Make Your Own 3D Photographs, Glasses

Step 1
3D vision is indeed an amazing thing and capturing content in 3D and then displaying it is something that doesn't fail to amaze. No wonder the shows are houseful whenever there is a 3D movie playing at the theater. While creating a 3D movie takes a bit of expertise, creating 3D photographs is a lot easier. All you need is some amount of photography skill, software to create 3D photographs using the clicked images, and some amount of skill of craftsmanship to make your own 3D glasses to view those photographs. We will show you in this step-by-step guide how you can achieve just that.

A. Click the photograph

This requires a digital camera and basic photography skills. The first thing that you have to do is to search for stationary objects to be photographed. You can even have humans as the subject, but make sure that they do not move for the few seconds that are required to click the photographs.

In order to make a 3D photograph, you need two photographs - one each for left and right eye perspective. This is done so that in the final 3D image, each eye sees what is intended for it, thus tricking the brain into believing that there is in fact one 3D view instead of two 2D photos.


Hold your camera in a horizontal position. Focus and click one photo. Make sure that the subject stays still, while you shift the position of the camera around 6 cm to the right, keeping the subject in focus at the exact same location of the field of view. Click the second photo.
Photo for left eye


Photo for the right eye

By now, you may have understood that the first photo is for the left eye, while the second one is for the right. Preview the images one after another to see if they are not offset too much from each other. This is necessary to create a good 3D photo.


Step 2
Create an anaglyph

Transfer the images for left and right to the PC and rename them appropriately to avoid confusion. Now download the software Anaglyph Maker from www.stereoeye.jp. This is a very small download (less than one MB). Extract the contents of the file to a folder and run AnaMaker.exe .

Click on Load Left Image button to load the left image along with a small preview in the window above the button. Do the same for the right image. Make sure that the images are at least 24-bit color, as this software cannot work with anything less. This is not an issue as the digital camera shoots in this mode.

Once both the images are loaded, make sure that you select Anaglyph Color (Red-Cyan), Anaglyph Red-Green or Anaglyph Red-Blue, depending on the type of anaglyph glasses you will make. You can even choose one of the last two options if you have LC-shutter glasses such as those included with NVIDIA GeForce 3D Vision kit. Click on Make 3D image button to make an anaglyph image. You can adjust the vertical position of the images using the U or D button. Similarly, you can adjust the horizontal position using L and R buttons. You can also adjust the brightness and contrast using the sliders.

The horizontal spacing of images will decide the depth of 3D image in the stereo window. You can actually control it in real time if you are wearing the anaglyph glasses. You must click on Make 3D image for this.


Now save the anaglyph image to your PC in the BMP or JPEG format by clicking on Save 3D image. To view this image, you need anaglyph glasses. We are going to explain how to make anaglyph glasses next.


Step 3
Make your own 3D glasses

This part is completely non-tech and requires you to use a little bit of your craftsmanship skills which have probably been lying dormant since your school years. Here is a list of materials required.

Materials required:

A sheet of card paper
A sheet of red, blue and green gelatin paper each
Pencil
Ruler
Scissors
Clear tape
Gum
Basic pattern for glasses as shown in the stencils.

The papers will cost you under 30 rupees, while the rest of it may be already present at your home. Follow these steps.

I. Print out or draw Stencil 1, 2 and 3 on a paper or directly print on the card paper. Cut out the sample pattern (including eyeholes) for your 3D glasses and tape the sides to the center section. You now have your stencil for the glasses.



II. Trace the stencil on the card paper. Cut the glasses out making sure to also cut out the eyeholes. Use a double layer of card paper, as a single layer may be too thin. Stick the identical layers of card paper to each other and let them dry. If you want, you can draw it directly on the card paper, but the stencil way is better, as it leaves no margin for error.

III. Tape the red (left) and green or blue (right) gelatin paper pieces to cover the eyeholes. Cut the gelatin paper so that it is a little larger than the opening for the eyes. Make sure that you use a double layer of the gelatin paper for each eye as a single layer may be too light. If you want to create Cyan, you can use one layer of green and one layer of blue gelatin paper.

That's it. Now you can create your own 3D photos and view them using your 3D anaglyph glasses.

Step 4
Do It Yourself
Left Eye View

Right Eye View