Most are in the midst of creating higher-speed phone networks to offer subscribers new services such as wireless games and the ability to take pictures or surf the Internet. Others, like Nextel Communications, let subscribers download software to their phones. But the applications, including calculators and games, are at best rudimentary. In Europe, cell phone applications are more sophisticated, letting people send short text messages, download new ring tones or even play videos. In Japan, where NTT DoCoMo is the first in the world to introduce a next-generation, or 3G, service, the applications get even more sophisticated.
Cell phones can receive video and other moving images, for example.
But now 3D imagery is the next logical step in the progression toward more sophisticated cell phone applications, said Kazuo Aoki, service development department vice president at J-Phone. Three-dimensional technology for cell phones is different from the 3D in the movies. Wireless 3D does not require wearing red and blue or green tinted glasses. And the 3D images on wireless phones don't appear to leap out at the viewer. Instead, the images are shaded and shaped to give them greater depth.