Multi-Lens 3D Display Might Change The Depth Of Our TVs Forever

At the movie theater, we often have the option to either watch the movie in 3D or plain 2D. The option to watch movies in 3D was propelled by the heavily successful movie Avatar. It was one of the greatest breakthroughs in cinematic history to introduce the 3D format into theaters all over the world. But when it comes to our TVs at home, things are not moving so fast. That might change in the near future thanks to a multi-lens 3D display concept recently unveiled.

It is a research group at Tsukuba University that has developed a new kind of multi-lens display that allows for a whole new depth when watching the screen. Instead of artificially creating a sense of 3D space, this new prototype allows true 3D space from different viewpoints. What this means is that when you’re watching a movie, you can experience the movie from several different locations and get a different view of the entire movie. For someone on the left side of the screen, a holstered gun inside a suit might be visible for example, while for the person on the right side, the gun may remain hidden. Stuff like this could profoundly change how we watch movies in the future.

So far this new multi-lens display concept only allows for a resolution of up to 200 x 200 pixels, but the concept is said to be easily upgraded after more effort has been put into making the device less bulky. The focal depth of this new multi-lens display is achieved by enabling parallax viewing from 50 locations, 10 horizontally and 5 vertically. More advanced upgrades of this system could very well become gaming and entertainment displays for our homes in the near future.

The parallax viewpoint concept is not by any means new, but when it comes to the format of weaving horizontal with vertical focal points, this system has proven to create a far more immersive depth in videos and pictures. Once this multi-lens solution is up to consumer standards, we might see it implemented in our everyday products. But for now it remains a prototype that both inspires and predicts the future of display technology.

Tsukuba University’s Multi-Lens Parallax Display