Brace yourself for the ultimate viewing experience with 3DTV

It was bound to happen soon, though nobody can say for sure when it will get into our living rooms. There is no doubt that the addition of third dimension TV i.e, 3DTV is only a few years away. The technology is there and most of the technical elements needed to turn this into reality are already in place.

The development of 3DTV technology is been carried out by a leading 3DTV consortium funded by the European Commission and consisting of hundreds of researchers. Their primary goal is to achieve fully-fledged and functional 3D video capabilities that can be integrated with various media forms. The core functions of the Three-Dimensional TV consortium can be summarized as follows:
• Capture and representation of entire 3-dimensional scene information.
• Complete definition of digital 3-D signal, storage and transmission.
• Display and reproduction of a 3-dimensional scene.
Besides these three functions, the consortium also intends to investigate possible areas of use as well as the social influence of 3DTV. Eye-polarizing glasses have been used in the initial design stages. However, plans are underway to develop a display system without the use of filters which will significantly delay the release of 3DTV to the general public. Moreover, according to a co-coordinator of the consortium, the concept of holographic 3DTV is feasible but could take another decade or so before it becomes commercially available. However, there are a few fast emerging technologies like Stereoscopic 3-D display which is expected to be commonplace at homes and cinemas in a few years. Stereoscopic 3-D is a revolutionary technology that displays images with depth. It enables viewers see images, without glasses and at the same time using motion parallax. Applications that make use of true stereoscopic display include 3-D home TV, 3-D video arcade games, 3-D video phones, avionic cockpit displays as well as some scientific and medical displays.

With the technical deficiencies notwithstanding, there are a few prominent reasons that could accelerate the introduction of 3-dimensional TV to home viewers:
• The rapid evolution of holographic systems that capture and record detailed, high-density 3-D scene information as well as carry out complex 3-D scene representation and motion.
• Advancement of efficient and complex media compression formats such as MPEG-4 which easily integrate digital TV, DVD and HDTV format, in addition to 3DTV in existing transmission media.
• The development of highly-efficient display techniques which rid the technical deficiencies of polarizing filters.
• Modern television displays have an increased rate of frames display, (over 1080p) which can provide high-def images motion with very little flicker rate.
• The capability of 3DTV signal to be broadcast by television stations over air waves or cable. The images be displayed live or even recorded and replayed in three-dimension.
• Stereoscopic 3-D devices can be used on computer displays with a single video board, for video arcade games, CAD workstations, air traffic control systems, scientific and medical visualizations systems.
• Three-dimension TV images can be projected on most screen sizes, direct view LCDs in full color and with no flicker.
Indeed, 3DTV is compatible with most contemporary display systems. Avid viewers will at the moment not enjoy the real deal, like watching their favorite sports footage with seemingly small-scale sportspeople running in the background. To be certain, as time goes by, we expect significant advances in development of 3DTV holographic systems. We do hope that in the not so distant future, HDTV systems with three-dimensional capabilities will not only be widely available, but also reasonably priced.