3D without (extra) headgear

Not much on the game development front to report today. I've been doing some modeling in preparation for my next project (or at least a pilot test of some concepts). Progress is slow so far. Even with a decent shortcut for character modeling, there's still a lot to learn. The hardest part has been keeping the model simple and clean so it doesn't have too many polygons and will deform properly once it gets into the game. Character design is quite tricky.

Regarding the title of this post, I saw an article this morning about a new television technology that can simulate 3D video without goggles. It basically sends two signals to the screen for every frame -- one contains the image itself, and the other contains a grayscale version of the image, which conveys the depth information. The grayscale image is used by a thin layer of...something...laid over the screen that tricks the eye into seeing depth where there isn't any. That's right, no 3D headgear required (except the round ones you've already got).

In addition to sounding quite cool, it struck me that this technology is reminiscent of bump mapping in games, which uses a similar grayscale image to trick your eye into thinking there's more detail on an object than there really is.

I think there's some amazing stuff coming in the next few years in computer interaction (multi-touch technology) and entertainment technology. It's hard to imagine the kinds of games we'll be playing in another five years, or on what kind of screen.