Let's imagine I was able to convert a Sputnik into a rotating
slit-scan stereo camera. Based on my initial estimates, the camera
would consume 2 rolls of 120 on a full rotation with the existing
lenses. The first roll would be the left eye, the 2nd roll would be
the right eye. 360 degrees of horizontal coverage and about 52
degrees of vertical coverage.

If these were developed and laid out on a light box with the left eye
strip on top and the right eye strip on bottom, could I view them with
a View Master PV4000 viewer?

The thing I first notice when I demonstrate MF 3D in a 3D world
viewer, is that people try to turn their heads left and right to see
more. If the PV4000 (or equivalent custom-built viewer) was on a
track, the viewer could slide left/right and pan through the entire scene.

You all have been doing this 3D thing a lot longer than I. Please
tell me the 100 things I don't know that make this impossible. Thanks!

The person who can probably answer all 100 is Michael Przewrocki:

._,_.___

amuderick wrote:

>
>
> You all have been doing this 3D thing a lot longer than I. Please
> tell me the 100 things I don't know that make this impossible. Thanks!
>

Well, I don't think it is impossible, but would the results be worth the
effort? The biggest problem would be the viewer itself. It's a nice
viewer for prints, but has no magnification. So viewing MF film would
be like looking at a very small print and the immersive power of MF film
and all the minute detail captured would not be in evidence. I have
used that viewer for stitched panoramic prints and it looks fine. I
have taken some 54mm? wide panoramic stereo slides with a Horizon 35mm
camera mounted in MF mounts and they looked OK. Also some 360 degree
digital stitched stereos that I never got to look quite right. Someone
had posted a site with 360 degree panoramas (digital anaglyph) in both
the X and Y planes and they looked very nice and were easy to scroll
around and zoom into. I have one of the 360 degree 35 mm film cameras
(spinshot maybe, it's somewhere deep in my closet) but never pursued it
further than a couple test shots. So I think using the Viewmaster 4000
would be best used with long roll paper prints or panoramic special
paper with images derived from MF/35mm/digital. However you could join
the ranks of the geniuses, some who are on this list, who could design
and build their own magnifying viewer for just this purpose.

Since video games are basically 3D worlds shown on a 2D screen, I see
great possibilities with the advent of higher definition, lower cost
stereo headsets, being able to take your stitched and digitized film or
digital images and create extremely immersive and explorable images.
Also there would be something very satisfying in actually turning your
head when viewing these. I remember wearing headsets like these in a
couple million dollar video arcades (both closed now) and the experience
and game playing was thrilling. The fact that half of the machines were
always down for repair probably led to their demise.

Dale Yingst

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