Hardware
Above is a composite of the equipment used for the stereo projection - basically, a screen, two projectors, with polarising lenses in front of them. The two images are projected in register onto the screen. The whole system is run on a Mac with dual screens. Users wear polarising glasses which separate the left eye image from the right eye one. And thus a stereo image can be acheived. The first item is the speaker arrangement.
The equipment is a constraint of the project, and has already been purchased as follows:
- Apple 2*3.2 GHz Quad Core Intel Xeon with 10Gbyte 800Mhz DDR2 FB-DIMM memory.
- Display Card - NVIDIA Quadro FX5600 driving
- 2 SX+DLP, 1024 x 7668 @ 60Hz, DELL 1908FP Flat-panel monitors, and
- 2 ProjectionDesign Projectors. I am not clear at this stage, exactly which model of projector, since their ceiling mounting obscures that information. They are similar to, and most likely are the F20 sx+, (stereo display version).
- There is ancillary equipment, such as 200 pairs of stereo spectacles; but, above constitutes the main part of the system.
Software
Much of the software is Open Source.
- OpenScenegraph [OSG]
- OpenScenegraph is an Open Source Graphics Library for projection and manipulation of 3D models by addressing graphics cards directly.
See: http://www.openscenegraph.org/projects/osg/wiki/Support - Present3D
- Built upon OSG - an XML based interface for compositing 3D presentations.
See: http://www.openscenegraph.org/projects/Present3D/ - Blender
- Open Source 3D Animation/Modelling software
See: http://www.blender.org/download/get-blender/ - OSGexport
- is installed in Blender for exporting models to OSG format. OSGexport should be installed in Blender scripts folder.
Docs: http://vterrain.org/Doc/Blender/
See: http://projects.blender.org/projects/osgexport/ - Compilers
- Various compilers are used depending upon environment, and what's being compiled.
For the Interface mock-up I used Microsoft Visual Express C#
See: http://www.microsoft.com/express/vcsharp/. Robert Osfield, working on Macs, uses XCode. - Other
- Other software encountered during the project will noted in a subsequent Appendix.