How to view 3D Stereo Pairs
The following pages feature parallel stereo pairs of views around Parramatta High School. They can be viewed two different ways - either with a viewer or without one.
You can skip straight to the first page of 3D images.
Or... have a brief glance at a historical aside on 3D images.
Without a viewer: The technique is similar to the one employed to view the popular "magic eye" style of stereograms.
  1. Some of the images can be viewed straight from the monitor. This depends on your system and on the flexibility of the tendons around your eyeballs! Hence it may be necessary to either print out the images or transfer them to a graphics package which will allow you to resize them to a convenient dimension.
  2. Look at the images from a distance of around 30cm. Allow your eyes to unfocus, and let the two images drift together. Watch one significant item in the view, controlling the drift of the images until they coincide.
  3. Carefully bring the images back into focus... without re-separating them. The 3D effect will be immediate and obvious.
stereo pair of badge Here is a fairly simple stereo pair of our school badge. It should be able to be brought into 3D satisfactorily on most monitors without a special viewer. (i.e."naked eye" straight from the screen)
With a viewer: This is a much more satisfactory option. Maybe you have a viewer already; if not, they are easy to make.
  1. You will need two small lenses with a focal length somewhere around 20-30cm. If you obtain a cheap plastic magnifying glass, you will probably find that the biconvex lens is actually two convex/flat lenses sandwiched together. If you separate these two, they generally make excellent lenses for this purpose.
  2. Mount the two lenses on a piece of cardboard, at a spacing of about 6-8cm. (68mm is optimal, but my big head needs about 75mm.)   Don't forget a cut-out for your nose!
  3. View the image through the viewer, moving to a distance at which the image is clear. Again, the 3D effect will be immediate and obvious.
It looks like this You might like to view a 1953 version of this device.
...or go to the first page of 3D images,
...or look at the how to view anaglyphs page.
Much more information about 3D photography can be found at the Stereoscopic home page.
This is an external (i.e. not PHS) link.
Click to return to home page
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