Integration of Three Dimensional Camera and Three Dimensional Display Technologies

The world around us is three dimensional (3D), yet all the conventional cameras and display systems are capable of acquiring and displaying only two dimensional (2D) images. This fundamental restriction greatly limits the capability of human being in perceiving and understanding the complexity of real world objects. Under separate efforts in the past, our team has developed technologies for a novel high speed 3D Camera and a true volumetric 3D display device. The unique features of our 3D Camera include the capability of providing instantaneous, full frame 3D range images at a CD camera's frame rate (30 frames per second or faster), a capability that no other currently available 3D image acquisition systems or 3D rangefinders can achieve at any cost. Our 3D display device is able to generate volumetric 3D patterns in true 3D space by a set of activated voxels that emit light. Besides no moving parts and high voxel bandwidth, additional advantages of our 3D display approach are all angle of view, simultaneous multiple user views, large viewing volumes, flexibility in voxel size and shape, inherent parallel architecture, and without the requirement of viewing spectacles. Despite the breakthrough made by our team and others in both 3D camera and 3D display technologies, there is no systematic effort reported worldwide to date to integrate the technologies of 3D cameras with volumetric 3D display monitors. This proposal will address the important issues related to this novel and unprecedented effort. The primary objective of the Phase I SBIR work proposed herein is to study the feasibility to seamlessly integrate a 3D camera system with a volumetric 3D display monitor, so that the integrated system can capture continuously 3D images of objects in the scene at a standard video rate (30 fps) and display the captured 3D images immediately on the 3D display monitor. In our Phase I effort, we will focus on the interface and 3D data exchange protocol between the 3D camera and 3D monitor. Both current designs of the 3D camera and 3D monitor will be modified and optimized. Preliminary experiments will be performed to validate the interface design. Using the phase I data and experience, we will then develop a Phase II design for a high speed 3D Camera/Monitor system suitable for real-time 3D image acquisition and visualization.