3D Vision Blog

One of the common complaints by the new to 3D users from the usual 3D video players such as the 3D Vision Video Player and the Stereoscopic Player is that they lack some features that have been common for quite a while on other 2D video players like Media Player Classic, KMPlayer, GOM Player, VLC etc. Unfortunately none of these few very popular and widely used media players does have full stereoscopic 3D video support, but some of them do have some useful features for people watching 3D videos as well. I’m going to be talking about the GOM Player here, as it is one of the first to implement some stereo 3D-related features in its official version and more specifically 3D subtitle support. This means that when playing back 3D video sin Side by Side or Over/Under format you would be easily properly overlay 2D text subtitles over the video in a proper format, so that you would get 3D subtitles displayed at screen depth. An easy to use functionality built into the GOM Player that everyone can use without having to go through adding additional filters and configuring them as is the case with using the ffdshow subtitles filter for example, but also not as flexible and as functional as the external ffdshow filter for subtitles.

To activate the 3D subtitles support in the GOM Player you need to right click on the video player, select the Subtitles menu, 3D Subtitles Mode and choose Disabled for 2D subtitles, Left/Right Mode for Side by Side and or Top/Bottom Mode for Above/Below videos. Have in mind that the choice you’ve selected remains until you close the player or select something else, so even if you play a 2D video after watching a 3D video with activated 3D subtitles support, the subtitles will still be shown “doubled” in the 2D video, so you would have to switch to 2D mode. Closing the player and then running it again however resets the 3D Subtitles mode to the default Disabled state, meaning the normal 2D video support.

When switching the subtitles to a different mode for 3D videos the on-screen messages overlayed on the video from the player also change correspondingly to reflect the 3D format of the video being used. What is left however is to also do the same with the playback controls of the player at the bottom of the screen that still render in 2D. So a job well done for the authors of GOM Player, but there is more to be desired in terms of stereoscopic 3D support that can be added in the software. Have in mind also that the 3D Subtitles functionality of the GOM Player is only useable for playing back 3D videos with subtitles on 3D HDTVs with manually activating Side by Side or Above/Below input mode. GOM Player does not support HDMI 1.4 frame packaging or frame sequential output for 3D content and is not compatible with stereoscopic 3D solutions such as the 3D Vision, so it is not a complete replacement for the 3D Vision Video Player or the Stereoscopic Player, just an alternative that you may use in some cases.

- To download and try the latest version of the free GOM Player with 3D Subtitle support…

Peter Wimmer has just released a new version of his Stereoscopic Player, one of the most popular, widely used and innovative solutions for playing back 3D videos in different formats on different types of 3D-capable setups. So it is no winder that the International 3D Society has also recognized the importance of this piece of software, and thus it is among the 14 companies and organizations that are going to be honored in the 2012 3D Technology Awards. The latest Stereoscopic Player version 1.7.8 adds support for 2D+depth input format, so if you are interested in testing some clips using this format you should now be ale to with the latest version. I’m reminding you that the Stereoscopic Player comes with a free evaluation version with some limitations, so you can try it before you decide if it works for you and should you buy a license for the software.

- To download the just released new Stereoscopic Player version 1.7.8…

Peter Wimmer, the author of the Stereoscopic Player, has released another interesting and useful 3D tool, namely the MVC to AVI Converter that can convert MPEG Transport Stream files (*.mts and *.ssif) as well as MP4 files (*.mp4) that use the new H.264 MVC codec used in Blu-ray 3D discs as well as some consumer 3D camcorders into AVI files with different compression. The idea of the converter is that it can easily convert the still hardly supported by any editors H.264 MVC 3D video files into a format that is widely accepted and can be easily used. Have in mind that this tool is not a Blu-ray 3D ripper and it will not remove any content protection that might be applied to a Blu-ray 3D media, the software is targeted more for users of 3D cameras that record in the MVC 3D format.

The Multi-view-coding (MVC) H.264 encoding format is slowly starting to get adopted by more devices and software, but still working with 3D video files in it can be a real pain. So with the help of the MVC to AVI Converter you can get two separate AVI files, one for the left and one for the right eye as well as the original or PCM decompressed audio in the left video file that you can easily import in your favorite video editor or further process to make them in Side by Side format for example. The tool supports different codecs that you have installed on your system for the video compression, so you have some flexibility.

Have in mind that the MVC to AVI Converter is a commercial software, but you can download a free trial version to try, it however places a watermark on the outputted video, so it is just for testing, before deciding if you need it. A private non-commercial license will cost you 19 Euro (~27 USD) and for a commercial license for the software you will have to pay 49 Euro (~70 USD).

- To download and try the MVC to AVI Converter 0.2.0 software…
- And here you can download a short test MVC H.264 compressed video…