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Advances in computer software technology have spurred the creation of numerous devices with a myriad of capabilities. None is more striking than the progress in rendering images on monitors and video sources, especially in 3-D representations.

3-D advanced converter cutting-edge technology is a major breakthrough in this rapidly burgeoning field. 2-D to 3-D conversion is a mainstay of today's film industry. Hardly a major project is completed that does not undergo a 3-D conversion process for insertion into the public domain. While these activities yield remarkable 3-D visualization, they are constrained by the time involved in the process.

Engineering manipulations to create the 3-D effect can take months to perform, as the procedure requires a frame-by-frame transformation. Advanced 3-D conversion software development overcomes this limitation. Highly advanced and encrypted algorithms have been devised to allow the 2-D to 3-D conversion in high definition with medical-grade quality and accuracy in real time with no lag.

This technology is the present state of the art in visual effects. It merely requires the input of any digital source of 720 pixels or greater to allow the software to engage effectively. Today's electronic market manufactures virtually all units at this threshold or beyond. This capability allows for conversion of virtually any input that can be digitally infused. Images derived from laptops, pictorial representations, videos, and direct camera renderings of surgical procedures can all be easily converted into 3-D. In otolaryngology, this would include images from functional endoscopic sinus surgery procedures, laryngoscopies, strobe analysis, ear surgeries, and other procedures.

Beyond this, an otolaryngologist in his/her office can record surgical or diagnostic procedures in 2-D and perform post-analysis in 3-D visualizations. Even computed tomography and magnetic resonance images are currently being studied for the feasibility of their manipulation under this conversion system.

Some major companies have developed dual-lens system devices. Their basic mechanism requires a mandatory apparatus with two lenses for stereopsis. Such a construct may allow 3-D images to be formatted, but nothing more. The equipment must be large enough to accommodate a double amount of lensing hardware. Small-bore or any single-lens source simply cannot be utilized, and there is no capacity to modify digital sources for 3-D visual effects on any dual-lens system. Moreover, such units require dedicated equipment and specific endoscopic and camera systems, which make the cost prohibitive for the average practitioner.

Several units on the market can yield 3-D imaging, but the author has founded a company that developed a more versatile advanced system for 2-D to 3-D rendering, offering advantageous parameters beyond those of present-day systems. The new system appears to have unique benefits, such as extreme independence from external influences and an unparalleled adaptability to a wide array of interfaces. In this regard, the new computer system technology functions with virtually all existing endoscopes, cameras, and digital sources.

There is growing research support for the use of 3-D technology for surgical, educational, and medical office activities. Studies have shown that in the performance of minimally invasive procedures, accuracy and two-point discrimination are greatly enhanced by 3-D representations. As such, surgical procedures and endoscopies with 3-D systems contribute to better task performance, speed, and accuracy.

Target acquisition studies have been used to confirm accuracy in mechanical procedures, and the results of using 3-D imagery have substantial advantages. 3-D advanced converter technology has potential advantages for many otolaryngologic procedures, and is now sufficiently affordable to permit wider use and more clinical research.

By Harold L. Bendelstein, MD

The art of medicine involves gathering data. It is extracted in numerous formats and implemented to diagnose medical problems and employ methods to cure such situations.

Beginning with basic physical exams and extending to more technological avenues as X-rays and EKGs, the amalgamation of data is the road map to good medical care. As time has progressed, the science of collecting more information has led to the development of CT scans, MRIs, and ultrasounds. Internal intrusions into the body by endoscopic means and laparoscopic techniques made possible by the invention of fiber optics have led to high-grade, high-definition images which have enhanced doctors’ abilities to expand the data necessary for state-of-the-art treatments.

All these advances, however, have one level of commonality. They are all flat. Doctors have learned to rely on data in 2D renderings. With the knowledge of anatomy and experience in understanding the clinical environment, doctors can glean information from these studies even though the third dimension of depth is not present.

In recent years, 3D technology has finally become available to the medical community. This imaging adds the missing element of depth to the above studies, which changes a mere representation to a virtual structure that can be examined and studied in its reality. The area that is studied becomes a full volumetric facsimile instead of merely a 2D composition. Volumetric representation contain an infinitely greater amount of information; 3D is the great game-changer. More innovative and interactive representation can now be achieved.

The technology for this breakthrough involves a blending of high-tech, multi-angled photography and computer-assisted directed assembly. The essential concept is to take a volume worth of data which can then be reconstructed on a 3D screen, hologram, or model from a 3D printer. Like the majority of products capable of 3D stereopsis, a scientific method of a high order is necessary to manufacture the data.

Those avenues are either from multiple projections or engineered dual lenses for any laparoscopic and endoscopic application. Either way, the cost involved is highly expensive and only available to large medical facilities.

A new approach is the development of 2D to 3D conversion advanced software technology. With this construct, 3D imaging can be created in real time without exogenous extra engineering or advanced multi-directional data reconfiguration. This new approach is probably the most advanced system in the world, as 3D is created instantaneously in real time independent of special methodology. And 2D endoscopic procedures, laparoscopic surgery, images off a laptop, recorded videos of procedures, and pictorial representations can all be converted to high-grade medical 3D using equipment the average practitioner has in his or her inventory. The technology is thus rendered affordable to small medical facilities and even individual physicians.

The 3D conversion technology, and the 3D MCS Converter Box, are computer advancement at a level of near artificial intelligence. Utilizing contrasting colors, surface interfaces, lightings, and numerous other cues, the advanced software can produce a mathematical depth map which quickly translates into high-definition 3D rendering instantly with no lag.

This modality for 3D is the most advanced and versatile in the world in that it is purely automatic and free from any extra inputs or specialized equipment. Possibilities with this state-of-the-art processing transcend in simplicity and number of applications any technology in the world today.

As the developer of applications for the 3D MCS Converter Box, expectations are that this technology in short order will become a mainstay in technological medicine. The advances of 3D in medicine spurred by the development of the 3D MCS Converter Box are surely to become a staple in the practice of medicine that will propel the medical arts and its teaching into the future.