Active Shutter 3D System - Timeline

Timeline

The principle made its public debut remarkably early. In 1922, the Teleview 3-D system was installed in a single theater in New York City. Several short films and one feature-length film were shown by running left-eye and right-eye prints in a pair of interlocked projectors with their shutters operating out of phase. Each seat in the auditorium was equipped with a viewing device containing a rapidly rotating mechanical shutter synchronized with the projector shutters. The system worked, but the expense of the installation and the unwieldiness of the viewers, which had to be supported on adjustable stands, confined its use to this one engagement.

In recent decades, the availability of lightweight optoelectronic shutters has led to an updated revival of this display method. Liquid crystal shutter glasses were first invented by Stephen McAllister of Evans and Sutherland Computer Corporation in the mid-1970s. The prototype had the LCDs mounted to a small cardboard box using duct tape. The glasses were never commercialized due to ghosting, but E&S was a very early adopter of third-party glasses such as the StereoGraphics CrystalEyes in the mid-1980s.

In 1985 3D VHD players became available in Japan from manufacturers such as Victor (JVC), National (Panasonic), and Sharp. Other units were available for field sequential VHS tapes including the Realeyes 3D. A few kits were made available to watch field sequential DVDs. Sensio released their own format which was higher quality than the HQFS DVDs.