Can I have 3D, please? (Zalman TriMon)

hansschmucker

Just got my new display yesterday and after a brief fight with NVidia's drivers I got it to work and well, ToMI doesn't work. Well, sort of.

I'm not sure if the problem is the result of a simple rounding error or a total incompatibility with the way newer versions of the TTT handle postprocessing and rendering buffers. If it's just the rounding error, it would be nice to see it fixed. If it's anything more complex: Leave it.

The thing is that ToMI apparently renders everything to a buffer that is not perfectly aligned with the display resolution... basically every pixel is offset by 0.5px in the y direction.

Since the TriMon uses a very simple scheme for 3D (splitting the images for each eye among even and odd lines) the result is that you get some very bad ghosting on both eyes.

Any information would be very welcome

--hans

hansschmucker

Oy, good news everybody:

I just purchased the iz3D driver and decided to try ToMI again. And what do you know: it works. Beautifully. We're talking about the cutscenes looking like a Pixar movie here (I know that 3D doesn't add any details, but you'd be amazed how the brain fills the blanks if it thinks that something is real).

Configuration is a bit problematic for some reason (basically while you're adjusting the depth, the image will sometimes flicker between two totally different depths, but once you enter a new scene, it will stick) and you have to turn auto-focus off, but then it works perfectly.

Also, the 2D parts of the interface are sometimes at the wrong depth (especially the dialog selection decorations and parts of the menu) and of course the mouse cursor is at a fixed position (so if you want to click on something that's not very close to the screen, you will see the mouse cursor twice, because your eyes can't focus on the item and the cursor at once), but nothing that will keep you from enjoying the game.

I wish I could capture a video of the intro and at least give you a glimpse via cross-eye or anaglyph encoding, but so far I haven't found a screen recorder that works with iz3D.

Badwolf

The whole idea of being able to play games in 3D like that sounds really cool.

I've been doing a bit of reading about it lately, but it's a pain that I can't just go on Youtube or whatever and see an example for myself, because of how it works.

I'm not sure how long it'll be before it really takes off, seeing as HD has barely even picked up steam here yet, but I can't wait til I can have a go with it myself.

LogicDeLuxe

They did seem to have changes between engines indeed. In Sam & Max, I use something about 7% separation and -0.5 convergence to have a comfortable 3D impression. For ToMI I use about 800% separation and -0.01 convergence to have a similar effect. Optimal values vary of course, depending on screen size and distance.
Autofocus is completely useless with Telltale Games, imho.
In both games, 2d objects not part of the scene are a bit troublesome indeed. Most annoying is the inventory in Sam & Max which is drawn in the far distance while the mouse cursor is not. It's far worse than the dialog selection box in ToMI.

And why record a video? Anyone should be able to try the iz3D driver. Color glasses anaglyph modes are free.

hansschmucker

For beginners I can really recommend the Zalman. It's cheap (€200 for 22 inch on Amazon) and easy to set up (just hook up the DVI cable and you're done). No incompatibility with different screens as you have with shutter glasses, no strange colors and no flickering.

Of course there are some issues as with any beginner solution:
1. You need polarized glasses (there are two delivered with the display) and not everybody likes wearing them.
2. The image is a little darker than usual, since every second line becomes black for each eye. It's not a big issue since the Zalman is very bright.
3. Move your head vertically, even only 2 or 3 inch and you'll get severe ghosting
4. There's some ghosting on areas with extremely high contrast (especially white on black).
5. The vertical resolution is divided by two in 3D mode.
6. No OpenGL games.

Still, I'm pretty satisfied. The biggest issue for now is that 3D movies are currently almost exclusively available with anaglyph encoding and I haven't yet found a player that will nicely convert them to interlaced format (I know, that would produce incorrect colors, but right now I'd say that it's better than nothing). So right now 3D is almost exclusively for games.

If you want to try it, I'd recommend looking at the 3D videos on youtube in cross-eye mode (for example this one). That's currently as close to the real thing as possible without equipment.

hansschmucker

LogicDeLuxe wrote: »

They did seem to have changes between engines indeed. In Sam & Max, I use something about 7% separation and -0.5 convergence to have a comfortable 3D impression. For ToMI I use about 800% separation and -0.01 convergence to have a similar effect. Optimal values vary of course, depending on screen size and distance.

Funny, for me it's a convergene of around -1.4 and a depth of 2-10...

LogicDeLuxe wrote: »

Autofocus is completely useless with Telltale Games, imho.
In both games, 2d objects not part of the scene are a bit troublesome indeed. Most annoying is the inventory in Sam & Max which is drawn in the far distance while the mouse cursor is not. It's far worse than the dialog selection box in ToMI.

Agreed.

LogicDeLuxe wrote: »

And why record a video? Anyone should be able to try the iz3D driver. Color glasses anaglyph modes are free.

I'm not exactly a big fan of anaglyph encoding. Often people think that the problems they're having with anaglyph would be "3d problems". Cross-eyed gives in my opinion a much better representation and it's easy enough for short clips if you're some distance away from your screen.