Method and apparatus for generating three-dimensional panoramic video

A three-dimensional panoramic video generating apparatus, comprising:

• a connection device, connected to an image source device, and receiving a panoramic video from the image source device;
• a storage device, storing a plurality of modules;
• and
• a processor, coupled to the connection device and the storage device, and loading and executing the modules in the storage device, wherein the modules comprise:
• a frame capturing module, capturing a plurality of frames from the panoramic video;
• a mapping module, transforming each of the frames into a polyhedral mapping projection, wherein the polyhedral mapping projection comprises a plurality of side planes, a top plane and a bottom plane;
• a parallax calculating module, calculating displacements of a plurality of pixels in the side planes by using the side planes of the transformed polyhedral mapping projection of each of the frames, and calculating displacements of a plurality of pixels in the top plane and the bottom plane of the polyhedral mapping projection by using the displacements of the pixels of the side planes;
• a pixel shifting module, shifting the pixels in the side planes, the top plane and the bottom plane of the transformed polyhedral mapping projection of each of the frames according the calculated displacements of the polyhedral mapping projection to generate a shifted polyhedral mapping projection;
• a transforming module, transforming the shifted polyhedral mapping projection of each of the frames into a shifted frame with a two-dimensional space format;
• and
• a video encoding module, combining the shifted frame and its corresponding frame into a three-dimensional image and encoding the three-dimensional images of the frames into a three-dimensional panoramic video.