Autofocus: a game-changing feature for SLR
A great feature that gives you even more control over how you watch VR porn has returned to SLR as part of the 13.18 update!
What is Autofocus?
Autofocus is a feature that modulates stereoscopic images based on spatial distance and orientation and corrects distortion. It can make images appear more realistic when viewed from different angles and can help reduce eye strain and misaligned images in VR. It is an experimental feature which disables non-compatible modes, like anaglyph, ForceMono, switch eyes and vertical flip.
How autofocus works
Stereoscopic videos can sometimes appear distorted, particularly from certain angles. While the front-facing image generally looks clear, you might notice distortions along the edges or with objects that are close to the camera. Sometimes objects very close to the camera may be difficult to see and may even cause discomfort.
These distortions occur because the camera's position doesn't match where your eyes naturally focus in the scene. To address this, we've developed an autofocus tool that corrects these distortions and improves the viewing experience.
There are four adjustable parameters under the Autofocus menu, shown below:
Camera IOD
VR is filmed with stereoscopic lenses that remain stationary. The two lenses do not rotate around like your head does when watching a VR video. Rotating your view and looking to your side can distort the image, because the picture information coming from that side is mostly– or entirely– coming from only one side of one lens. This can distort the size and angles of images as you look farther out and away from the center.
Adjusting the Camera IOD slider will mitigate this kind of distortion. It doesn’t affect things nearer to the center, so it will only be noticeable on the periphery of the video.
IPD
Everyone has a different IPD, but VR videos are filmed with fixed hardware. The lenses are a certain distance apart from each other, and that distance doesn’t change or match perfectly with every person’s unique IPD. As your eyes naturally cross to see close-up objects, your view may become distorted because of this miss-match in the distance between the lenses and the distance between your eyes. It’s more noticeable with close objects, when your eyes converge to gain focus.
Adjusting the IPD slider will mitigate this distortion and can be adjusted to better match your own IPD.
Vs
(Top: before, Bottom: after)
Autofocus Threshold
Image correction is required only for close objects and should be applied sparingly. This setting adjusts the difference of depth that triggers refocusing.
Refocus Duration
This is the speed at which corrections occur. This setting can be adjusted to change how fast the image changes during refocus. Finding the optimal value can help reduce eyestrain.
That should help you get started using Autofocus! We’d love to hear what you think. Give it a try and tell us about your experience in the forum.
