Over the years developers have come up with a multitude of ways to produce realistic-looking landscapes. Conventional three dimensional images are made on a computer screen by drawing multiple polygons and reassembling them on top of one another. This produces the illusion of movement through an actual real environment. In fact, graphics processing units have to calculate the positions of different objects in reference to one another in order to figure out where items might have collided had they been moving in the real world.
There was a time when programmers had to write these routines individually for each platform they wanted to support. Classic disk operating systems were often seen as the only way to gain enough control over a machine to actually produce an immersive environment. That’s why so many first person shooters and aircraft simulation games only ever came out for the most basic DOS-based platforms. Many modern 3D technicians have fond memories of getting their start developing custom mod packages for their favorite old time games.
The advent of commercial-grade open source graphics libraries made it possible to develop sophisticated 3D worlds on one machine and then port them to a variety of different platforms. Everything from game emulators to flight simulators take advantage of this kind of technology. Businesses that use 3D training software to teach their staffers how to do something in the real world will likely gravitate toward these libraries.
Entertainment industry insiders continue to push the envelope as far as software is concerned, however. Organizations can order a wide variety of 3D glasses in order to meet the needs of almost any situation. Those who plan to use conventional anaglyph 3D filters will appreciate paper frames, which are a great way to provide 3D images for individuals without requiring them to invest in a great deal of physical hardware.
Using this system, a computer program will present half of an image in red and another part of it in blue. Playing the two images on top of one another at the same time creates a stereo effect that’s roughly analogous to the way that dual-channel speakers make moviegoers sound like they’re really part of the action. Adventurous computer programmers have actually combined active 3D technology with stereophonic speakers in order to make individuals feel as though they’re inside of a game or movie.
Space program administrators have adopted a similar system for use with training individuals for orbital activities. Most individual consumers will probably look for something a little more grounded, but they can still use the same kind of equipment to provide solid home entertainment. As display chips become less expensive, some mobile app developers have even gotten in on the fun by combining their 3D technology with dual image displays. This makes it possible to produce 3D images so simple that consumers can use standard paper products to view them without any change to their screens.
Chances are good that more than a few developers are working on new applications that should shock the market in just the next few years.