First 3D Television Channel to Launch in the U.S. in 2010

It certainly looks like 2010 is shaping up to be the year during which 3D finally moves from the realm of novelty into both mainstream film and TV. Satellite cable provider DirecTV has a new satellite in the air, and according to HD Guru, one of the 200 new HD stations to be broadcast from it includes the first U.S. HDTV channel in 3D.

There are still some technical hurdles to clear before you’re watching zany sitcom antics flying toward you, but the trend is clear. The satellite begins full operation in March, and existing DirecTV set-top boxes will simply need a firmware upgrade to support the 3D programming. Unfortunately, you’ll still need to pick up a 3D-capable HDTV to play it back, and that’s where the market lag will play a role in determining how fast 3D will penetrate.

Although 3D content has a long history stretching all the way back to 1922 — when the first public 3D movie was displayed — a number of optics and display challenges, as well as market realities, relegated 3D to a periodic novelty for decades. With the vast majority of the technical hurdles now solved and 3D displays making steady inroads at seminal trade shows like CES over the past couple of years, 2010 is poised to be 3D’s breakout year. The emergence of a string of blockbusters like Avatar, Alice in Wonderland and more rounds out 3D’s emergence — or re-emergence — on the big screen. Soon, consumers will come to expect the same experience in their home theater as well.

Sony, Samsung, Mitsubishi, LG and other manufacturers will be showing off 3D displays at CES 2010 next week. They’ll be hoping the stars will align properly to make 2010 3D’s breakout year, and DirectTV’s news is a timely piece of that puzzle. Are you excited about 3D’s inroads to the home, or is your pocketbook still weary from the last cycle of high definition upgrades?

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Samsung’s Impossibly Thin 3D TV Tempts Hollywood Producer Read More http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/01/samsungs-impossibly-thin-3d-tv-tempts-holl

BY CHARLIE SORREL

LAS VEGAS — If you had any doubt that the big thing in televisions this year will be 3D, then Samsung’s CES press conference would have finally convinced you. The company is throwing its rather large manufacturing weight behind 3D in the home, bringing not just TVs but 3D Blu-ray players and home theater systems into stores this year.

The TVs were the focus today, and consist of LEDs, LCDs and even a plasma model. The star, though, and the one that Jeffrey Katzenberg couldn’t keep his hands off (more on that in a second), was the 9000-series. This 3D TV features a proprietary 3D engine that, like Toshiba’s new sets, can convert 2D video to 3D (although Samsung presented this as a temporary solution until more 3D video is available). The 9000-series will come in screen sizes from 19” to 65”, but that wasn’t why Katzenberg was fingering the thing and gawking at it as the presentation wore on. One look at the photo will tell you the answer — the TVs are thin, as in a third of an inch thin. Turn one of these sideways and it all but disappears. Add to that a gorgeous steel body and you get a TV that even an impossibly rich movie mogul will covet.

Better still, the 9000 series will come with a large touch-screen remote. And why waste that second screen when you aren’t actually doing any controlling? Samsung lets you watch live TV on the remote itself while the big screen continues to play your 3D movie.

Samsung is jumping on the App Wagon, too, and in the spring there will be a range of free apps (they’re not called applications any more) in its own store, called “Samsung Apps”. The store will be open, so anyone can write software for your TV, and paid content will follow in the summer, followed by software for other platforms such as phones.

So why was Katzenberg on stage? Because his company Dreamworks has, along with Technicolor, teamed up with Samsung to get some 3D content onto the televisions. After a rather monotonous speech, he announced the company’s first 3D Blu-ray title, Monsters vs. Aliens. These 3D movies will, he optimistically predicted, “reduce piracy”.

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