Side-By-Side Video Player

by Paul on Dec 25th, 2013 01:56 AM

[EDIT3]
Hi... I want to keep the app free, however I would greatly appreciate any donations
So if you are finding yourself using and enjoying the SBS Video Player, please show some support by sending me some digital $$$!

Bitcoin: 1KtkW4tuJqEZD2cZ8EH1Un6VGPqAqh3otS
Dogecoin: D8m8w6VAuYbKs6Nxm1jnQkT4SvbTMsxdG9
[/EDIT3]

[EDIT2]
You can get the app in the playstore now:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta ... ideoplayer
[/EDIT2]

[EDIT]
I created a majorly improved V0.2 of my app. In summary:
- able to play webstreams (which can be started out of a browser)
- play 1080p video (or whatever your device is capable of)
- play videos in perfect sync
- play on any display with any resolution you want
- play in fullscreen
- zoom in, so there are no black borders anymore

Download here:
http://www.sendspace.com/file/as99nu
[/EDIT]

Hi,

in my opinion the Dive or VR Headsets in general are very interesting for watching Videos/Shows/Movies, because they are (perceived as) bigger than any cinema screen and they fit in your backpack. However as far as I know there is no application to watch videos on the Dive, except for the Go Show app, which I personally dislike because of the "cinema" environment (viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2588).

That is why I developed an app which plays every compatible video file (see http://developer.android.com/guide/appe ... rmats.html) side-by-side. This does _not_ create any 3D effect, but lets you watch regular 2D Videos on your dive. Some infomration regarding the app:
- it was developed and optimized for a Nexus 4 (screen without a 720p resolution probably will deliver unsatisfying experiences)
- the video for both eyes is sometimes unsynchronized. Skipping through the video may resolve the problems, but it is a little bit buggy
- 1080p videos will most likely stutter
- in order to play a video you have to open the file through a 3rd party app (e.g. a file browser) and select the SBSVideoPlayer app to open it
As you can see this app has a lot of shortcomings, but I wanted to share the app nonetheless.

Screenshots:


Download the App here (<1MB):
http://www.sendspace.com/file/zlf58v (mirror 1)
http://www.share-online.biz/dl/FWUB7CYMHH1 (mirror 2 - downloads via Android may cause problems with this mirror)

The reason I'm posting this (besides to share my little app) is to ask if "video" is a VR killer-app only to me:
- Is there any interest from your side for an optimized version of this app?
- Do you use this app?
- In case there are bugs, which prevent you from using it... would you use this app if everything would work?
- What would be the top 3 features, you would ask for?
- Is there any interest from you side to develop something similar/would you benefit from opensourcing this one?

I would love to have some feedback from you guys! If there is none, I will be contempt with the way things are (as the app works for me) and I will not put in any further work and time.

Have a nice Christmas

EDIT: Ihr könnt mir übrigens auch gerne in Deutsch antworten, wenn euch das lieber ist!

Re: Side-By-Side Video Player

by Checksum on Dec 25th, 2013 09:51 AM

On IOS you can try 3dtube in mode side by side.
I don't have open dive yet but I try it with two lenses and give good result.
Can play sbs and top/down half and full and will alway display sbs full.

Re: Side-By-Side Video Player

by Paul on Dec 25th, 2013 12:50 PM

Hi Checksum,
thanx for your answer. The problem I see with the 3DTube app is the missing functionality to play any regular 2D video side-by-side. I want to be able to watch all of my DVDs on the Dive, which I can't with the 3DTube app (from what I understand).
Btw.: On Android you can watch 3D-Youtube videos with the regular Youtube app. (I have no iOS device at home)

Re: Side-By-Side Video Player

by fab0 on Dec 25th, 2013 15:47 PM

Thats a real good idea!

I think technicaly it would be possible to create a synthetic 3d effect from 2d video. The same way televisions can do the samwe (2D to 3D coverters..) maybe by just slightly shifting The 2 pictures for each eye, but thats just an idea for your project!

Keep it going, id love to see a final stable version of it in the play store.

I just got one problem with your app: when i try to open the .apk it says "parsing error" and i cant install it. Ease fix that, id love to try it, i got an mexus 5 with kitkat 4.4.2

Regards and marry christmas

Re: Side-By-Side Video Player

by Paul on Dec 25th, 2013 16:15 PM

Thank you for your answer fab0.

I am very sorry to hear, that you get a parsing error. I tried to download the apk via the link I posted and then I tried to install the apk. I got the same error... I think the problem only occurs, when you try to download the apk via an Android phone from share-online. The downloaded apk is only 12kb (instead of 265kb) and contains html/js.

Two workarounds:
- Try to download the apk from here: http://www.sendspace.com/file/zlf58v
- Download the file from share-online with a PC and put it on your Smartphone
Sorry for any inconveniences

Regarding your idea of synthetically creating a 3D effect: I agree that this should be possible in the sameway that TV Sets are capable of doing this. However I have never seen how good these conversions actually work and I imagine that there has to be a lot of work to be done in order to implement such feature. Further I do not know if the computing power of a smartphone would suffice. You could shift the images slightly, but from my understanding this would only cause the complete "2D Surface" to be further or nearer away, but would not apply different levels of depth to the elements in the video. All in all this would be rather low on my "todo-list" and I would probably only work on it, if I could find a library, which would take care of creating the synthetical depth information.

However I do not want to discourage you: I highly appreciate the feedback and would love to hear more as soon as you get the app going

Re: Side-By-Side Video Player

by fab0 on Dec 25th, 2013 18:22 PM

Thanks for the new link, now it works propperly

Yeah i also think creating 3D videos would be just a nive feature, its much more important to make it run stable and with any formats/resolutions.

I dont think that huge amount of processing power is needed for such a task, the best "high end" tv's aka smart tvs such samsungs models only got a dualcore Soc, but nearly every 3d tv supports 3D conversion.. Would be a nice feature

What i would really like to see is kind of a "3D view mode" where you can set up custom content for each eye, in that way it would be possible to experiment with the view, for example creating 2 photos with the cam and moving the phone some centimeters in between or do the same with video. Would be interesting got the inspiration from here: http://xkcd.com/941

Would like to try that but theres no palttform for such experiments^^

Regards

Re: Side-By-Side Video Player

by lalalol on Dec 27th, 2013 12:39 PM

Thanks for this app.
It works fine on my Asus Padfone 2 (720p).
But it would be nice if you could use the player to watch videos from your webbrowser. Because some webbrowsers like Boat Browser and Opera let you open videos with an app to watch them. Too bad this app isn´t listed there. Would be a really nice feature.
And also it would be great if you could fix the asynchron pictures.

Re: Side-By-Side Video Player

by jpslara on Dec 27th, 2013 13:23 PM

Hi,
I just download and install SBSVideoPlayer on my S3, but I can´t initiate the aplication. I can't find it on my application menu. i could find it using ES application manager, and when try to lunch this application I get the error "This application can't be initilize".
Any Idea?

My S3 (GT-I9300) is using Android 4.1.2

Regarts.

Re: Side-By-Side Video Player

by lalalol on Dec 27th, 2013 14:02 PM

"jpslara" wrote:
Hi,
I just download and install SBSVideoPlayer on my S3, but I can´t initiate the aplication. I can't find it on my application menu. i could find it using ES application manager, and when try to lunch this application I get the error "This application can't be initilize".
Any Idea?

My S3 (GT-I9300) is using Android 4.1.2

Regarts.

You need to browse for a .mp4 movie file with your filebrowser, then you have to open it with SBSVideoplayer

Re: Side-By-Side Video Player

by jpslara on Dec 27th, 2013 17:03 PM

ok,
Now I can see a video sbs with your program. It is a good idea. Now maybe you could try to simulate some kind of 2D to 3D effect, as some TVs do with content that is not 3D.