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The recent release of Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over has introduced thousands of youngsters to the joys of that '50s favorite, the 3D movie. As we learned at HowStuffWorks, the technology behind 3D, or stereoscopic, movies is actually pretty simple. They simply recreate the way humans see normally. Since your eyes are about two inches apart, they see the same picture from slightly different angles. Your brain then correlates these two images in order to gauge distance. This is called binocular vision -- View-Masters
and binoculars mimic this process by presenting each eye with a slightly different image. A 3D film viewed without glasses is a very strange sight, resembling that hokey cartoon effect of a drunkard's point of view. The same scene is projected simultaneously from two different angles in two different colors, red and blue (or green). Here's where those cool glasses come in -- the colored filters separate the two different images so each image only enters one eye. Your brain puts the two pictures back together, and voila, you're dodging a flying meteor! For more on the history of 3D films, we
suggest you consult the venerable Bad Fads Museum. The most successful 3D film in history? The Stewardess, an adult film made in 1969.
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