YouTube now supports NVIDIA’s active shutter glasses, displays 3D videos in Firefox

In an odd collaboration Google, Firefox and NVIDIA have made a special version of YouTube, which lets you view 3D content in Firefox 4 using NVIDIA’s 3D Vision system.

YouTube has been showing 3D videos for a while now, but those were of the anaglyph variety – this update adds support for NVIDIAs active shutter glasses.

You should be familiar with the anaglyph glasses – and the poor color reproduction of that approach. YouTube also supports passive 3D displays (ones that use polarized glasses) and monitors that support 3D content with the left and right image side by side.

The new update uses HTML5 and WebM to enable support for NVIDIA’s 3D Vision, which uses a pair of active shutter glasses. Such glasses display the full range of colors though they tend to dim the image. You’ll also need a display that works at 120Hz, Firefox 4 (or above) and of course an NVIDIA graphics card and glasses (you can grab the 3D Vision Asus Bundle and you’re good to go).

Odd that Google went with Firefox first rather than add support in their own browser (I’m sure they will eventually).

YouTube an LG have a deal in place to show 3D videos on the glasses-free 3D display of the LG Optimus 3D. With the likes of the Optimus 3D, the HTC EVO 3D and others the number of user-contributed 3D videos to YouTube will sure grow – though I’m still not convinced there will be many people who will watch them.

Anyway, if you have all the things you need to try out YouTube with NVIDIA 3D Vision, head over to this page and set up your system.

Source