Consumer 3D Television Moving Forward 127
TheSync writes "Hollywood Reporter claims that SMPTE (the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers) will 'establish an industry task force to define the parameters of a mastering standard for 3D content distributed via broadcast, cable, satellite, packaged media and the Internet, and played-out on televisions, computer screens and other tethered displays.' Already, Japanese Nippon BS viewers with Hyundai 3D LCD sets can watch an hour of 3D programming daily. Even your existing DLP TV set might be 3D capable today with the addition of LCD shutter glasses."
Reader DaMan1970 makes note of another developing television technology; telescopic pixel displays. "Each pixel consists of 2 opposing mirrors where the primary mirror can change shape under an applied voltage. When the pixel is off, the primary & secondary mirrors are parallel & reflect all of the incoming light back into the light source."
Unfortunately hard to take-off (Score:5, Insightful)
Motion sickness
Astigmatism
Eye strain
The fact some people just can't plain see it despite having 2 eyes
Battery life of wireless shutter glasses
Looking like a nerd
There's some serious patience required to adjust to it, its not natural to focus your eyes direction at one depth, and change the actual focus to another. When what your looking at is far away (like a movie screen), its a lot easier. When its a TV or computer screen that is just a few feet away, its harder to adjust to, and for a lot of people if they don't instantly "click" with something then its hard to get them to want it.
Speaking of the obvious thought of porn, I'm surprised magazines haven't tried using stereoscopic pictures. This is a really easy 3d trick anyone can do- simply take two pictures of a static object side by side with the camera pointing towards a certain object (make sure its the same object in each one!). Put them next to each other, then slowly cross your eyes until they merge. It'll form a 3d picture, full color, no special equipment required, no red/blue glasses to give people headaches. The further apart the pictures are taken, the more pronounced the 3-d effect. You'll want to use the cross-eyed effect as opposed to the "looking into the picture" effect because it allows for a larger picture.
Theaters must win on features, not performance. (Score:5, Insightful)
The big news in the movie theater business is that Regal, AMC and Cinemark are closing a deal with Hollywood to pay for digital 3D projectors going into many of their theaters so the big summer movies of 2009 can look better than anything an HDTV can do. But if HDTVs will do stereoscopic 3D in a few years, then Hollywood and the theater chains have just blown a huge amount of money on tech that'll only get customers out of their homes for a few years.
This is why theaters need to stop pushing performance and start pushing features. With digital projection, movie theaters can theoretically show everything that's popular on TV: live sports, live news, talk shows, religious shows, long running scripted dramas and comedies. It's even technically possible for theaters to connect video game hardware to the projector and run controllers down to the audience so people can play a video game on the big screen. Of course, it'll be hairy for theaters to get the rights to show any of these things, but the relentless progression of home market tech, especially when it comes to screen size and picture quality, means it's just too expensive for theaters to stay ahead. Theater digital projectors are big and not mass produced, so even if they only perform a little better than home market projectors, they're vastly more expensive and won't come down in price. The last thing theaters need is to blow a huge wad of cash on a new projector, then have to buy another one in a few years.
What's much smarter for theaters to do is buy the least expensive Hollywood-approved projector they can (Christie's CP2000-M is 2.2 megapixels and is bright enough for screens up to 35 feet wide), then feed it with every conceivable kind of content. News reels died in the 1960s not because people don't want to drive to theaters to watch the news (the communal setting actually improves news just as much as it improves movies), but because only TV could show news live. Now theaters have most of the tech they need to show live news, but it hasn't occurred to them to ask the TV networks for content. Theaters still think Hollywood is the only sugar daddy they have.
It's great news that HDTVs will soon get stereoscopic 3D. I just hope Hollywood and movie theaters don't use it as an excuse to replace their projectors yet again. They need to compete against the home market creatively, not by throwing more dollars at the projection booth.
Re:Theaters must win on features, not performance. (Score:5, Insightful)
Theaters are a place to go, a thing to do, an experience to enjoy. They will never go away.
Re:Theaters must win on features, not performance. (Score:3, Insightful)
People have been saying that since the VHS home rental market sprang up. Most people were satisfied with that. There is no quality threshold that the stay-at-home crowd is waiting for, it already came long ago.
I think it's a matter of amount of difference. People said that before because the ability to actually see the movie seemed to be the main function. Then we discovered that quality was important enough to grant going to the theater for the best products (movies) and leaving the rest for the home systems.
To dodge the new menace of equal quality we would have to discover the other thing about theaters that make it worth to keep going. And here we reach your other point:
Theaters are a place to go, a thing to do, an experience to enjoy. They will never go away.
Let's see if theaters could reach the timelessness status of restaurants:
- You can't get the same product at home, or it's much more expensive in most cases: This was true for theaters, but as they rely on technology (not on human service), it can end.
- You can't have the same environment at home: Theaters abandoned that route a long time ago. I concede that really nice and pretty theaters could last eternally as an elegant way of spending an afternoon. The rest would have to throw out more than half the clientele, the ones with phones, kids, or an inability to shut up.
- Having the same product at home means some work on your part: This won't help theaters unless your friends really make a mess with the popcorn.
Maybe they'll survive as holographic rooms when people move to smaller and smalled homes, but that's the only chance I see for theaters in 50-100 years from now.
Re:HDTV is overrated (Score:3, Insightful)
nope, features (portability, simplicity, stereo, 3D, ...) always (often) beat Quality.
Think Tapes vs cassette, Cinemascope vs VHS, DVD Audio (and HiFi even) vs MP3, LCDs vs. CRT (much better image vs flat screens )...
Maybe SHD is better for you : there will be Audiophiles for 2D (maybe they will be called Pictophiles), but if (and there are many good reasons it might not) 3D catches on, Super ultra 2D high def will be a niche.
This was CLEARLY a joke! (Score:4, Insightful)
Man, those moderators get weirder en weirder...