You are not in Kansas anymore. You are on Pandora, ladies and gentleman.
– Avatar
On Thursday, 3D graphics took a significant step toward being built into Web browsers, notes C/Net.
The Khronos Group, which oversees the OpenGL graphics interface, announced that its work with Mozilla to bring hardware-accelerated 3D graphics to the Web has reached draft standard form. The standard, called WebGL, lets programmers who use the Web’s JavaScript language take advantage of video card support.
OpenGL competes with Direct3D on Microsoft Windows platforms. Internet Explorer remains the dominant browser in terms of usage, but all four of its main challengers–Mozilla’s Firefox, Apple’s Safari, Google’s Chrome, and Opera Software’s Opera–are working hard, sometimes in an informal alliance, to get ahead by advancing the Web state of the art, says C/Net.
All four of those browser makers have endorsed WebGL, and developer test versions of Firefox, Safari, and Chrome have it built in. Google also has its own O3D project, which currently is a browser plug-in but is also being incorporated into Chrome.
3D is suddenly hot, with films, television and video games moving to 3D. Avoiding a standards war may be the trickiest bit.
Officials for the FIFA World Cup announced this week that next year’s tournament will be broadcast in 3D.
The organization, which manages the world’s largest sporting event, has signed a media rights agreement with Sony, an official FIFA Partner, to deliver 3D images from up to 25 matches of the quadrennial event, taking place in South Africa.
Sony says its 3D professional cameras will be used and viewers will be able to enjoy 3D experiences at a number of locations during the 2010 FIFA World Cup.
In September Sony announced it would roll out a 3D-capable Bravia LCD TV in 2010, along with Blu-ray Disc players and a 3D capable PlayStation 3.
Sony’s 3D-compatible sets will include a small piece of additional hardware that enables them to show 3D content but they’ll also work as conventional television sets. The biggest expense for 3D viewing will be the glasses. Those could cost up to around US$200 and won’t necessarily be bundled with a television.
While many TV makers use passive polarized glasses, Sony’s plans active shutter glasses that alternate the image for the left and right eye.
Sony expects that 3D televisions will make up between 30 percent and 50 percent of all sets it sells between April 2012 and April 2013. Sony chief Sir Howard Stringer told investors the company is counting on 3D to be the company’s next $10 billion business and anticipates 3D-capable electronics will generate as much as $11 billion between March 2012-13.
Panasonic developed the world’s first 3D full HD Plasma Theater System. It includes a 103-inch plasma television and a Blu-ray disc player, distributing full high definition images to both the left and right eye. HDMI version 1.4, released in June 2009, defines a number of 3D transmission formats.
Content providers, such as Disney, DreamWorks, and other Hollywood studios asked SMPTE for the development of a 3DTV standard in order to avoid a battle of formats. Vendors that presented their respective technologies at the task force meeting included Sensio, Philips, Dynamic Digital Depth (DDD), TDVision, and Real D.
James Cameron’s Avatar is being released in 2D and 3D formats, along with an IMAX 3D release in selected theaters. Cameron developed many innovative technologies to make the film. They use RealD for theatrical distribution which allows the use of inexpensive circularly polarized glasses. In the Real D system, a “ZScreen” is placed immediately in front of the projector lens to switch polarization. Images are decoded when the audience wears complimentary polarized glasses.
Here’s how James Cameron turned a stage performances into a rich 3D, CG scene. Unlike previous performance capture systems, where the digital environment is added after the actors’ motions have been captured, Cameron’s new virtual camera allows him to observe directly on a monitor how the actors’ virtual counterparts interact with the movie’s digital world in real time.
In November 2004, The Polar Express was released as IMAX’s first full-length, animated 3-D feature. It was released in 3,584 theaters in 2D, and only 66 IMAX locations. The return from those few 3-D theaters was about 25% of the total.
Related Dailywirelees stories include The Virtual Set, 2008 Summer Olympics: On Demand, and Scanners 3D.
