3D The Hot Technology At Cedia

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"Robert Perry, SVP of Panasonic Consumer Electronics, said he believes his company is setting the standard, with separate 1080p streams delivered to each eye via glasses. He said the company wants to have Full HD 3D TVs to market in 2010 and expects at least 50 Blu-ray titles to have 3D for the new systems next year as well."

I would like to know what the titles are.

"Andy Parsons, SVP of corporate communications and new product planning for Pioneer, said the Blu-ray Disc Association is working at “break-neck speed” to adopt a standard for 3D on Blu-ray by the end of the year. “We want to get this to market as quick as we can,” he said."

Each company has there own 3-D system - Panasonic has one, Samsung/Mitsubishi a second, Sony a third, etc. so, it doesn't look like they are looking at any standard. Too bad as this could be big if they have one standard.

 Good point - you know how now some BD software is incompatible with certain Blu-ray players until a new firmware update is released? Will all these proprietary 3D displays and systems floating around, we could have the same problems when say, Avatar in 3D is released next year.

There will be a standard and the manufacturers will adhere to it.  Notice how they have announced general dates but not specific products.  These products will all come out after the standard is announced.  Since these companies are involved in the standards discussion they have a better idea of what it is shaping up to be behind the scenes.

As to what titles, I would think look at the titles that have been released in Digital 3D theatrically over the past few years.  That might mean some double dips on BD for titles like Meet the Robinsons, Coraline, etc.

I don't know that I buy that.  Each one will push for their particular solution to be the standard even if there is a consensus brewing in some inter-company standards body,  and with Sony bulldozing the DVD forum with BluRay (and I LIKE Bluray winning, don't get me wrong), the incentive for the losers in that decision to go out on their own, and wring their hands saying 'Sony did it why can't we?', is all the greater.

But the studios will only release titles for a BDA standard.  If ____ releases 3D HW and there is nothing to play on it it will quickly go away. I know of manufacturers that pretty much have product ready to go who are waiting for an official standard to be approved.  The Sonys and Panasonics are going to be heavily involved in negotiating the standard, and it won't get approved without their cooperation.

Hope you are right, time will tell.

This article says Sony is looking at 3-D for PS3 games only for the end of 2010 -
http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10345950-1.html with a new Bravia TV. Years later, 3-D processing will be built into the PS3. 

This article says Disney will be releasing 3-D Blu-Ray titles "as early as the fourth quarter of 2010" - http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=3417

If you need to buy a new Blu-ray player and a new 1080p TV, this will not go well. The BDA standard needs to work with 480p, 720p and 1080p TV's. Put the 1080p for each eye 3-D technology in the new Blu-ray players and new 1080p TV's. For those of you that already have "3-D ready" 1080p Mitsubishi and Samsung TV's, and/or the "3-D ready" 480p and 720p front projectors, they will work too but, with 540p,  360p or 240p for each eye. If Sony, Mitsubishi, Samsung, etc. do not do this, you all know what is going to happen. You will buy bootleg copies of the same movies that have been converted for your system.

You can buy bootleg 3-D copies of most 3-D movies now on EBAY and they work with the "3-D ready" Mitsubishi and Samsung TV's fine. You are only getting 240 lines for each eye but, they look a lot better the 3-D anaglyph crap that you can only get now on Blu-ray.

So, Warner Brothers, Disney, Paramount, Sony, Mitsubishi, Samsung, etc. are you listening? If you don't do this right, the bootleggers will be making all the money, not you!

Roland,

You make some excellent points regarding the acceptance of 3D by the general public and even those of us who call ourselves Home Theater buffs.  Bickering, a lot of competing formats and, most of all, having to ditch ones present, relatively new, equipment in order to get "True 3D" (whatever that means) is going to either turn people off or send them into the arms of some of the alternative sources of product that strikes fear into the hearts of those in the industry.

On a personal level, I've always enjoyed an occasional 3D movie probably because I was was exposed to 3D quite early thanks to Bwana Devil, The House of Wax and many other movies in the fifties as well as being one of the millions of kids who had a View-master and other such items in our formative years.  My dad even brought home some 3D pictures (using the Blue/Red glasses) from Europe showing the Palace at Versailles that amazed me as a "yout"  But I have to stress the word "occasional" because I don't think that I would want to view all my media in 3D all of the time.  For one thing, it involves an "implement implementation." That is to say, we are not yet at the point of holographic 3D on a practical level ("Help me, Obi-wan Ken-obi") so any viewing involves having to wear something.  That seems o.k. at first but on a regular basis the novelty quickly wears out.  If I were to need to put on glasses every time I wanted to watch something I would eventually tire of this.  I'm speaking as someone who wore glasses for almost 50 years before being freed of that thanks to Lasik and C-K surgeries.  Freedom from frames is part of the benefit.  The opening of my peripheral vision was an unexpected eye-opener as well.  Secondly, there seems to be a fatigue factor involved with 3D, even in all the many implementations I saw at CEDIA 2009.  Yes, I enjoyed what I saw, but it is going to become an adjunct to, and not the main focus of my viewing experiences no matter in what form.

I also agree with you that because I will view 3D occasionally, I'm probably not as critical in my assessment regarding "full 1080p" versus the other versions as some.  I happen to own one of the new 3D capable Mitsubishi sets (a WD 65837 set) and I purchased it because of its picture/price and not because it is also 3D capable.  But I was interested in seeing what this means and CEDIA showed this to me.  On the last day of the show when traffic was lighter I purposely attended the excellent Panasonic 3D demonstration and followed that immediately with another viewing at the Mitsubishi booth for comparative purposes.  Technically, the Panasonic presentation was great but I have to say that in my opinion what I saw at Mitsubishi wasn't significantly far behind.  It was, to me, a very satisfying 3D experience for my purposes.  Great 3D effects and great color.  It's interesting that you mentioned the current 3D Blu-ray "merde" because right before I left for Atlanta I viewed the wonderful  BD movie Coraline.  The 2D version was tremendous but the 3D version was almost unwatchable.  Yes, you got 3D effects, but the color was completely sucked out of the movie by the use of the Red/Green glasses and the process employed.  I won't be watching much more, if any, 3D movies using that process.  Coincidentally, one of the 3D clips that was being shown in the loop at the Mitsubishi booth involved Coraline but this time the colors were beautiful, as was the 3D effect. It was so superior to what is currently being sold in the stores in the 3D Coraline anaglyphic Blu-ray package that it is no contest.

I'm still debating whether to purchase the equipment that I would need to turn my Mitsubishi from being "3D ready" to "3D capable."  I probably will, because that's just me and it's available now.  One must purchase wireless Nvidia glasses and the emitter which attaches to the special jack on the back of my monitor.  Then you need a source of 3D content.  The Mitsubishi booth was using an Aspen PC running special software that turns 2D content into 3D content.  I'm still trying to get additional information to clarify exactly how that works.  The Aspen package appears to be pricey ("Niveus-level PC pricing) but I'm looking into Glacier Media Systems for a product that might do what I need for ~$800. At that price point (since I already have the monitor with 3D capability) I might give it a shot. In any event, I will be reporting on the progress of this project here on the HTF to share with others who have an interest in 3D.