Glasses-Free 3D Comes To iPad 2 via Head Tracking [Video]

3D is all the rage these days, whether that be displays or cameras, with Nintendo’s 3DS mobile gaming console one of the few to offer glasses-free 3D. Now thanks to research by Jeremie Francone and Laurence Nigay from the Laboratory of Informatics of Grenoble at the EHCI Research Group, Apple’s iPad 2 is getting in on the action.

iPad 2

As you can see from the video, the iPad tracks the user’s head movements via its front camera and uses that data – and not the accelerometer – to create the 3D effect. The iPad then alters the displayed image based on this information to create a 3D image on-screen. Clever stuff!

We track the head of the user with the front facing camera in order to create a glasses-free monocular 3D display. Such spatially-aware mobile display enables to improve the possibilities of interaction. It does not use the accelerometers and relies only on the front camera.

What’s perhaps the most amazing of all is just how well the 3D effect translates to video!

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(via MacStories)

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