[WIP] Able to capture gameplaying in stereo using two vcr's

[Likay]

I'm interested in capturing gameplay in stereo in acceptable framerates.
Main reason for doing this is to give people a hint how gaming in true-3D is.

Fraps is way to slow to work and it probably haven't the ability to capture both channels anyway.
(It might work with Dragons Hook/Over-Under and capturing with fraps but i'm feeling very lengthy here. )

I plan to make the videos in crosseyed format. The advantage is that no extra HW equipment is needed. Backside: It might take some time to learn it. Personally i had no problems getting crosseyed images to work and pretty soon managed to watch videos too. Tip: Train on pictures first!! Freke has an excellent guide for crosseyed technique and 3D-pictures on his site for viewing.

The idea is to capture both channels during gameplay with vcr's (have two of them already). To do this i need 2 pcs of VGA-to-TV-converters. Found two relatively cheap ones. (http://www.misco.se/?420136) for about 35 Euros each. Attached cables were VGA-to-VGA, USB-power plug (needed to provide the device with power), Composite cable RCA-to-RCA and one S-Video-to-S-Video so it was quite a nice deal anyway. There is a chance that only one box might be needed and i could use the TV-output from the graphiccard for the other but what the.... hehe. The advantage of this setup is high framerates in the video. Backside: Quality since i have to record to vcr's and then record it back to the computer. Syncing: But that is probably solved by setting an "editing point" for ex. exiting a menue or something in the game while playing.

I start with connecting everything to the comp and one of the vcr's. Works ok but the recorded quality from the vcr is terrible. Picture from the VGA-TV-converter looks good on the telly so i think my vcr might be in line for a thoroughly cleansing. I used those vcr's years ago... lol.

Made a mistake during the evening and managed to connect the device to wrong output of the graphiccard.. Result: couldn't see the signal from the tv-card but i found out realtively fast that movies only shows on one of the channels from the graphcard. Caused me a little headscratching though.
I have experience from this when watching movies in vlc: I have to use "Clone filter" to make the picture to be shown on both projectors. One cool thing: When watching movies i can adjust the screen settings (side adjust) of the projectors and get a 3D-effect! (The movies are not in 3D but the movie appears to be in front of or behind the screen itself. Backside: You need glasses (polarized in a polarized rig) to see this).

So, now i have everything going on the hardware i think. Just have to clean the vcr's and hope that the other vcr is ok too.

cheers

[Jahun]

Good work!
Keep us up to date and if do you succeed, post alot!

One thing to keep in mind: I think the vcr's will run at different (slight) speeds. You may have thought about this already, but when you are done recording and have them digital again, put them in Adobe Premiere or so, and tweak the speeds of both to be better matched...

[Likay]

Actually i'm aware of that but the vcr's usually sync well. Recording a movie for 5 minutes should give no syncproblems. However there's another problem: The refresh rate from the computer is 60Hz+ and the refresh rate of captured videos is 24 Hz... When recording i might get timeshifting between the channels which cannot be adjusted else than doing a completely new recording. The timeshifting will be at maximum 1/48 second (if i edit the thing right) and might not be noticeable. Note: Might not! hehe, like i never have heard that phrase before.

edit: One funny thing here. I was able to capture gameplay with 2 vcr's and make a x-eyed-movie from it but the quality from the vcr's are kinda crappy. Not the worst problem though. It seems like when i play games on the big screen i only need a few percent separation as i need when viewing a little small screen in a mediaplayer. Which means i have to capture these movies with very high separation... (ouch, my eyes...). I figure some way out though. Might just turn one of the beamers off and play mono for awhile. lol

cheers

[Likay]

Yep. Allthough my computer freezes all the time i managed to capture gameplay in stereo for crosseyed vision! Only made a test video so far with the convergence and separation way too high. A little disturbing to watch the vid with this high separation so i'm soon gonna go for more decent settings.

Looking forward to post some examples soon.

cheers

[Freke1]

this is going to be the best 3D gamevideos ever...

[Jahun]

Likay, great work!


May I request plz also anaglyph versions?? Some people may have glasses like that lying around from Dino 3D books etc..

Although I can do crosseye easily.. it tends to stick for a little on me.. not really a nice feeling

[Likay]

Well, if you play these in the stereoscopic player you can choose anaglyph. But: The quality is not great. If you're viewing these on a screen it might be a disappointment. Capturing from videos is not the best method i guess lol. But my intention was to make movies for crosseyed viewing at first so fps is more important and for this it's quite enough... Anyway: Here's some samples without sound (I still have ALOT to learn).:

http://rapidshare.com/files/51497700/Pre.rar.html

Samples in RAR: Sonic Heroes, T-Rex in Tomb Raider Anniversary, Shiny's Sacrifice (Just because i really love the intro! Haven't played the game though). I have some excessive stereosettings in Sonic Heroes but that's quite ok. Same with The T-Rex-scene. But if i simply edit cut some scenes with Lara away this will be fine too.

For viewing crosseyed, simply open them in your favourite player (vlc, mpcl or whatever). Maximize the window and sit about two meters from your monitor for least eyestrain. (Check our youtube group and Frekes tutorial on howto when it comes to viewing crosseye vision. Test on pictures first to learn how. Then go for vids!). Freke also have a great homesite with both tip and a lot of stereoimages.

Else, open them in the stereoscopic player, choose right image first and then your desired viewing method.

cheers

[Likay]

Now tinkered a bit more with it. The quality now is better than before (and filesize also bigger.. ). I changed the ingame refresh rate to 72Hz for better syncing with the recorders 24 Hz. Recorded twice with good results. Still: Remember that vcr's work with 625 scanlines and that is about the same as 800x600 resolution! The picture can never be better than that using vcrs. There's also some noise in the pictures caused by the vcr's. Not the best quality on them i suppouse .
Now the problem is capturing sound... I record stereo to one vcr to make the sound synced.. However when i merge the vids in the Stereomoviemaker it separates L/R-sound according to L/R-video . Since i only have sound on one vcr (want to keep it that way since the ears are very sensitive for timeshift) only one channel gets to the stereomovie. Now i plan to rip the stereoaudio from the original file. After that merge the sound to the readymade stereomovie and hopefully be able to sync sound well. Looking forward to post better videos than the others soon!

When it's going i think i'll make anaglyph movies as well. It's true that some people still have some of these glasses around too. Thanks for the heads up Jahun!

Cheers

[Jahun]

!!! sorry totally missed this one, downloading now!


And yeah I meant a anaglyph one, for instance to put up on Youtube (ieks! compression kills anaglyph a bit but still). To attract people that do not have stereoscopic players..

[Jahun]

Ok, now I was preparing from some really low depth, heavy artifacted/ghosted stuff, but this is actually really cool! (playing it with anaglyph on my 19" screen)

And I love the T-rex versions!

When she points the guns out of the screen, that rocks! Nice stuff, keep it coming I play the movie not at full screen though, more 1/4th, but that is perfectly fine.


One note, when she points the guns out of the screen, the effect is quite strong. Stronger than it would be on my projectors! And I think I know why, and would like to hear your take on this:


My projectors are not strong, so I play in total dark. This way they are really fine. But just as a test, I played with a light on. Now the view was really deteriorated because I had so much ambient light showing on the screen, but it gave me a reference frame, my surroundings. Then, when in HL2 something sticks out of the screen, my eyes can place it better. So I can't play that way (untill I get SPAR's and a subtler lamp) but it did show better out of screen 3D due to reference.

I think this works best on things in the middle, out of screen 3D at the edge deteriorates a bit maybe from that the frame shows you it can't be sticking out..

But now I see your T-rex movie on my screen here, and the popout is strong too, I guess due to reference from all the screenclutter etc around it and that my room here is lit..


Please let me know what you think and how it compares with your projection system... Maybe I should start playing in projection 3D with a very faint lamp behind my screen, lighting up the wall behind it a bit, but not showing on the screen as much...

[Likay]

I made these vids mainly for crosseye and for those a stronger separation is needed to get good visual quality. Try vieweing crosseye and see. I probably have to capture totaly different versions for x-eye and for anaglyph.

cheers

[Jahun]

Well, that wasn't really my point.......

But it worked perfect with anaglyph, so don't feel like cross eye. Can try if you really want to.


Again, it was nice in anaglyph. Oddly enough I had very very little ghosting.

[Likay]

Well... i think i'm starting to see the end of the tunnel here... . There's a lot of trouble doing this way. In a matter of fact there seems to be only one advantage here and that is good framerate.
I have issues with image quality: mainly differences between the vcr recording quality, framesyncing which doesn't seem possible to do perfect. The sound is also another story.. lol

Anyway, here's some results:

Tomb Raider Anniversary: Captions from the Lost Valley (not with same high separation as before so it looks nicer in the stereomovieplayer). No big stereoeffect in x-eyed viewing though.

http://rapidshare.com/files/54360602/Lo ... a.avi.html
http://rapidshare.com/files/54362758/Lo ... b.avi.html
http://rapidshare.com/files/54364392/Lo ... c.avi.html


If there are any problem with playing the files: Try install the latest fdshow. If viewing x-eyed vlc does the jobb well.

Going to post vids from other games too when time gives permission.

Request: Some help from someone who have experience in anaglyph viewing: Which settings should i use in the stereomoviemaker for best anaglyph? (Don't have own glasses but i do have some discofilters somewhere. )

cheers

[sharky]

hi likay!

Tjaba!

for anaglyph you can use "stereo movie maker" its in the download section! there you just need to set anaglyph in the output settings, select the two clips and the software makes everything for oyu..

bye

[Likay]

Oh yes, i know! I already use that software for making these movies. Regarding anaglyph: There are different colors of the filters. Which ones are the most common? red/green, red/cyan?. Should i use anaglyph grey or anaglyph color? I believe that A-grey probably gives better 3d but maybe not. And so on. (More or less you might say i waiting for Jahun to guide me a bit. )

[Freke1]

Best 3D gamevideo EVER. Great work. It works well crosseyed too.
Congrats They should definitely be on Youtube.

[Likay]

Well, i kinda like these games hehe. Here's captures from Tomb Raider Legend: Bolivia.
Side by side, right image first.

Versions for crosseyed viewing (chunked in 5 minutes parts):
http://rapidshare.com/files/55925858/Bolivia_1.avi.html
http://rapidshare.com/files/55928954/Bolivia_2.avi.html
http://rapidshare.com/files/55933002/Bolivia_3.avi.html
http://rapidshare.com/files/55940379/Bolivia_4.avi.html

ps: Working on a-glyph for these too.

Next vid will probably be HL2.

cheers.