3d conversion

[adultmike]

H,
I just wonder and would like to know
1 what is the difference between hardware 3d tvset converter and pc software converters?
2 which is the best pc 3d software converter.
regards
mike

[Cornucopia]

First off, what do you mean by "hardware 3d tvset converter"?
Modern 3D TV sets don't necessarily "convert" (even though they must in essence do this for it to work).
They only accept a few common formats (hdmi 1.4 "framepacking", SbS, T/B, possibly Interlaced or Checkerboard), and they only output to a particular screen+glasses combination (Active LCS, Passive Circular Polarized).

Are you trying to convert in realtime for playback only or are you trying to convert file->file?


More info necessary, please...

Scott

[adultmike]

I just wonder if it is worthh trying to use one of the different pc software for 3d conversion. It is worth of doing it in comparison with reatime conversion (in terms of quality)?
Obviously, some algorithms are used in order to do it.... are there some differences between companies' methods (panasonic, sony, etc) or between pc software. Or even, is there any advantage in any of the formt sbs, t/b etc. I use active shutterglasses with panasonic tvset TXP42ST50 and sony bluray Sony BDP-S790.
I'm asking this question just for its own sake and just to get to know if it is worth of trying to watch realtime /file converted 2d blue ray on 3d (eg The Blue Planet documentary)? I know that it may depends on the movie bur it is just that?

mb

[fritzi93]

You could try it yourself with DVDFab. The 2D -> 3D conversion will work during the trial period. Output to SbS or T/B.

Personally, I think it does a poor job of it, not as good as the on-the-fly conversion by my LG 65LW600. Which is no great shakes either, so after playing with it a bit when I first got the TV, I don't bother with it any more.

Think about it; even some post conversions by studios (Clash of the Titans, Conan) have been slammed as being lousy jobs. How well do you think software widely available to hobbyists will do? Although there may be some that can do better than Fab, I dunno.

Now, if you mean 3D BD to 3D SbS or T/B, that's not so hot either, but try it and judge for yourself.

Good luck.

[Cornucopia]

2 issues here: 2D->3D and 3D->3D'

AFA 2D->3D, the only even half-way decent conversion is painstaking, exhaustive, expensive Hollywood conversion (and even that isn't close to perfect). All the rest "may fool some of the people some of the time" but that's about it. If you watch long enough you'll see inconsistencies, anomalies and bad renditions of 3D, even on stuff that earlier might have been somewhat passable. Tricks & techniques like Horizontal motion extraction, Frame differencing extraction, Horizon line & gradient assumption, motion-compensated extraction have their place but none of them are appropriate for all scenes.

Here's an example from real life:
My son very much enjoys our new 3DTV and he has a PS3 with a number of games. Some are 3D-compatible, some not. One day he wanted to play Skyrim in 3D. He had seen forums talk about how wonderful it was in 3D and was psyched to try it that way. Unfortunately, he didn't realize the finer points of this: Skyrim on a PC can use nVidia 3Dvision to play out to a TV in 3D (because the 3Dvision can read the 3D calls and 3D/VR mapping) but the version of Skyrim that plays on a PS3 has NOT been set up to be 3D compatible.
So he thought, "if I just TURN ON the 3D on the TV and put on the glasses, it'll be in 3D." What happened was that the PS3 "knew" the game couldn't do 3D and didn't generate the HDMI 1.4 SEI messaging to the TV that it should be in 3D, so the TV assumed that the 3D had to be manually set up - either in SbS, T/B or as 2D-3D. So he chose the 2D-3D without understanding what was going on.
I came home a couple of hours later and he told me all about how cool this 3D was, but that it was also "weird". I watched for about a hour with him (good bonding time), but knew after about 2 1/2 minutes that he had done the 2D->3D. Things that should have been "rounded" were flat, things that should have been flat were "rounded" or receding, items in the background were many times "in front of" items in the foreground and some things even had "inverted depth" (and this is after trying a L<>R swap). Of course, because of the nature of the game, it still was a cool experience, but it certainly didn't help with "depth perception" or expansiveness. I tried to explain afterward the difference, but he's a teenager and blew it off, so I let him assume it's 3D after all.

And that's with a new LG that has some of the BEST realtime hardware conversion available right now. So don't get your hopes up. Consumer/Prosumer software processes are WORSE.

AFA 3D->3D', you need to remember that the whole point ought to be maintaining the optimal quality throughout the chain. Modifying the layout should only be done WHEN NECESSARY. Nowadays, there are better, common standards for 3D sources and 3D storage format and 3D distribution and 3D display format. The best that's possible is to maintain full resolution & quality for both eyes up to at least the display device. There are already compromises built into some distribution channels however. Cable/Sat/Netflix+Streaming/OTA most often use SbS (~85%) or T/B (~15%). If they are already that way, they should STAY that way until they get modified for the display/glasses format (in realtime, by the hardware of the TV). BD3D is much better to start with, because you're getting (near) full quality for both eyes from the MVC encoding on the disc along with the HDMI Framepacking distribution, so even a conversion at the end for the display won't lose much quality, if any. Other forms and methods available on the web or from camcorders are much less compatible, so for those it DOES make sense to get them to a more standardized format if necessary. An exception to this for me is that I've got a Fuji W3 3D camcorder and it saves as DualStream AVI files. At least on MY LG TV, I can watch my home recordings in 3D, either through the HDMI cable from the camera, or coming from a USB/Flash/DNLA server/HD storage with that TV, so I don't have to do ANY conversion. Takes much less time & effort, quality is maintained, and I have lots of viewing options. Not all camera + TV combinations are so lucky.

If you need to do realtime conversion ON the PC, use something like Stereoscopic Player, StereoMovie Player or one of the BD3D player apps (Cyberlink, TMT, Corel WinDVD).
If you need to do conversion from file-to-file, use StereoMovieMaker, a Stereo-aware NLE like Vegas 9/10/11/12, or AVISynth scripts.

Scott