Home Media Magazine - June 15, 2008 - (Page 32) NEWS 3-D Sans Glasses Is ‘Holy Grail,’ Execs Say Continued from page 1 www.homemediamagazine.com TOP H A R D WA R E include helping determine the best file formats for home 3-D product, working within DVD and Blu-ray Disc standards, and coordinating with other 3-D groups in Europe and Asia. “We need to bring this stuff to the home — that’s what’s important,” Chinnock said. said in a conference call with DreamWorks investors April 29. “There will be a time in which this will migrate on to other platforms and have, I think, again, premium value, but that’s down the road a bit.” The theatrical factor The interest in at-home 3-D is being fueled by the resurgence of 3-D in theaters: According to research from Screen Digest, per-screen ticket sales for 3-D movies are more than double those for the same movie in 2-D. By the end of 2009, more than 4,000 3-D capable screens will be up and running. That’s thanks in large part to a recent agreement by Regal Entertainment Group to install 1,500 RealD 3-D screens in its theaters, eclipsing the total Imax and Dolby have installed combined. There were less than 100 digital 3-D screens nationwide for Disney’s Chicken Little in 2005. “Why is it finally time for 3-D to happen?” said 3Ality Digital Systems co-founder John Modell. “We have synergy between content creators and the technology industry.” In the home already In some ways at least, 3-D in the home, is already in the home: more than 1 million HDTVs sold so far in the United States are 3-D ready, Chinnock said, and another million are expected to be in American households by the end of 2008. TV broadcasters and gaming are showing signs of 3-D interest. In April 3ality Digital demonstrated the ability to broadcast a live, 3-D feed via the existing 2-D infrastructure for an episode of “Deal or No Deal.” And Illinois-based TDVision recently unveiled a video codec that encodes 3-D content for delivery to existing 2-D set-top boxes. “We believe the next step in the evolution of TV will be 3-D technology,” said Sungho Kim with Samsung Electronics, which introduced its 3-D DLP TV in 2007 and 3-D plasma HDTV this year. Only a few dozen DVDs with 3-D have been released, packaged with glasses. Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment is the first studio using Blu-ray for 3-D, with its Aug. 19 release of Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds 3-D Concert. A two-disc DVD is also being released, and both it and the Blu-ray will come with 3-D glasses. Also, 3-D company TDVision Systems in May showed off technology that converts standard Blu-ray Discs to 3-D on certain 3-D capable TVs. “We see a host of new opportunities for cooperation and innovation on the horizon — not only for display providers, but for those within every facet of the 3-D technology chain,” said U.S. Display Consortium (USCD) CTO Dr. Mark Hartney. USDC is the other co-founding organization of the 3D@ Home Consortium. DreamWorks Animation CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg admitted the studio is looking beyond the theater for its 3-D content. His company will release all of its theatrical films in 3-D beginning in 2009. “Whether or not it achieves the fullest potential [is unknown],” he The ‘holy grail’ of home 3-D Mitch Perliss, senior business director of North American distribution at MagicPlay Entertainment, knows a thing or two about trying to get 3-D into the home. When he was with SlingShot Entertainment in 2002, the company paired Imax and horror DVDs with a set-top 3-D converter and two pairs of 3-D glasses, at about $100. But, much like the throwaway 3-D glass movies of old, the idea proved gimmicky. “If you’re watching with five, six friends, and they all need glasses it could be expensive. And it looks goofy,” he said. “I think the answer is if one has the ability to do 3-D without the glasses.” Philips is working on autostereoscopic (without glasses) 3-D TV technologies, and more than one company has released projector-based 3-D technology with no need for glasses. But nobody yet has found a way to do glasses-less 3-D in the home affordably and with the ability to deliver the same experience seen in theaters. “There’s a significant amount of image trade-off when you try it without the glasses,” Chinnock said. “Showing a movie [without glasses], it just doesn’t work right now. The image is degraded just too much.” Richard Doherty of The Envisioneering Group said there’s a market for 3-D in the home and that the glasses issue won’t be a big one forever. Getting the product — and the message — to consumers is the biggest challenge. “They are largely unaware, and challenges in showing [3-D] at retail exist,” he said. “Starting as a glasses-based market, the consumer application market will soon transform into glasses-free consumer applications,” predicted Jos Swillens with Philips 3-D Solutions. Philips has an autostereoscopic 52-inch screen set for this winter. While 3-D content will be slow to come into consumers’ hands at home, the future is bright, Chinnock said. “The Holy Grail for TV, clearly, is glasses-less 3-D,” he said. “We’ll get there, but it may take awhile.” MAY 20 0 8 PLATFORM UNITS SOLD 1 2 3 4 5 Wii Nintendo DS PlayStation 3 Xbox 360 PSP 675.1 K 452.6 K 208.7 K 186.6 K 182.3 K Source: The NPD Group PS3 Beats Xbox 360 in May Continued from page 1 “Nintendo’s Wii and DS have captured the top two spots in terms of hardware sales for the fourth consecutive month,” noted NPD analyst Anita Frazier. “The continued success of Grand Theft Auto IV is not translating into big hardware sales for either the PS3 or the 360, but there may yet to be a lift in June due to gift-giving for Father’s Day and graduations.” Still, the PS3 pulled away from the Xbox 360 in terms of hardware unit sales, with more than 20,000 units separating them. Last month, the consoles were neck and neck. Wal-Mart Shoppers Buy PS3 Continued from page 1 L ATE F L ASHES I MOVIE GALLERY GETS NEW ‘SHERIF’ Movie Gallery, which recently emerged from bankruptcy protection, has a new executive. Sherif Mityas has been named COO and president of retail operations, effective June 16. Mityas assumes the vacant COO position and replaces Jeffrey Stubbs, who resigned as president of retail operations, according to a regulatory filing. The new COO, a former aeronautical engineer, brings 20 years of retail consulting experience, most recently as a partner with A.T. Kearney Inc. When Dothan, Ala.-based Gallery exited Chapter 11 protection last month, C.J. “Gabe” Gabriel assumed the position of CEO, replacing co-founder, chairman and CEO Joe Malugen, who remained a member of the board. Edward Woo, analyst with Wedbush Morgan Securities in Los Angeles, said with outside investors now running Gallery and old management no longer holding equity in the new company, the switch wasn’t surprising. “I think Gallery realizes they have to do something different since the old movie-rental model is, and has been, suffering for a while,” Woo said. — Erik Gruenwedel Correction: In a story regarding a fundraiser for a DVD producer (HM, June 1-7), it should have been noted Warner Bros. is not associated with Paul’s Brain Trust, the fundraising group for Paul Prischman. The $100 gift card promotion, from June 8 to 14, acted as a rebate to consumers eager to experience Bluray movies and cutting-edge video games, clerks said. Wal-Mart also is offering a selection of Blu-ray titles for $15 each, including Flags of Our Fathers, Syriana, The Patriot, A Knight’s Tale, The Last Samurai, Training Day, The Fifth Element, Shooter, Blood Diamond, 300, War and 3:10 to Yuma. Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal-Mart said entertainment, which included standard DVD and Blu-ray, helped boost May same-store domestic sales 4% to $19.5 billion, compared to a 0.3% increase and $18 billion in the prior-year period. The company does not report sales data for separate product categories or items. Managers and employees of electronics departments contacted at California Wal-Mart locations in Foothill Ranch, Torrance, Norwalk, San Diego, El Cajon, Oceanside, Temecula and San Clemente all said they had sold out of their daily shipments of four PS3s since the start of the promotion. “I sold eight yesterday,” said Mohamed, manager at the Foothill Ranch store. By comparison, he said the store hadn’t sold any of the Magnavox players. He did, however, recommend the Magnavox if the customer just wanted to watch Blu-ray movies. “The PS3 gets pretty hot after four hours,” Mohamed said. An employee at the El Cajon store offered the consumer a Panasonic Blu-ray player for $448. “We don’t have any more PS3s in stock,” she said. “We should be getting some more in tonight.” The Norwalk manager said there was no shortage of Magnavox units. “We have lots of those,” she said. Michael Pachter, media analyst with Wedbush Morgan Securities in Los Angeles, said the PS3 has “at least” $100 worth of added value over a standard Blu-ray player, a fact he said contributed to renewed consumer interest. “People will want BD more when there is more content, but they want consoles now,” Pachter said. Rob Enderle, independent analyst with The Enderle Group in San Jose, Calif., said the PS3 remains one of the best deals on the market, even without the gift card. He said the fact that the PS3 can be updated for Profile 2.0 (Web connectivity), whereas the Profile 1.1 Magnavox cannot, motivated informed shoppers. “I’ll bet a lot of people at the stores and those that read up on their purchases know this,” Enderle said. Analyst Edward Woo said the influx of shoppers at Wal-Mart revolved around the perception that the game-playing ability of PS3 was worth at least $100. “If the $200 net price goes much lower ($100 range), than I think [standalone Blu-ray] players will begin to win out over movies and games,” Woo said. HOME MEDIA MAGAZINE (ISSN 1934-9882) is published weekly 51 times per year (weekly except for one week at the end of December) by Questex Media Group, Inc., 306 West Mi http://www.homemediamagazine.com
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