I am a software engineer, I have chosen 3D visualisation as a career some times back Where
OpenGL Programming is used intensively. Recently I came to know I have an eye disease
called amblyopia in one eye so that I am not able to see 3D images.
Will I be able to do 3D graphics programming?
Can I be able to chose 3D graphics as a career?
Can you suggest me on that.
I will really appreciate a guidance at this moment since I am very much and strongly
interested in Computer graphics and visualization. But also don’t want to limit my career
because of this eye disability.
If I understood what is “amblyopia in one eye”, it means you only have monocular vision. So that why doctors says “you can’t see 3D images”. But in 3D graphics programming, it is quite rare to really work with stereoscopic displays. That would be the only case were your disability will cause trouble. So avoid things like autostereo displays, LCD shutter glasses, anaglyph stereo, polarized stereo, stereo head mounted displays, and such.
For example, 100% of the 3D games work with monocular displays. Only a handful provide options for stereo graphics.
Stereo graphics seems more present in the professional visualization industry, but I am not an insider of the field.
I have the same problem as you and i do 3D graphics for many years now. It is really no problem. A few days ago i extended a program to do stereo-rendering. It works perfectly, as i am told. I don’t see the effect, for me there is no difference to normal monoscopic rendering, but people do stand in front of the projector and try to “grab” the items in the world because “it feels so real”.
As long as you are a good programmer and you can think 3 dimensional, it doesn’t matter at all, that you cannot “see in 3D”. And as suggested above, real 3D rendering is very rare. And even if you are supposed to program it, you can do it (as i just did), though of course you need to ask people more about whether the effect is pleasing to them.
I’m in a similar boat - I was born able to see out of only one eye. I always used to joke that I just couldn’t ever work on stereo graphics. Fast forward 20yrs, and in grad school I was writing stereo rendering code and doing user evaluations on 3D display technologies. So it’s definitely still an option open to you…but it does mean debugging can be a little bit harder. =)
I was consulting my doc and getting some tests done on my eyes. I am elaborating my prob in lill detail…
There are 2 technology of production of 3D images as I know–
A.Active B.Passive
A). Active: I am able to see the 3D images generated by “Active stereo system” and wearing active system glasses, where a 3D image has 2 parts—1. a left side image and 2.right side image. They differ by their position on the screen and looks like a blurred image seeing from naked eyes.
At a particular fraction of second left side of the 3D glass -on your eyes - opens(right side glass remains closed) and its corresponding left side image is shown on the screen(suppressing the right side image),
And next fraction of second right side of the 3D glass opens (left one closes this moment) and its corresponding right eye image is shown on the screen(while left side image is suppressed deliberately).
These two process happen alternatively and very frequently in sync with the left and right images. And it makes a 3D image with depth on the screen.
I was able to see this 3D image and animations clearly wearing the Active stereo glasses.
B). Passive: Passive stereo technology which is used in 3D movie theatre with chip glasses(some times paper glass frames and plastic lense inside the frame). with this glass and its corresponding image generation I had undergone a 3D stereo testing of my 3D vision called “Titmus Fly Test” by my Ophthalmologist, She found that my “second of arc” is 100–>80 while for normal(both eye normal) person it is 40–>20. I was able to read 1st 5 stereo figures out of 9 (she gave me to read) wearing passive 3D glasses. Normal eye person can read till 9 out of 9 figures.(They can catch the minute depth in 9th figure also, after 5th figure which I was not able to catch)
Is my situation clearer to suggest me? If not, kindly let me know- I will try to give more infos from my side. I am in huge dilemma right now about this field making as a career for life time.
Congratulations, for me active and passive makes no difference, i simply cannot see 3D images, at all, no matter how it is presented. You might call it a brain-damage, because my eyes are both “perfectly fine” (if you ignore my short-sightedness). I’ve had this since my birth, so i have never seen anything in 3D, though i have no problems in daily life, whatsoever. Only in very few sports-activities it sometimes becomes clear, that i have a disadvantage compared to others, but that is very rare.
So, as said before, it is really no limitation when programming 3D stuff. Don’t be afraid of it. Don’t base your decision on some medical examination results, base it on whether you WANT to do this in your future and whether you feel, that you are SKILLED to do it. This is about programming, not about eye-sight. Are you a good programmer? Can you think well in 3D and calculate well with vectors and matrices? Do you have good understanding for cg algorithms, graphics hardware, modern techniques, etc. ? Are there any other things that you would rather like to do instead?
Those are the questions you should ask yourself. Forget your condition, it is the last thing that stops you from working in this field. It is your passion and your skills that count (given enough passion your skill will improve by themselves).