Stereo Pictures

Stereo Pictures

Instructions

To picture gallery

Stereo viewing, the realization of the third dimension, is caused by the fact that our two eyes realize things from different viewing angles. The angle difference is defined by the distance between the eyes. Therefore each eye sees something slightly different from the other. Our brain is able to transfer these differences into a three dimensional impression.

While looking at a conventional photo, both eyes see the same picture, which disables stereo viewing. It's obvious that we need two pictures for three dimensional viewing, in fact one for the left and one for the right eye.

How can we achieve each eye only looking at „its“ picture without using additional optical equipment? Therefore we need to apply a trick:

Important remarks:

The width of one picture must not exceed the distance between your eyes.
Because of the short viewing distance the pixel structure of your monitor will be visible. The pictures are stored with a much higher resolution than corresponding to your monitor. Therefore you will get highly improved results when printing the pictures with a good photo printer; glossy photo paper will provide the best results. The picture gallery is divided into parts which each fit onto a DIN-A4 paper sheet.
Viewing the stereo pictures may be exhausting for your eyes. Don't do it excessively!

Try it:

Put your nose very close to the center between both pictures. Relax your eyes as if you were looking at something very far behind the picture. Don't try to focus!
Move away from the pictures very slowly. You will realize 3 unfocused pictures. Concentrate on the center picture, but still don't try to focus!

Further move away from the picture surface until you reach a distance of about 25 to 30 cm. Still don't try to focus consciously!
In the „center picture“ (which indeed consists of 2 different pictures) the informations for the left and the right eye are mixed. Concentrate on a distinct detail at about the center of the picture and try to make the both parts of the picture congruent.
After this you only need a little patience. The eyes will focus automatically and the third dimension will open nearly suddenly!
Experienced „stereo viewers“ may be able to omit steps 1 to 3.

Have fun!