Projection In The Courtroom

A new evolution for home theater has recently come about in the last few years since an increasing amount of 3D movies and are now available. Welcome, the 3D projector. 3D Projectors originally hit the market in 2008 mainly for educational purposes with a maximum high resolution of 720p. Then, in 2010 that changed with the first release of a 1080p model by LG. This meant that it could process signals from 3D-ready Blu-rays, Playstation 3, and could also handle multiple 3D formats. Some projectors can now even convert 2D content to 3D.

Unfortunately, these 3D projectors still require 3D glasses that must be worn in order to see a three-dimensional image. Remember the old red and blue style glasses? Well, those were the most basic way to achieve seeing this 3D effect, but also the poorest way for viewing 3D material. More modern glasses for the latest 3D technology use a different method through polarizing lenses (passive glasses) that filter the projector's light to each eye. The result is a very convincing 3D effect.

3D projectors achieve this effect by using active shutter glasses. This is a standard that will stay true for all future DLP 3D projectors. With these, the screen rapidly alternates between scenes intended for each eye while the glasses open and close the corresponding lenses. The only downside to this is that it causes a dimming effect on the image quality and the colors aren't as rich as they would be with watching content in standard 2D high definition.

As valuable as it is to use 3D projectors for educational purposes in classrooms, it would be just as valuable for educating a judge and jury in a courtroom (admissibility issues aside). Imagine a scenario where a crime or car accident happens. Immersing the viewers into the scene so that they have a much better sense of what is going on and what it almost feels like to be there would spark different thoughts than by just watching a standard 2D presentation. How would things change if 3D projectors that did not require glasses were available? Would that remove the feeling of viewing something through a frame? Perhaps it would enable the judge and jury to feel as if the incident is happening right in front of them?