Analysis of 3D viewing experience viasubjective evaluation methods

Abstract: 3D video technology has in recent years become immensely popular given the success 3D movies have had at the cinemas. More and more people have therefore requested to be able to experience this 3D sensation beyond the cinematic screens, and at the comfort of one’s home in front of the TV. Leading television manufacturers have responded by producing modern television sets capable of rendering 3D video, and several TV channels around the world have started to broadcast programs and movies in 3D. Since it is not yet clear what constitutes the overall visual experience of 3DTV, the purpose of this master ’s thesis project is to explore through subjective testing methods the relevance that some aspects might have concerning the 3DTV viewing experience. Another aim is to advance the standardization work regarding subjective evaluation methods for stereoscopic 3D videos. Key 3D terminology and concepts are presented, as well as subjective evaluation methodologies. Stereoscopic 3D video sequences were produced; a customization of a rating-capable video player was made; 3D viewing-and-voting experiments with test subjects were carried out; different attributes were incorporated into the experiments and evaluated such as video quality, visual discomfort, sense of presence and viewing distance; experiment data were collected and analyzed. The experiment results indicated that viewers in general showed an inclination to vote similarly for the different attributes that were examined. This in turn showed that video sequences with the characteristics presented in the experiments, mostly coding related distortions, could be assessed with subjective evaluation methods focusing solely on one rating scale concerning the general video quality, which would give a good understanding of the 3D video quality experience.