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## Stereo images

Figure 17

Stereo images, which are composites of left and right eye images, can convey additional depth information that cannot be expressed by images that are generated using a single eye point. VisIt provides four forms of stereo images: red/blue, red/green, interlace, and crystal eyes. A red/blue stereo image (see figure) is similar to frames from early 3D movies in that it appears stereo only when using red/blue stereo glasses. Unfortunately, red/blue stereo images are not very useful for visualization because colors are lost since most of the color ends up in the magenta range when the red and blue color channels are merged. Red/green stereo suffers similar color loss. Interlaced images alternate lines in the image with left and right eye views so that squinting makes the image look somewhat 3D. VisIt's crystal eyes option requires the use of special virtual reality goggles for images to appear to be 3D but this option is by far the best since it allows interactive frame rates with images that really appear to stand out from the computer monitor. VisIt does not use stereo imaging by default since it makes images draw slower because an image must be drawn for both the left eye and the right eye. If you want to view stereo images using the Crystal Eyes option, you must provide the -stereo command line option when you launch VisIt or clicking the Crystal Eyes radio button will have no effect because vis windows must be created in stereo mode. If you want to try looking at stereo images, click the Stereo check box and then also click one of the Red/Blue, Red/Green, Interlace, or Crystal Eyes radio buttons to choose type the stereo image type.