Life in 3-D

I've been somewhat fascinated with 3-D pictures since middle school when I learned how to draw 3-D pictures using the right shade of red and blue pencils. Since learning how easy it is to to make 3-D pictures with Gimp (free, powerful picture editing software), I've been experimenting with 3-D pictures.

All you need is two pictures of the same thing from slightly different angles. Then you take the red channel out of the right eye view, take the blue and green channels out of the left eye view, then lay them on top of each other so they both show. You will need to align the pictures (easiest while wearing 3-D glasses) so the subjects are even vertically, but parallel horizontally. (That sounded kind of confusing).

Of course its most effective and enjoyable if you have red/blue 3-D glasses. You can make some for yourself, or you can take the easy route like we did and buy Shark Boy and Lava Girl 3-D and/or Spy Kids 3-D.

Here are a few fruits of my experimentation:

This is a scene on the sea side of the 'Fort to Sea Trail' where you can retrace the probable path that Lewis and Clark took to go from Ft. Clatsop (Astoria, OR) to Sunset Beach. Trees do a great job of showing depth.

This is a crawl tube made from a tree trunk consumed by lava from Mt. St. Helens. As the lava cooled, the downed tree trunk burned out leaving these tubes.

Here I attempted a 3-D person picture. Usually its nearly impossible to get kids to hold the same position and pose for two pictures from different angles. Fortunately we had a second camera. My wife took a picture with one camera and I took a picture with another camera. Unfortunately, the camera's were spaced too far apart, so although this looks very much 3-D, its not realistic 3-D.

If you were a little bug climbing on the thick, soft moss of the Oregon Coast, this is what you would see.

Nasa.gov has some great 3-D pictures from the Mars Rovers. If you want to see what its like to stand on Mars...this is where you go. Its quite amazing. They also have 3-D pictures of the sun (don't worry its not as bright as the sun.)