Panasonic Full HD 3D experience eyes-on
By Richard Lawler 
posted Sep 11th 2009 10:13AM
posted Sep 11th 2009 10:13AM
Active shutter 3D technology once again did not fail to impress, though large format action content like the Beijing Olympics Opening Ceremony and action sports footage was far more impressive than the movie trailer. The benefit of a picture where everything, regardless of distance from the camera, is in focus is one of the biggest benefits 3D has going for it and nothing makes that more apparent than video from a large stadium. Aside from a few glitches from a pair of the glasses being low on battery and flickering annoyingly throughout, the framerate was smooth and the picture sharp, a marked difference from the jittery motion we witnessed during JVC's 3D demo earlier in the day.
With Sony jumping on board it certainly appears Panasonic has everything lined up for acceptance as a Blu-ray standard, and we fully expect to see 3D televisions and assorted hardware on shelves by next year's holiday season. This weekend ESPN tests 3D broadcasts with the USC/Ohio State game, focusing there would do more for 3D backers benefit than pumping up films, which simply don't do enough to bring the effect past "nice gimmick" status. The 3D Full HD truck tour will likely be coming through your town sometime in the next year, I definitely advise checking it out.
I like my D's how they are, thanks.
Yeah, but one more "D" would be great for video games!
-hey John is that a new tv?
--Yea
-What kind is it?
--Oh its the new 52" Full HD3DLCD
-thats a whole lot of D's
--How much did it run?
-a bazillion dollars
I myself prefer Double Ds.
One more D and it's Total Recall City.
I agree I have one eye that has weaker eye site then the other so generally these products don't work correctly for me. Its really irritating when my family is watching a 3D movie and I'm stuck most the time trying to focus my eyes to work right with the glasses.
@Bryan: I have heard that close to 40% of people - for similar to you reasons - will not be able to watch in 3D.
I can't find the original article (I believe I have read it on BoingBoing) but actual technology is pushing limits of human eyes. IOW, one should expect some side effects after full length movie.
Make the glasses less lame and then maybe...
Make it blue.
or the standard consumer electronics color of...BLACK.
What are you talking about, those glasses are the new 80's
suck it 2010 we goin back to the 80's woot woot
new HD3DLCD
"Make the glasses less lame and then maybe..."
I'd suggest getting rid of them entirely. Under no circumstances am I voluntarily going to watch TV wearing a pair of spectacles unless I can no longer wear contact lenses. I've sat through a 3D movie recently and it all just felt goofy.
Kurt Rambis glasses, included.
OMG. IT LOOKS LIKE THAT BALD GUY IS COMING STRAIGHT AT ME!!
fail
Just don't let him take you to bed so easily... Play hard to get... Or whatever, you know?
3D = YES!
GLASSES = NO!
Can u imagine having your mates over to watch the game, and everyone has to don the super geeky 3D specs!
I appreciate that the 3d glasses free technology is more expensive but surly better to bring it to market now so in 5 years we can all afford it! The way I see it is the 3d + glasses technology is going to damage the reputation of 3d and put people off. Therefore the glasses free technology may never come to market! Rant over…
From the manufacturers point of view this makes sense. First generation of TVs need glasses, everyone invests in the switch from HD to 3D HD. Second gen is glasses free, meaning everyone needs to buy a new TV - yay for the economy :)
I know how ridiculous having to sit around wearing geeking glasses. Oh wait... I do that all the time and so do my friends.
For 3D is nice it doesn't improve the experience like HD does but, sure as apples is apples, NICAM is better than mono, 3D is better than 2D.
Quad HD OLED in 3D FTW!
And how many sets of goggles will you get with your TV? How much do extras cost? Will your friends need to bring their own over?
I think there was an article on here the other day about a glasses-free 3D TV or projector. Something like $100,000. I'll take the glasses for now.
3D Contact Lenses
From what I’m reading you’ll need to by a new 200Hz TV for 3D + glasses if your to be able to play back PS3 games in 3D. As there are only relatively few amount of 200Hz HDTV on the market right now that pretty much means everyone will need to buy a new TV anyway!
Granted a replacement 200Hz TV would cost considerably less than glasses free 3DTV because the technology is not as developed yet.
http://www.gizmowatch.com/entry/3d-tv-the-hdtvs-successor-is-almost-here/
Personally I find the following problems with 3D + glasses
- if using for long periods you can get headaches
- the picture seems to shirk and lose clarity
- you look like a tit wearing the glasses!
My concern is that the glasses free technology will never make it to market due to glasses version putting everyone off and the developers think there’s not a big enough market out there for 3D to continue with the glasses free technology. – I hope I’m wrong because I think 3D could be as big if not bigger than the switch from black and white to colour!
The glasses look like a prop from "Watchmen".
Maybe i'm the only one who is excited about this. I love 3D movies and i'll love them more if I can watch them at home.
They look like some sorta Transformers Movie Happy Meal tie in toy. Optimus Prime Shades! Sweet!
Didn't 3d movies die out in the 60s?
it should die out again, it's a stupid gimmick.
Yeah, 3D is so stupid. I hate seeing in 3 dimensions everyday, especially when I am outside. It has too much depth, it's just a fuckin' gimmick, I swear. Real life should be flat. Fuck 3D, man.
Not since I last checked....haven't you seen all the movies that are on 3D or the ones that are coming soon? It's gaining popularity and there's better technology for it then there was decades ago.
You haven't seen a REALD 3D movie lately, have you?
acutally I have, and it does nothing for the films except promote more shitty filmmaking and takes out good cinimatography with having "pop-out" effects instead. If your entire moving watching exsistance revolves around movies like "Bloody Valentine" or "Final Destination" you obviously don't share the same taste as me, and thats fine.
Do you think a film like district 9 would have been augmented had it been in 3d? the hurt locker? No...it would have taken away from both films. I don't want to "feel like I'm in the film" I don't need to, i watch movies to watch a story, like I'm reading a book.
Personally I think that if you watch movies for the FX over the storyline you have bad taste in movies, but I'm just stating my opinion, and my opinion is I wish 3d movies would go away.
GOOD 3D is new. Some movies will of course be over-using it just like they do/did with CGI. In time, watching movies in 3D will just be normal. It will feel like your next to the scenes and the characters giving it a much more intimate feeling. You are just stuck on being an old fart that doesn't like new things, seriously. Look past movies like Final Destination and think about what it CAN do. I saw the clips from Avatar and I swear, it PULLS you in being in 3D. Also, movies like Monsters vs Aliens, a fun cartoon film in any dimension, was WAY more enjoyable in 3D. Besides, all 3D movies so far have also been shown in 2D. In fact, I had to see Up in 2D (wanted to see in 3D) and it was an extremely emotion animated film even though it was also made for 3D, so your reasoning is a logic-fail.
how is it a logic-fail? The only movies you have listed as "good" are childrens 3d CGI movies that used 3d for the gimmick effect (I saw monsters vs aliens, and if you think the 3d is anything other then gimmicky you need your head checked) I saw up in 2d and it was fine, I felt nothing was loss, and I could probably guess the scenes that they used 3d for the gimmick effect.
can you name one FILM (as in a movie with a solid script, storyline and acting, most recent that comes to mind was hurt locker) that would be agumented by 3d and not made cheesey. If explosions in the hurt locker made crap fly "at you" from the screen, imagine how much that would have cheapened the movie?
My logic isn't flawed, and once again, I am just stating my opinion, your argument has no substance. Just like how even in digital, good filmmakers still shoot in 24p instead of 30p because it gives it a slightly less real feel that adds to the effect, where as movies shot in the 60i/30p (think of the sci-fi movies) look like made for TV movies despite having "more realistic" motion. Some people like gimmicks, just like some people like the circus, I dislike both.
My point is there is that you said if movies focus on 3D effects than the story will suffer. However, Up (yes being a kids movie, but from a studio known to be diverse enough to cater to adults) had nothing lost in the 2D form. I have never seen it in the 3D, but I actually heard it was one of the most subtle uses of the new 3D tech yet, in contrast too MvA or Final Destination. Movies are to entertain, in a multitude of genres and styles. Seeing a love story in 3D may be considered pointless, but it doesn't make the technology a gimmick by any measure.
I like the circus, but clowns are scary
totally agree
Yeah, I agree, it's a gimmick. Movie studios are really getting behind 3D because they think it's a good piracy deterrent. It's really hard to shoot a bootleg video of a movie, when it looks all distorted without glasses. THAT'S what this is really all about.
And yeah, it's only good for CGI special effects and kid's movies. I really doubt that, say, There Will Be Blood or Doubt, would benefit with 3D. Comedies either: The Hangover was great, but 3D would not have made it somehow funnier.
Grammar Delinquent, I can answer your question. First of all, I completely agree that most uses of 3d is gimmicky and consists of waving shit around on the screen so it's sticking out at the audience. That is totally lame and pretty cheap, IMHO. However 3 3D movies that I have seen have been pretty good. First, Coraline 3d had the most excellent usage of 3D I have ever seen in a film. All of the usages of 3d in that movie were designed by artists and cinematographers - not producers or marketers trying to make things "pop out at you." A few scenes that really stuck out at me in Coraline 3D were the following:
1. When it was raining outside, there was a shot showing some of the characters sitting at a kitchen table. The camera was outside the window and focusing on the characters inside. The rain and rain drops were out of focus, yet their depth was obviously in front of what was inside through the window.
2. The father was sitting on his computer and the camera was behind him, aimed at his back. You could see the computer screen and the reflection of his face on the monitor. As you know, reflections show the total added depth of how far the light actually has to travel, so his face was obviously at a depth beyond the glass of the monitor screen. Then Coraline walks into the room through the door behind the camera, and the camera remains focused on the father and the computer screen. You can see Coraline's reflection in the monitor as well and can clearly see the difference in depth and that she is even farther back in the monitor than her father's reflection. The sense of depth in that scene is incredible.
3. When Coraline first opens the portal in the home to the other dimension or whatever, the portal starts out in 2 dimensions and then expands to 3. This may sound like a cheap shot - but it was nothing like waving around a stick in the audience's face. This was done in a very artistic manner. This was because of what they did with the camera when this happened. Not only did the "portal" (looks like some sort of slinky device wrapped in cloth) expand towards the audience but it also gained depth away from the audience at the same time. It looked incredibly cool.
Coraline on DVD is bundled with some 3d glasses but that won't look nearly as it did on a projection system with polarized glasses. If you missed it, that's too bad.
The other 2 movies I enjoyed on 3d was UP and also U2-3D. UP was good because they literally didn't do anything special with the 3d. It was just a normal Pixar movie but with 2 camera angles rendered for every frame. It was great because of its subtlety. U2-3D was pretty cool looking because they were creative in their layering of the band. For example, they would show multiple angles of the band playing at different depths, with one of the angles being shown in the shadow of one of the band members. That was pretty creative.
So anyway, Grammar Delinquent, yes you are right for the most part but I gotta say you have missed out on a few key movies that actually did do the 3D thing the right way.
@globgloop
I agree with those choices: Colaline, Up!, U2-3D
I watch A LOT of 3d movies and those would be my three TOP.
They all got it right
@Grammar Delinquent
I absolutely agree with everything that you've said. 3D is nothing more than a gimmick that Hollywood is pushing as a means to increase cinema ticket prices and reduce piracy. It adds absolutely nothing to the movie experience and the sooner people realise this the better. The fact that you also have to wear stupid glasses in order to see the movie is just the icing on the crapcake.
What the hell is wrong with glasses? Who is going to watch YOU? Don't you have enough self esteem to look past that?
You don't pay attention to your friends and family at all while watching TV? What a cold life you must lead.
No, i watch the screen.
Anyone remember the Sega Master System had 3-D LCD shutter glasses and a handful of 3-D Games? I still have mine and the effect was pretty cool then. The technology is long over-due for the general public (beyond a few PC applications) - lets get it going already!!
PS Who cares what you look like when you're watching a movie or playing a game?
How does this differ from the 3D that has been in my Samsung 52 inch DLP - which is described here - http://www.dlp.com/hdtv/3-d_dlp_hdtv.aspx
Totally incompatible, or not?
It's the same principle. Whether the standards will work the same way is the question. There also hasn't been any mention in any of these articles whether active shutter technologies will work with existing non-DLP TVs with high refresh rates.
Who has that info?
The goggles look tinted. Is it like watching TV with sunglasses on, meaning the colour is ruined?
Well, they say it's active-shutter; I'm assuming that's LCD shutter, so you'll lose about 50% of unpolarized light when they're open, and a maximum of 50% duty cycle, so you'll need ~4x the brightness. With appropriate LCD designs, you can match polarization and reduce that to the duty-cycle loss only, but no farther. So it's like sunglasses in that respect, but the attenuation should do nothing to colors.
I thought NO new TV is needed and all of the processing is done in the player or STB, as long as the TV is capable of doing 120 Hz or 240 Hz?
There are no TV's on the market that support an input of over 60hz. All the existing TV's that have the "120/240hz" are just internal refresh rates that work off the 60hz source signal.
There are a few DLP TV's, such as the Mitsubishi's, that have a 3D ready feature but those are still a 60hz input source that have a box pattern interlacing that achieve the 3D effect.
Yea I dunno about the rest of you but I'll never buy into 3d simply b/c I dont wanna spend every moment at my tv wearing f!@#$in sunglasses.
Never say never :-)
People though computers and the internet were stupid ideas...
While I agree with that, it's not like you HAVE to watch everything in 3D. Put on a football game in 2D while you're grillin', but pop in a movie later and dim the lights and throw on the glasses for a great movie experience...Like you're going to the IMAX. Not a huge deal to me.
the internet IS a stupid idea. I've never gonna use it.
I saw several demos at CES this past January. And I'll tell you right now, for sports in particular, I don't care how stupid the glasses look (and really they don't look that bad, just like thick sunglasses) it was AMAZING. They kept showing a NBA clip (Lakers if I remember correctly) and OMG I swear it was like sitting in the friggin stadium!!!
3D is so YAWN TASTIC
Grammar Delinquent cant be more right. Not only does it take away from good film making techniques it also takes away from color depth and brightness.
Amongst all these 3D sets, I've not heard anyone talk about wearing 3D glasses on top of your existing glasses? Anyone know how they are going to work? Clip-ons? Surely i don't have to wear glasses on top of my glasses!?!
I wear glasses. It's not something I'd want to wear all day, but they fit fine.
That's another deal breaker. I'm not friggin' wearing glasses *on top* of my glasses. Talk about uncomfortable.
I recently went to watch G-force 3D and I really hate those glasses. Same one shown on the picture above. They are really heavy and never sat right over my own glasses so it kept pulling them down off my face. I sat through the whole show holding the 3D glasses up with 1hand.
They really need to make clip-ons for this considering how many people actually wear glasses nowadays.
@Grammar Delinquent
Grumpy old man much?
Avatar will be the first measure of success or failure of 3d movies. I think it will be a success.
But.. who's driving the truck?
People are so vain. They won't wear something in their home because the glasses are not fashionable...
...
...are we 12 year old girls now? Is that what gamer geeks have become?
I still think 3D as a movie gimmick, while neato, is a dead end. Imagine this. You buy a ticket for $15, walk into an IMAX (or IMAX-sized) theater, and watch the superbowl on a humongous screen in super-hi-def 3D. The entire presentation is delivered via a static camera from an angle to capture the entire field (occasionally overlays for replays). A true "you are there" experience.
Or a U2 concert (normally hundreds) from the same perspective.
At smaller sizes, it's a cute gimmick. at IMAX, it's a-freaking-mazing.
Think about the kinds of things that benefit from a "you are there" experience. events you can't attend - like sports or an expensive ballet or concert, or a videogame with e first-person-perspective (shooters and racers). that's where the technology provides more than gimmickery. And it all falls apart at less than 60" or so.
Did anyone else think of Back to the Future II as soon as they saw the picture with the shark coming out of the frame?
Did the 3D glasses turn that guy's eyes red, or is he a Terminator posing as a 3D television?
what about porn in 3d?- take cover!!
*looks that truck with the shark*
how do they fit their 3D gear into that 2D truck?
The shark still looks fake.
I truly wasn't expecting the experience that I had in that truck. I little to no excitement with all the other 3-D clips that I saw at the other vendors spaces. I was blown away by panasonic and it was one of the highlights of the show. The question is when and how much, bring it.