Proust and the viewmaster

The world's first-ever live 3D transmission and screening of an international sporting event took place in London on Saturday 8 March 2008. The Six Nations rugby game between Scotland and England in Edinburgh was captured by three 3D rigs comprising dual Sony HDC950 cameras. The two resulting HD feeds (for left and right eyes) were then uplinked and transmitted by satellite to Riverside Studios in west London, and projected through two Christie projectors allowing 250 viewers to watch the game on a big screen with light stereoscopic glasses. The event was a joint venture between BBC Sport and the3DFirm, a consortium comprising 3D specialists Inition and rental and post-production company Axis Films.The closest precedent was February 2007, when the NBA captured a basketball game in 3D and transmitted it via fibre cabling to a nearby hotel. Riverside Studios were the location of the BBC's first colour transmissions in 1967.

Although the Riverside test screening went perfectly well, the viewing experience was limited in terms of production with only three cameras positions, no close-up zooming or slow-motion replay. The light stereoscopic glasses rendered the experience familiar and seamless, and delivered a true immersive like-being-there sensation.
Combining HD and 3D technology could well bring live broadcast events to big-screen venues to an entire new level. Many movie theatres are equipping themselves with 3D-ready digital projectors in order to offer stereoscopic 3D films like the currently hugely successful 'Hannah Montana 3D' from Disney. They may one day use the equipement for 3D events too.

3D technology is also coming to flat-panel displays too, with glass-less autostereoscopic products like Philips' WOW range. At the moment they cannot support real-time sources but the technology is moving rapidly. The 3D displays are still too expensive for the consumer market (around £6,000 for the 42-inch model from Philips) and 3D broadcasting is far from being standardised.
Given that 3D capture and transmission can be developed using elements of existing HD technologies, it is possible to expect 3D to become the next step of premium sports pay TV, with regular commercial broadcasts ten years from now. In the meantime the primary market for autostereoscopic displays will be corporate and 'digital signage' out-of-the-home advertising.

On a personal note, stereoscopic 3D always puts me in a feel-good Proustian mood because my favourite child toy was the ViewMaster this bulky red plastic slide viewer (photo) I had Robin Hood, Bambi, The Jungle Book and so on; I felt like a kid at the Saturday projection, I loved it. Besides it was like being in the stadium in the middle of the Scottish crowd and Scotland won that game in a miserable heavy rain. As for the flat 'autostereoscopic' panels, they remind me of these glittering birthday cards my granny would send me, showing Mickey and Donald engaged in some action and when you moved the card you could see 3D effects or even mouvement.