Stereography Part 2 - The power of money
In Part 1 I tried doing Stereography with my limited hardware of an Action Tracker Sports 35, Nintendo 3DS XL or my mobile phone to produce wigglegram.
There's limitation to my approaches, either there's a time gap between 2 exposures causing non-aligning images when anything in the scene moves due to wind on thir own, and even though the 3DS XL doesn't have this issue, its image quality is low.
I thought of doing this.
That plan never materialized. Technically I can, but to commit the sin of wasting multiple frames to make one picture is something I instintively refuse to do, unless film price goes back to 2020-level, about 30% of 2025 price, or less. But that'll never happen.
I bought a KanDao QooCam EGO instead, and that's great.
That guy with a stereo camera
This is a largely irrelevant account between me and a guy who had a QooCam EGO. Feel free to skip this.
One day I was about to run late to a dinner gathering with some friends in Mong Kok. But I felt compelled to talk to this guy who's holding up an unknown camera with 2 lenses.
My experience in Stereography has taught me that it's most likely a stereo camera, a digital one, and not an example of the ancient artifact Fuji WD3. Therefore I was intrigued.
The person seemed pleased that someone recognized his stereo camera, and went on a sales pitch introducing this camera for 15 minutes.
The camera is capable of taking still image and video with the 2 lenses, separated by around 65cm, a typical distance between human eyes, meaning it can simulate how human vision works.
He went on to show me, with its snap-on viewer, video of a temple filled with incense smoke. The effect was impressive.
While being all positive about the camera's ability, he didn't miss to mention its shortcomings, namely: short battery life and spotty auto-focus. He advised me to buy extra battery and buy the camera online instead of through physical dealers, for a cheaper price.
I felt happy to meet someone with such passion and friendliness in sharing his interest. I was late to the dinner with my friends though.
A Modern Stereo Camera
A few years later, I decided to buy the stereo camera. While my encounter with the person in Mong Kok inspired my choice, the major driver to buying one is my upcoming trip to Japan during the cherry blossom season.
For years I have had difficulty capturing the 3D property of foliage in 3D format. A shallow depth of field against a distant background is one of the most common ways to gain that separation required to make the subject "pop".
To achieve a 3D effect, I could have used my mobile phone to cha-cha (i.e. take) 2 photos, and combine into a stereo photo in post-processing. However, foliage tends to wiggle with even the slightest of wind, causing nauseating effect when people view the mis-aligned pair of images.
Also, I realized it's difficult to a layperson to free-view (i.e. view stereoscopic image with naked eyes). In addition to the images, a viewer is necessary (without wigglegram).
The KanDao QooCam EGO meets both criteria. And it's a relatively recent product than the discontinued Fuji WD3 with the modern quality-of-life such as mobile connectivity and Type-C port charging.
Kandao QooCam EGO creates JPG and DNG in a simple left/right configuration that software like StereoMaker Pro can easily import and process into parallel/cross eye view or wigglegram.
What's most impressive about this camera its ability to capture video. However, I am unsure how to show that in this blog. If you have watched a 3D movie in cinema, you know what I am talking about.
Now that's the power of money.
Once I am back from my upcoming trip, I expect to write up the gear page of this camera. With my very limited experience of this camera, I already believe it has a lot of potential in enabling a new type of travel photography.
