Fans were amazed at the arc of Rory Delap's long throws in 3-D
I’m guessing someone at ESPN/Disney loved Avatar a lot, as they’re spearheading the push to get people watching things in 3-D at home with today’s announcement of an ESPN 3-D channel that will debut in June.
Word has it that the first broadcast (they’ll show some 85 sporting events in their first year) will be the opening game of the World Cup, to which I say “huh?”
ESPN, Discovery, Sony and IMAX are all getting into the 3-D TV game, and ESPN’s spokes-suit can barely restrain his excitement. Take it away, Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing Sean Dratches!
“This will be a meaningful step to drive adoption of 3D television sets and afford opportunities for our affiliates to create value through new product offerings, and our advertisers, who want fresh sponsorship opportunities,” said Dratches, while struggling to keep his eyeballs from doing that thing in cartoons where the dollar signs appear and you hear “ka-ching!” over and over again.
This could be fun, one supposes, but it could also be an absolute nightmare.
Not only will 3-D TVs be realistically a couple of years away from really being affordable to anyone who’s not a world-famous soccer player, but the technology will surely detract from the nuance of the game. For example: did anyone who saw Avatar gripe about the gaping plot holes? Probably not because they were too busy drooling over the sweet-ass battle sequences and sensory-massacring special effects. Similarly, I bet it’s hard to pay attention to a soccer game when you’re too busy ducking to avoid the ball. Or maybe not. Maybe this will finally make Bolton watchable.
Funnily enough, a member of UF does some work in broadcasting, and shed new light entirely on the whole 3-D/HDTV playground currently available, one that really hasn’t been fully exploited by broadcasters who appear to already be moving on to that nebulous next big thing:
ESPN are really ahead of the game, considering they don’t even offer real HD yet. In fact no one does. Everyone rushes out and buys a 1080p TV set yet the only format in 1080p is Blu-Ray. ESPN broadcasts in 720p and like everyone else does not have the bandwidth to send 1080p down the pipe. Most cable stations are worse. They just compress the picture to a size they can deliver without spending money.
I’m sure a Drogba Flop isn’t terribly different from Torres Dive or a Ronaldo Simulation in 3D. I can’t imagine what it might be like to watch Reading take it to LFC in glorious HD 3-D.
Sean ;-)
What’s a HDTV? Is my CRT device suddenly obsolete? It’s only 12 years old.
I propose a contest to figure out which of the UF team is in “broadcasting.”
God, I hope that one of you f**kers works for The Jay Leno Show…
The Avatar plot was stolen from Fern Gully. And, yes, I complained about the plot of Avatar.
This isn’t that surprising, since Disney has invested heavily in 3D technology. Disney being the parent company of ESPN.
TFA: definitely not surprising, but kinda pointless at the moment. While it’ll be “cool” to time it around the World Cup, it will take years for this stuff to really catch on, and considering that they haven’t quite mastered HD yet and are now trying to sell us on something new, it feels a bit irresponsible.
@TFA and Pixar!
I wish I worked in broadcasting.
3D glasses don’t work with my real glasses, anyone else have that issue? I’ve always thought 3D was retarded.
Granted a “next big thing” that everyone will rush out to get will make it hilarious to see the sad looks on the faces of all the HD snobs who bitch about stuff not being in HD.
get contacts…worked fine for me, although the glasses/3D gave me a headache after 2.5 hours of
the blue man group movieAvatar./hate stuff that is not in HD, but will not be running out to get a 3D technology.
Football in 3D? Can someone help me uncover a Tevez/face joke?