Archive for the ‘3DTV News’ Category

June Playboy Will Have 3D Centerfold

Playboy’s June edition will be on the newsstands Friday, and for the first time ever, the centerfold comes equipped with 3-D glasses.

“What would people most like to see in 3-D?” asked Playboy founder Hugh Hefner. “Probably a naked lady. I’m not a huge enthusiast of 3-D,” he said in a telephone interview. “I leave real life to go to the movies and 2-D is fine with me.” Spoken like a true grumpy old man.

To offset the sizable extra cost of including 3D glasses with every magazine, Playboy let HBO help out. HBO wanted a new way to promote their hit show, True Blood, so paid for the 3D glasses, and branded them with the show’s logo.

Toshiba’s Glasses-Free 3DTV

Already jumping forward in the 3D tech universe, Toshiba has announced its intentions to release a 3DTV that doesn’t require special 3D glasses to get that 3D effect.

Toshiba’s mobile display division has built the 21-inch auto-stereoscopic high-definition display using the same technology that will power Nintendo’s upcoming 3D handheld. The only major difference is size – obviously.

The company’s technology makes use of an integral imaging system called a “light field” display to create 3D without glasses over a thirty degree viewing angle. The effect without glasses is done using a “multi-parallax” method. This lessens possible eye fatigue and makes the 3D image change depending on where the watcher is while watching the TV.

At this point, the viewer likely has to be sitting in a very specific spot to get the full effect, so expect this technology to be less than impressive in its infancy.

NewSight Japan Shows Off Glasses-Free 3DTV

NewSight Japan gave a demo of their new 70-inch glasses-free 3DTV at Japan Finetech. The new model is said to use “parallax-barrier technology” that renders viewable 3D images without glasses. According to the NewSight GmbH’s description:

“The NewSight parallax-barrier technology allows the viewer to see the 3D image ‘naturally’ in the way people are used to viewing normal 2D displays. The technology subdivides the LCD image into complex repeating segments that, when viewed and then integrated by human binocular vision, presents 3D views of scenes. The special parallax barrier is affixed to commercial-grade LCD displays in a precision assembly process.”

This barrier apparently has a number of precisely placed slits that let each eye to see a different pixel set, creating the illusion of depth, according to Digital Trends’s Ryan Fleming. The drawback is that the person watching the 3dtv has to be seated in a specific area in relation to the screen.

For glasses-free 3D TV to really take off, this will be it biggest hurdle.

3DTV Health Concerns And Warnings

Samsung’s 3D TV’s have now gone on sale, and they are accompanied by a lengthy warning about associated health risks. Clearly the company is trying to cover their bases just in case anything, and we mean, anything, could go haywire.

From Samsung’s official statement:

“If you experience any of the following symptoms, immediately stop watching 3D pictures and consult a medical specialist: (1) altered vision; (2) lightheadedness; (3) dizziness; (4) involuntary movements such as eye or muscle twitching; (5) confusion; (6) nausea; (7) loss of awareness; (8) convulsions; (9) cramps; and/or (10) disorientation. Parents should monitor and ask their children about the above symptoms as children and teenagers may be more likely to experience these symptoms than adults.”

Among the most high risk groups that Samsung points out are: pregnant women, young children, teens, the elderly, people prone to seizures or stroke, people prone to dizziness or motion sickness, people with eye problems, people who are out of shape, and people who have been drinking.

So….who does that leave exactly? And what will the fallout be for the potential 3D gaming industry?

Sharp Developing Glasses-Free 3D for Mobile

Japanese electronics company Sharp has recently announced that they have developed a new 3D touchscreen LCD that doesn’t require special 3D glasses.

They were able to develop the 3D screens without the need for glasses by using parallax barriers. And what does that mean? Both transmissive and non-transmissive columns are used to trick the brain’s visual cortex into see three dimensions when viewed from different angles. I know – my brain hurts too.

Sharp plans to begin mass production of the no-glasses 3D screen during the first half of 2010, with an unknown release date. The Japanese electronics company believes up to 50% of its screens can be 3D-enabled before 2012.

Verizon 3DTV Packages Coming Late 2010

According to the latest Verizon press release, the company is planning on releasing a 3D package to its TV subscribers before the end of 2010. The 3D packages will compliment the SD and HD channels already available, and be available to the nearly 3 million customers, mostly located in the Northeast.

“The market for 3D TV is very early in its development. We’re monitoring the early sales of 3D TVs and expect to announce a 3D offering well in advance of the holiday TV-shopping season, when 3D television sales will expand,” Shawn Strickland, vice president of FiOS product management for Verizon said. “Verizon’s intent for our formal 3D offering is to be in the market in time for the holiday sales of 3D TVs, with a product worthy of our customers. Our goal is to offer a product that has a fully automated HDMI format-switching capability that switches between 2D and 3D, not via ponderous access to the TV’s setup menu. By then, we expect to have access to good 3D content and to have chosen our mode of delivery, whether full-time or part- time broadcast service, or via video on demand and to what measure as pay-per-view material.”

Verizon hasn’t released details like pricing or package structure yet. Specifics will likely wait until more 3D TVs are on the market, and a more realistic projection of the 3D TV industry can be figured out.

LG 3DTV Coming In May

LG is a huge player in the entertainment tech market, but hadn’t been saying much about their 3D TV plans. That didn’t mean they didn’t have any though! The LG LX9500 3DTV will be launching in late spring and it is going to be the world’s first full LED 3D TV which comes in a choice of two sizes, the 47 inch and 55 inch.

The viewer will have to wear AG-S100 shutter glasses, which block each lens alternately in time with with the screen’s refresh rate, to benefit from the 3D effect.

There hasn’t been a great deal of information regarding the specs of the TV, although it is known that there will be around 1200 LEDs, a dynamic contrast ratio of 10,000,000:1 and a refresh rate registered at 240 Hz.

LG Wants 25% 3DTV Marketshare With Infinia

LG, the second biggest TV brand, said it is aiming to sell nearly 1 million 3D TVs this year to take 25% of the market, joining a growing number of companies investing their hopes in that 3D will become the next big then.

South Korea’s LG Electronics said on Thursday it wanted to increase market share in 3D TVs more aggressively, hoping to keep its lead over Sony and combat falling prices with premium models.

“Our goal is boosting market share in 3D TVs and you can clearly see that, as our target for 3D market share is 10 percentage points above our LCD TV sales target,” Havis Kwon, LG’s vice president and head of the LCD division told reporters.

LG, which competes with Samsung and Sony, said it expected the global 3D TV market to grow to around 3.8 million units this year and to more than 13 million in 2011.

Manchester United vs. Chelsea In 3D TV!

Sky will be starting Europe’s first 3D television channel with coverage of the Barclays Premier League match-up between Manchester United and Chelsea on April 3. They will follow that first match with at least five more Premier League games live in England before the end of the season, as well as the Coca-Cola Football League play-off finals at the end of May.

“It’s fitting that one of the biggest games of the season will be the launch pad for our pioneering Sky 3D service,” said Brian Lenz, Sky’s director of product design and TV product development. “With 3D, seeing really is believing, so it’s great news that over 1,000 pubs across country will be able to show the magic of 3D to their customers.”

Sky 3D plans to add other sports programming as well as movies, tv and film content later in 2010.

March Madness Final Four Will Be In 3D

CBS Sports is joining up with Cinedigm Digital Cineman Corp. and LG Electronics to televise the Final Four college basketball games on April 3 and the April 5 title game from the 2010 Men’s Division I Basketball Championships in 3D.

Fully produced by CBS Sports, the 3D games will be shown in this enhanced format in 100 movie theaters nationwide, as well as on LG’s LCD HDTVs at locations throughout Lucas Oil Stadium, the 2010 venue for the Final Four.

CBS Sports executive vice president, operations and production Ken Aagaard said that there also have been conversations with cable operators and DirecTV about possibly offering the main games in 3D.

“We’re working with LG. Realistically, there are only a few places because there just aren’t that many homes with boxes to support 3D,” said Aagaard, during an interview after CBS’s annual media day supporting the basketball tournament at the network’s Manhattan headquarters. “This is another platform we can use to leverage the tournament.”

LG is the official 3D sponsor for CBS Sports’ tournament broadcasts and an official Corporate Partner of the NCAA. LG Electronics, which debuted the first 3DTVs in Korea last year, will be introducing this new feature in an extensive line of 3D-enabled LED HDTVs and Blu-ray Disc players in the U.S., starting this May.

« Older Entries    Newer Entries »