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Uluru in 3D

by Brian Dunning, Nov 24 2010

My wife and I are here in Australia for The Amazing Meeting, and we took an extra day to make a sidetrip to Uluru (aka Ayers Rock), the largest known single piece of rock in the world. It's a giant piece of sandstone that was upthrust and is now tumbling in the alluvium, though it's probably done tumbling. Rock solid, you might say. For your entertainment and amusement, I took a series of 3D pictures of it.

These are the kind where you need to cross your eyes, not the kind where you converge your gaze behind it. In other words, your left eye needs to look at the right picture, and vice versa. Some people have trouble with this method, but it works for me, so that's what I did.   :-)

Click to see the large version of each. Enjoy…

This last one isn't actually of Uluru, but of a nearby formation called Kata Tjuta (“many heads”, aka The Olgas) which many people find even more impressive:

25 Responses to “Uluru in 3D”

  1. ZenMonkey says:

    Hey, those are nifty! Although I can only look at a couple at a time.

  2. Citizen Wolf says:

    .

    eh?

    .

  3. Paul Cordingley says:

    They’re great! Thanks for sharing them.

  4. Steve says:

    WOW This was the first time I’ve managed to get 3D pictures to work and they were utterly amazing..

    WOW

    (First time I’ve commented on the blog, but I’m a long time listener to your podcast).

  5. Lisa says:

    Oh, very cool! Once I got the hang of it, I was able to scroll down and look at each without uncrossing my eyes. Superb shots; thanks for sharing these. (Is it the flu that’s making me feel a little light-headed right now, or…?)

  6. Can’t get 3D to work, but usually can’t get it to work the other way either, so never mind. Doesn’t matter. I’m Australian. I’ve seen it for real.

    I was fifteen when I climbed the rock. There are trees growing on the top, which is rather incredible: a small patch near the bit where you climb to, and another small patch further off but visible. So I decided to go for a walk to the second patch of trees and back.

    When I got there, a wedge-tailed eagle rose out of the bushes and hovered above my head. Don’t know how many of you have ever had a wild large bird of prey hover only a metre or so above your head, waiting for you to scare a mouse, but trust me, it is an awesome experience in the original sense. (I ran like hell.)

    It can be amusing to pretend that an event like that could have some sort of mystical significance, but I can’t think of one other than “eagle-as-guardian-wards-off-intruder”.

  7. Max says:

    Cool, though I prefer parallel-eye.
    Did you use a 3D camera, or just take two photos?

    Check out this low-tech way to view full-screen full-color full-resolution 3D imagery without 3D glasses.
    http://www.crystalcanyons.net/abouts/3dc8_dualmonitor.shtm

  8. MadScientist says:

    Thanks Brian, I’m glad I can see it without the heat and the flies. Enjoy TamOz.

  9. The Pick Man says:

    “Check out this low-tech way to view full-screen full-color full-resolution 3D imagery without 3D glasses.
    http://www.crystalcanyons.net/abouts/3dc8_dualmonitor.shtm

    Yep. Simple!
    :-(

  10. Ryan Johnson says:

    These are great! I had no idea you were a stereo photographer! Yet another thing that we have in common. Have fun my friend! Great shots! I especially like the old drawings.

  11. gwen says:

    Incredible! Thank you for the tour. I have always wanted to go there, and now you have whetted my appetite for Australia even more! I hope you are having a blast!

  12. Rabbe Sandelin says:

    Is it just me, or is the left-right picture swapped? Some of the background elements seem to hover in the foreground…

    • You’re probably trying to look at them parallel-eye style rather than cross-eye style. Some people have success by putting their finger on the picture and bringing it toward their face, keeping their eyes on the finger; and when it’s halfway there the pictures in the background will converge. You should see three pics and the one in the middle will be in 3D. Then you just need to shift your focus from the finger to the picture without moving your eyes.

    • I was getting the inversion effect as well, so I tried swapping the image positions in Photoshop. They resolved correctly for me after that. (Love this stuff. I even did a few paintings in anaglyph format, back in the day.)

  13. Michael Fairbanks says:

    Thanks for the finger in the eye suggestion. It worked great. Now, if only I could get my foot out of my mouth.

  14. Spuriousness says:

    Still waiting for the Nintendo 3DS to be released here in Australia, so these pics will have to suffice :)
    While your here Brian, you may want to look into an something that won “Invention of the year” on our ABC’s “New Inventors” TV series this year, but seems to be drawing a lot of skepticism. It’s called the EvestG and apparently it is supposed to be the beginning of a new field of Science called “Electrovestibulography” about measuring mental states like depression.

  15. Aaron says:

    Oh too cool for school. But you should know that Uluru is not the largest rock. That arguably is Mount Augustus.

  16. Jason says:

    Wow-it took a while, but once you get the effect going you can literally scroll each picture and voila, breathtaking 3D!

  17. Reuben Soggledere says:

    Thanks for posting these! I love 3D photographs. If like me you’re into that kind of thing, there’s a beautiful collection of Alpine imagery at http://www.alpes-stereo.com but you need red-cyan-glasses for those.

  18. BrianM says:

    Iijm, or do some of these pics suggest intimate female anatomy?

  19. feralboy12 says:

    I got the 3D to work, but now my eyes are stuck that way. Thanks.

  20. Craig says:

    Mt Augustus is a monolcline, rather than a monolith – but then, arguably Uluru isn’t a monolith either. If Ayer’s Rock / Uluru is a monolith, then I think Pine Mountain – about 1.5 x bigger than Uluru – fits that same definition.

  21. Icepick says:

    Great pictures, but I’ll have to keep working on the 3D