Hello everyone,
When it comes to viewing images in stereo 3D in ArcGIS Pro, users require special hardware.
Users currently only have two main options, either use active stereo with shutter glasses (ex. NVIDIA 3D Vision) or use passive stereo with mirror displays (ex. Schneider Digital PluraView). While they both are functionnal options, they do come with certain downsides:
- Active stereo hardware, while cheap, is getting harder to find
- Passive stereo hardware is expensive
- Both options often require a professionnal grade GPU (ex. NVIDIA Quadro)
This is where the idea of supporting new OpenXR monitors comes in. In the past few years, autostereoscopic displays have begun to appear on the market (ex. Acer SpatialLabs, Sony ELF...). These have the following main advantages:
- They are glasses free, using cameras to track the eyes instead
- They are, compared to passive mirror displays, less expensive
- They do not require a specific GPU type
Most of these displays use the OpenXR API, which is the same open standard used for most VR headsets, and I believe this is also what the new ESRI XR Viewer app uses.
Thus the idea of adding support for OpenXR stereo monitors in ArcGIS Pro is that it would make access to stereo viewing cheaper and easier for users, while also providing more choice for users when choosing their hardware.
