Synthesis of a High Resolution 3D-Stereoscopic Image from a High Resolution Monoscopic Image and a Low Resolution Depth Map

Abstract

We describe a new low-level scheme to achieve high definition 3D-stereoscopy within the bandwidth of the monoscopic HDTV infrastructure. Our method uses a studio quality monoscopic high resolution color camera to generate a transmitted "main stream" view, and a flanking 3D-stereoscopic pair of low cost, low resolution monochrome camera "outriggers" to generate a depth map of the scene. The depth map is deeply compressed and transmitted as a low bandwidth "auxiliary stream". The two streams are recombined at the receiver to generate a 3D-stereoscopic pair of high resolution color views from the perspectives of the original outriggers. Alternatively, views from two arbitrary perspectives between (and, to a limited extent, beyond) the low resolution monoscopic camera positions can be synthesized to accommodate individual viewer preferences. We describe our algorithms, and the design and outcome of initial experiments. The experiments begin with three NTSC color images, degrade the outer pair to low resolution monochrome, and compare the results of coding and reconstruction to the originals.