So you wa'na be a 3D Shutterbug?
The beginner's approach to taking stereo picture pairs
You can take stereo picture pairs with the camera you already own. In fact, a lot of the stereoscopic photos you can view here were taken without the luxury and expense of a stereo camera. Some hints:
Picture composition
Look for subjects featuring good depth cues. You'll want objects in the foreground, middle ground and background. Position yourself so that the objects in the foreground are no closer than about 5 feet. Keep the important background objects within about 30 feet. The stereo effect doesn't work well beyond about 60 feet, so don't expect to see all those trees and mountains in stereo.
Movement in the picture
Since you are going to take two pictures of the same scene, it is important nothing in the scene moves between both exposures, just the camera. Take your pictures in calm weather. Have your subjects hold still. Take your two pictures quickly to minimize any movement. If there are people or things moving in the background, you will have it ignore them when viewing the stereo pairs or edit them out with a photo editor.
Camera settings
It's good to have a fair amount of light so you can use a large f stop (small lens opening) and a slow shutter speed. A large f-stop will allow for a long depth of field with everything in focus. If you have to use a flash, you will find that in the 3D image, an object's shadow seem to be attached to the object. This is because the flash moves when you move the camera and that is not the way you see the real world. Keep the flash in the same place if you can, don't use a flash, or put up with this odd effect in the 3D image.
Aiming your camera
Always keep your camera pointed straight ahead. If you have a focus sight in the center of your view finder, point it at some object way in the background and when you take the second picture point the focus sight at the exact same place. Hold your at the same orientation both times. Be careful not to aim your camera higher or lower for the second picture because the geometric distortion of the camera lens will cause parts of the second image to not line up with their counterparts of the first image.
Moving your camera
It is important to take 2 pictures displaced only horizontally and about 2.5 to 3 inches apart. Take a comfortable stance, with your feet close together, and on level ground. Without lifting your feet, place your weight on one leg and snap a photo. Then lean on the other leg and snap the second photo. Remember, you need only the separation between your two eyes or about 2 ½ inches to get a good stereoscopic effect, and keep the film plane (the back of the camera) absolutely parallel to the scene. If you want to take hyper-stereo 3D photos of far off scenes, you can move to the side more that just 2.5 to 3 inches. A rule of thumb that makes good looking 3D images is that you can move to the side about 1/30 of the distance to the nearest object in the photo. If the nearest object (grass, tree branches, sidewalk, ETC) is 30 feet away, you could move to the side about 1 foot and still have a good 3D image.
Photo developing
Since you took the pictures at about the same time, the exposure and color content will be real close. The pictures will be in groups of two on the film and easy to locate when you get them back. Just take the film to your favorite developer and they will do the rest, while you wait anxiously to see how well you did.
Checking your 3D photos before scanning
When you get your photo prints back, you can view the prints in stereo by placing them on a flat surface, side by side, with the right view photo (the one you took when standing on the right leg) on the left and the left view photo on the right. (you might straighten out any curl so the photos lay down flat) Position your head directly over the photos and about 2 feet above. Stare at the both photos while crossing your eyes so that your left eye sees the right photo and the right eye sees the left photo. It helps to hold your thumb about 10 inches from your nose and while looking at the photos, focus on your thumb. You may have to move your thumb up and down some depending on the size of the photos. You may also have to tilt your head side to side a little, but when your eyes are aimed right, you will see 3 images and the one in the middle will be in stereo 3D. Crossing your eyes may feel real odd, but with some practice it becomes easier. (a bit of advice, from my older sister when I was about 6 "don't let your eyes get stuck crossed like that")
Preparing your photos for the computer
It may require a little scouting, but you will need to find someone with a photo scanner and some photo editing software. If you don't know how to use these items, a friend who does is also very handy. Scan in the right photo and give it a name with 'r' as the last letter (name'r') and scan in the left photo using the same name with 'l' as the last letter (name'l'). Make sure you use the same resolution to scan both images. If you use a PC and scan the photos in as windows bitmap images (*.BMP) you can use the simple-to-use (but short on features) program "Paint" that comes with Windows to do your photo editing. If you (or your friend) has one of the many commercial photo editing software tools, you have many other options and probably know all about how to use them. After you view the images, you may have to crop or tilt your images in the photo editor to make them line up when viewing them. Aligning your images is an iterative process where you edit and view, and edit and view --- until you get it right. When you have scanned in and edited your 3D photos, you should end up with 2 image files (namer.BMP and namel.BMP).
Time saving hints while scanning in photos
If you find that you tilted the camera when you took one of the pictures, it is much better to tilt the photo when you scan it, rather than trying to rotate the image in the photo editor. Generally photo editors don't rotate images very smoothly when rotating the images only a few degrees. When scanning in a photo (with a slight rotation) the scanner smoothes out the jaggy diagonal lines. It also saves time if you align the two photos one over the other, slightly rotating one photo if necessary, so that the horizon or some other distant feature in both photos are parallel. Then tape the photos together so they won't move when you put down the lid of the scanner, and scan them in at the same time. You can use the photo editor to separate and name the two images later. Scanning in the photos at the same time also gives them the same color map if you are using the *.BMP form in 8-bit color.
Digital cameras
If you like to own all the latest goodies, and have a new digital camera, you don't need the friend with the scanner and can ignore all the hints on scanning. You do need, however, to fix any rotation error with the photo editor (Ahh -- jaggies in the picture !!!), so don't rotate the camera when you take the photos. Your camera comes with a lot on cool software for editing images, like red-eye fixer, ETC.
Viewing your 3D image files
If you don't have LCD glasses and 3D viewing software, you can view your pictures on the monitor just like you did when view the prints. A much better way to view your pictures is to get some 3D-Spex LCD glasses, and the 3D-Pix software from NuVision Technologies Inc.. When you have 3D-Pix installed, just launch 3D-Pix, click: file, Open..., Stereoscopic image, and either your left or right files, put on your 3D-Spex and (like magic), you see your Expert (beginner's) stereoscopic image of ----(your Mother-in-law at the family reunion picnic ?).
Ma!
Now I are a 3D Shutterbug!
-- Enjoy --
The following is a place to get the 3D accessories to see 3D images:
NuVision Technologies Inc. Provider of 3D-SPEX and other items
Send me a note dwaco@gte.net
This site Copyright (c) DWACO Inc. 1997
