First-ever local 3D anaglyphs unveiled

Stills from Jago¿s existing educational productions that are already available in the market(Last Row) A 3D anaglyph clip of a submarine shown at the press briefing

For the first time in the country, a team of animation experts has started creating animated 3D anaglyphs -- commonly known as 3D movies. The team, Joint Animation Expert Group Organisation (Jago), demonstrated its expertise showing several 3D animation clips made by its members to a press conference recently.

What makes 3D anaglyph movies unique is their ability to make viewers feel they are inside the world they are watching. If the video is showing waves in a sea beach, viewers can get closer to see and feel the waves and return too. These special 3D animations give a real-life feeling of depth and distance of the view.

Three dimensional or stereoscopic images and movies are nothing new. In fact, the idea dates from as far back in history as to precede even the invention of photography. Binocular drawings came as early as in the 17th century. The images, when seen through tailor-made lenses, produced a blended composite that seemed to be three-dimensional.

In 1853 W Rollman made an exposition of the anaglyph technique called stereoscope, using drawings of blue and red lines on a black field. When people looked at the drawing through red glass on the left eye and blue on the right it seemed three-dimensional. The left eye would see the blue image appear black, while not seeing the red. Similarly, the right eye would see the red colour as black, while missing the blue. The resultant image perceived by the brain looked like a three dimensional one.

Combined with photography, this new medium of entertainment came very much into vogue, attracting even the British royalties. A stereoscope was presented to Queen Victoria.

Anaglyph became more popular with the advent of movies, when coloured film was used to reproduce the effect with viewers wearing the red and blue glasses. Right now, 3D is enjoying another round of boost and popularity, with the Mars landscape images coming from the Nasa and the movies like Spy Kids 3D, Shrek 3D, and James Cameron's Titanic 3D at the Imax.

The anaglyph technology has huge potential, both at home and abroad. Jago claims its work is comparable to those of the leading foreign artists except, of course, the multimillion-dollar films like Spy Kids 3D. Although that is a little overstatement, the team did come up with some impressive 3D clips at the press conference to back up their claim.

The most popular use of the technology is for entertainment. Three-D shows have already become popular here with the local theme-parks offering visitors anaglyph movies. Jago said it can offer local companies 3D movies of similar quality but at much lower costs. There are other commercial uses too: Architects and constructors, for example, can take their clients to a virtual 3D tour of the building or construction they have designed. It also has a wide range of educational uses, such as helping students to visualise concepts, complex diagrams and imaging.

Abroad its use is far wider. There are popular movie theatres and TV channels dedicated to 3D anaglyph movies and shows. The movies are a craze. Spy Kids 3D became a huge commercial success using anaglyph paper glasses in 2003. Polar Express, in 2004, used a superior method for 3D and the film earned $60 million, 14 times the income of its 2D version, which is unprecedented. Disney released its 2005 Chicken Little in digital polarised 3D in about 84 theatres and grossed nearly 3 times the income from its much-wider 2D release. Five new polarised 3D films are slated for release in 2006. Those include Monster House, The Ant Bully, Happy Feet, and Fly Me to the Moon. The use of anaglyph may see a great uplift should this crop of 3D films prove lucrative.

Jago hopes one day this will happen in Bangladesh too. "We now have the skill. Too bad we don't have the infrastructure. But we can make do with it if we get proper support from the local investors," Arif Ahmed, the CEO of Jago, said. "This is about the local animation industry. It's an industry with so much potential, we just can't afford not to help it grow." Indeed.

The team has not undertaken any big projects yet, as it would require several months to finish any 3D anaglyph animation of a standard length. It is currently looking for clients and sponsors willing to work with it. "This technology has a lot of potential, especially for the local animators. Like Japan and India, one day we too may start exporting 3D anaglyphs," Arif quipped.