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Topic: Laser-powered Dolby 3D

Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-04-2014 10:25 PM

I don't mind the collecting so much, it's the washing that's a hassle. We have "hard water" here and the wash process leaves spots on the glasses. We wipe'em down after every wash. I've tried quite a few different things in the water to minimize the spots, and sometimes we'll get lucky and have a load that's basically spot-free, but it's rare. I'm not sure why that is.

I'd think disposable Dolby glasses could be made cheap enough if the quantity was in the hundreds of millions, the way it is with Real D.

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Peter Castle
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 220
From: Wollongong University, NSW ,Australia
Registered: Oct 2003

posted 04-05-2014 12:48 AM

One of the things to note about Christie's 6P solution is that they are not standard Dolby 3D glasses they are using. The colour frequencies of the lasers are different to the filters used in Dolby 3D. The glasses are just being made for Christie by Dolby (or whoever Dolby uses).

At Cinemacon, it took me quite a long conversation with the Christie rep to realise that the individual projectors only have 3 lasers in them and that the 6P was just hype. Any company making 3-laser projectors could just as easily make matched pairs of projectors with different frequency lasers.

The resulting image was quite good at the increased brightness - the files had been adjusted for the higher lumens - but I'm still in the active glasses camp.

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Lyle Romer
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1400
From: Davie, FL, USA
Registered: May 2002

posted 04-05-2014 05:32 AM

quote: Marco Giustini
The quantity of 3d glasses a cinema disposes every day is ridiculous. I appreciate the extra hassle of the reusable ones, but we live on a planet and we don't have a spare one AFAIK.

I'm all for reuse/recycling where it makes sense but lets not be overly dramatic. I don't think people comprehend how big the earth is and how little space things like waste really take up. There was a show I saw a few years ago that showed that all the waste produced by the USA (without recycling) for the next couple of hundred years could fit on one landfill that just made a small square in the middle of a state on the map they showed.

Plus, even if used 3D glasses were just thrown randomly on the ground, it would look like shit (or look like Mumbai) but it wouldn't "destroy the earth."

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Marco Giustini
Film God

Posts: 2713
From: Reading, UK
Registered: Nov 2007

posted 04-05-2014 05:40 AM

Mike,

I'm sure a water softener is perfectly capable of removing the limescale from any water, you just need the right device and the right dosage of products.
The rest is massively OT so I will just say that AFAIK human beings have not planned to leave earth yet and we may be all living on this planet for more than a couple of centuries.

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Carsten Kurz
Film God

Posts: 4340
From: Cologne, NRW, Germany
Registered: Aug 2009

posted 04-05-2014 07:35 AM

quote: Peter Castle
One of the things to note about Christie's 6P solution is that they are not standard Dolby 3D glasses they are using. The colour frequencies of the lasers are different to the filters used in Dolby 3D. The glasses are just being made for Christie by Dolby (or whoever Dolby uses).

This is the same for Barcos Dolby 3D as well. As is for Sonys Dolby 3D solution, they all need special tailored filters for the specific spectrum.
Actually these manufacturers wouldn't even need to go with Dolby, I think they are only doing it to have a brand attached to it. Though it may be that Dolby has exclusive rights for Infitec technology in cinemas. However, I wouldn't even be sure if LIP based color separation would fall under the Infitec patent.

These glasses are actually being made by Iridian Spectral Technologies in Ontario.

- Carsten

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Marco Giustini
Film God

Posts: 2713
From: Reading, UK
Registered: Nov 2007

posted 04-05-2014 11:03 AM

Didn't Panavision use the same technology?

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Harold Hallikainen
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 906
From: Denver, CO, USA
Registered: Aug 2009

posted 04-05-2014 11:42 AM

Is this a two projector system? 3 different lasers per projector for a total of 6 wavelengths? Does anyone know the wavelengths being used? Are all laser-based projectors using the same wavelengths? What did they do to get rid of speckle? Is the FDA fine with these?

Yhanks!

Harold

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Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-05-2014 05:14 PM

Marco,

Yes... Panavision used a similar technology for their 3-D system for both film and digital but it was considerably more efficient than the standard Dolby 3-D system is. I do not know who made the filters for Panavision.

Mark

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Marcel Birgelen
Film God

Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012

posted 04-07-2014 05:58 PM

quote: Lyle Romer
There was a show I saw a few years ago that showed that all the waste produced by the USA (without recycling) for the next couple of hundred years could fit on one landfill that just made a small square in the middle of a state on the map they showed.

I guess the big deal with recycling isn't the amount of space it takes up if you dump your waste somewhere. If it isn't toxic and somewhat stable, someone will always be in need for some cheap landfill too... And if you incinerate it at high temperatures, the volume will even shrink further.

Recycling is much more about the fact that resources aren't endless and the plastics used in 3D polarizer glasses belong to the kind of materials that aren't endlessly available and are mostly easily recyclable with modern processes.

What I don't understand is why Dolby doesn't provide an adequate cleaning solution themselves? Why don't they offer some kind of dishwasher, trays that allow easy stacking and loading, cleaning and water softening agent that's proven to work and doesn't leave all kinds of nasty stains that need additional manual cleaning?

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Carsten Kurz
Film God

Posts: 4340
From: Cologne, NRW, Germany
Registered: Aug 2009

posted 04-07-2014 06:57 PM

Hi Harold,

nothing is standardized yet for the LIPs, though through common physical conditions it may be that different manufacturers would use identical wavelenghts.

As far as I know, Barco uses a single projector emitting 6 wavelengths, while Christie uses a dual projector setup. Barco is probably able to use both RGB triples in parallel for 2D if needed.

Speckle is reduced by using different approaches. One major is 'mixing' or 'clustering' - using multiple laser light sources.

Regarding the FDA - they are working on it. NEC has a smaller projector with just enough power to not fall under regulations. The few existing prototype installations are operating under exemption rules.

http://lipainfo.org/

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Lyle Romer
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1400
From: Davie, FL, USA
Registered: May 2002

posted 04-08-2014 05:25 AM

quote: Marcel Birgelen
Recycling is much more about the fact that resources aren't endless and the plastics used in 3D polarizer glasses belong to the kind of materials that aren't endlessly available and are mostly easily recyclable with modern processes.

Well, there are "bio-plastics" made from things like corn. I'm not anti-recycling, I am just bothered when people make it sound like we will destroy the earth if we don't recycle. Metals especially are a shame not to recycle every bit because they are theoretically infinitely recyclable and it takes much less energy to do so than to make new metal from ore. Unfortunately, recycling plastics is largely a one generation type thing where it is used for things like floor mats or parking lot stops.

quote: Marcel Birgelen
What I don't understand is why Dolby doesn't provide an adequate cleaning solution themselves? Why don't they offer some kind of dishwasher, trays that allow easy stacking and loading, cleaning and water softening agent that's proven to work and doesn't leave all kinds of nasty stains that need additional manual cleaning?

I've never understood why they didn't do this at the beginning. I'm sure they could design a machine that lets you just dump the glasses in and it stacks them in a tray for you. If Dolby had disposable glasses, they would have the best 3D solution hands down. Especially for a large/busy complex, collecting and cleaning the glasses is a real pain.

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Steve Kraus
Film God

Posts: 4094
From: Chicago, IL, USA
Registered: May 2000

posted 04-08-2014 09:52 AM

This answers the question I had all along with Dolby 3D and laser light source projectors.

Dolby works by applying the principle that human vision works in three colors but does not differentiate much within each of the colors. Thus, using special filters, they can give one eye a sliver of the red spectrum, a sliver of the green and a sliver of the blue while the other eye gets a different part of the red spectrum, a different part of the green, and a different part of the blue. Each eye gets full RGB color but different wavelengths and thus the filter glasses can separate the colors and deliver different images to each eye.

The issue for laser is that laser light is mono chromatic. Three lasers give you RGB but only one point on the spectrum for each color. So by using six lasers, two different reds, two different, greens and two different blues, the problems is neatly solved and increases brightness to boot. Nice.

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David Buckley
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 525
From: Oxford, N. Canterbury, New Zealand
Registered: Aug 2004

posted 04-08-2014 07:59 PM

Thank you Steve for that clear explanation of how Dolby 3D works.

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Marco Giustini
Film God

Posts: 2713
From: Reading, UK
Registered: Nov 2007

posted 04-08-2014 11:48 PM

Dolby do recommend a couple of dishwashers and the cleaning procedure (and detergernts) has been approved to work well with their glasses. They also designed a bespoke tray.
As far as I know if the proper procedure is followed and the right amount of chemicals is used, they work quite well.

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