TransCAIP: A Live 3D TV System Using a Camera Array and an Integral Photography Display with Interactive Control of Viewing Parameters

• Published in: IEEE transactions on visualization and computer graphics Vol. 15; no. 5; pp. 841 - 852
• Main Authors: Taguchi, Y., Koike, T., Takahashi, K., Naemura, T.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States IEEE 01.09.2009; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Cameras; Control systems; Conversion; display algorithms; Image converters; image-based rendering; Integrals; Layout; Photography; Pixel; Real time systems; Rendering; Rendering (computer graphics); Three dimensional; Three dimensional displays; Three dimensional TV; Viewing; Virtual reality
• ISSN: 1077-2626; 1941-0506
• DOI: 10.1109/TVCG.2009.30

The system described in this paper provides a real-time 3D visual experience by using an array of 64 video cameras and an integral photography display with 60 viewing directions. The live 3D scene in front of the camera array is reproduced by the full-color, full-parallax autostereoscopic display with interactive control of viewing parameters. The main technical challenge is fast and flexible conversion of the data from the 64 multicamera images to the integral photography format. Based on image-based rendering techniques, our conversion method first renders 60 novel images corresponding to the viewing directions of the display, and then arranges the rendered pixels to produce an integral photography image. For real-time processing on a single PC, all the conversion processes are implemented on a GPU with GPGPU techniques. The conversion method also allows a user to interactively control viewing parameters of the displayed image for reproducing the dynamic 3D scene with desirable parameters. This control is performed as a software process, without reconfiguring the hardware system, by changing the rendering parameters such as the convergence point of the rendering cameras and the interval between the viewpoints of the rendering cameras.