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Rock star Brian May revives Victorian virtual reality

Queen’s Brian May on quest to bring Victorian 3D to the VR generation.

Not content with touring the world as a member of Queen, Brian May has also been busy bringing back Victorian 3D for a generation raised on digital technology.

Stereoscopy is a Victorian technique for creating an illusion of depth in an image.

At its simplest, it involves viewing two images side-by-side that through a special viewer which turns them into a 3D image.

At one point during the late 1800s it was a worldwide phenomenon – bringing virtual reality-like experiences of world-famous locations and people into millions of homes.

But it has gradually waned, especially since computers and video games brought a different kind of ‘reality’ to our living rooms.

Now Queen’s Brian May, inspired by his own childhood experience of taking 3D images, wants to bring it back.

The books referenced in the video are Queen in 3-D: Updated Edition by Brian May, and Mission Moon 3-D by Dave Eicher and Brian May.