branch of electrical engineering, electronic engineering, materials science, and material physics involving components, electronic devices such as lasers, laser diodes, LEDs, waveguides, etc. which operate by the pr ...

liquid crystal Liquid crystal (LC) is a state of matter whose properties are between those of conventional liquids and those of solid crystals. For example, a liquid crystal may flow like a liquid, but its molecules may be oriented in a crystal-like way. Th ...

modulator called a

ZScreen ZScreen is a push-pull electro-optical liquid crystal modulator that is placed immediately in front of the projector lens or computer screen to alternately polarize the light from each video frame. It circularly polarizes the frames clockwise for ...

is placed immediately in front of the projector lens to alternately polarize each frame. It circularly polarizes the frames clockwise for the right eye and counter-clockwise for the left eye. The audience wears circularly polarized glasses that have oppositely polarized lenses that ensures each eye sees only its designated frame. In RealD Cinema, each frame is projected three times to reduce flicker, a system called triple flash. The source video is usually produced at 24 frames per second per eye (total 48 frames/s), which may result in subtle ghosting and stuttering on horizontal camera movements. A

silver screen A silver screen, also known as a silver lenticular screen, is a type of projection screen that was popular in the early years of the motion picture industry and passed into popular usage as a metonym for the cinema industry. The term silver scree ...

is used to maintain the light polarization upon reflection and to reduce reflection loss to counter some of the significant light loss due to polarization filter absorption. The result is a 3D picture that seems to extend behind and in front of the screen itself.

References

External links

*
Who is Lenny Lipton?
About Inventor and Chief technical officer of RealD through 2008 {{Stereoscopy, state=expanded Motion picture film formats Film and video technology 3D imaging 3D cinema

Technology

See also

References

Further reading

External links