Sony is banking on new 3D content, 3D TV’s and a new camera system for the shooting 3D content to pull them out of the mess they are in with their Bravia LCD TV offerings.
In 2010 Sony will use the World Cup in South Africa to launch new 3D TV’s which the Company is claiming will be the “centrepiece of their “3D entertainment experience”.
Sony claim that users will also be able to plug in their PlayStation games consoles, allowing them to play games in 3D, as well as from Blu-Ray disc players and computers.
The only problem is that there is limited 3D content available and Sony being Sony will be asking a premium for their new TV’s.
In Australia Sony are going to have to compete with the likes of Sony who have had 3D TV for over 12 months and Chinese Company TCL who already have a 3D TV that does not need 3D glasses.
Another big issue is that 3D content in a lot of cases still needs 3D glasses and even then there is no compelling reason to move from 2D to 3D.
Speaking at last week’s IFA show in Europe Sony executives said that they also plan to makes the equipment needed to make 3D movies and television programmes.
Ralf Tanger, an expert on 3D technology at the Fraunhofer Heinrich Hertz research institute said that Sony’s plans are “ambitious” and not necessarily a formula for success.
3D TV has been around for many years with very limited success. In 1946, the Soviet Union made “Robinzon Cruzo”, the world’s first talkie in colour and 3D, and in the 1950s there were more than 60 others including Alfred Hitchcock’s “Dial M for Murder” before studios put 3D on the back burner because it had no appeal with consumers.
In the 1970s and early 1980s studios tried again with offerings like “Jaws 3D” and “Friday the 13th, Part 3”. At the time cinemas issued cardboard glasses. Again the concept failed.
At the recent he Cannes film festival Disney-Pixar’s 3D cartoon comedy “Up” was shown to an audience of celebrities who were given “goofy” glasses.
“At the moment the big handicap is that we are lacking in material,” Joern Ostermann, head of the Laboratory for Information Technology at Leipniz University in the northern German city of Hanover, told AFP.
Other companies such as Panasonic and Samsung are currently working on new 3D standards and there is every possibility of another format similar to Beta Vs VHS and HD DVD Vs Blu ray.
