Watching World Cup soccer on a 50-inch screen at the Best Buy in Arundel Mills last week, Brian Sturm was gazing through clunky-looking glasses at what could be the next big thing in popular entertainment.
Sturm, a 34-year-old financial analyst who considers himself a "huge" sports fan, was brought into the store by the games and the offhand remark of a friend who said the 3D display at Best Buy would show him sports in a way he never had seen before.
"The picture is amazing, and I'm not a 3D kind of guy," Sturm said. "It's better than being there. It feels like the players are coming though the screen at you. It blows HD away. I'll tell you what, I wasn't thinking about it before, but when I have the money, sure, I'll be getting 3D."
Sturm's words are exactly what the media industry wants to hear. With fierce, bodies-in-motion competition on the field and crazed, colorful fans in the stands, the heavily viewed games are proving to be a winning way to lead consumers into a new and more expensive frontier of viewing.
"The World Cup is one of those events that everyone is watching some portion of, even if you're not normally a giant soccer fan, just to find out what the buzzing is about," says Kelly Gould, director of broadcast services at GKV, a Baltimore communications firm. "Everybody's paying attention on one level or another, so it's a great way to captivate people with new technology around this big sporting event. In that sense, the World Cup is definitely creating a new awareness of 3D."
Awareness is one thing. But given the fact that many Americans have yet to even come to terms with HDTV (high-definition television), analysts also say that getting buyers to go from wanting a 3D TV to actually purchasing one any time soon could be a tall order — especially in these uncertain economic times.
"I think 3D is sort of in that high-def position of several years ago where its applications are coming out, and we're seeing sneak peeks of how great it's going to be. But I think it's just not there yet for everybody," Gould says.
Still, with hit films like "Avatar" introducing millions of filmgoers to the lush experience offered by the latest 3D technology, and such companies as Disney, Comcast and ESPN promising consumers that same viewing pleasure in their homes, it is safe to say everyone is going to be hearing more about the new technology in coming weeks and months. And that goes for video game enthusiasts, too — as that $45-billion-a-year realm of the media industry also embraces 3D courtesy of Sony and Nintendo.
ESPN's launch on June 11 of its ESPN 3D network in conjunction with its coverage of the World Cup games is perhaps the primary driving force behind the heightened awareness. And the buzz already generated suggests that 3D could find its way into the nation's home-entertainment grid much faster than HDTV did.
"Between now and Christmas, I think you will begin to see a virtual avalanche of commercials on television from the consumer electronics companies trying to sell you a 3D TV," says Bryan Burns, vice president for strategic planning at the sports media company ESPN. "And as that goes farther into the mainstream, consumers will become more aware of 3D. And between those commercials and the events like World Cup that we're doing, the awareness will continue to grow. ESPN is a lot of things, but one of the things it does is reach 100 million people a week across all our media."
Comparing the current 3D rollout to the one started seven years ago for HD, Burns says: "When we started with ESPN HD in 2003, we had a smattering of good customers and distributors, but they were small ones."
But with 3D, it's a vastly different story.
"This time, we went into our launch day with Comcast, DirecTV and AT&T," Bryan says, explaining that they were instantly available in 45 million homes via the subscriber lists of those media conglomerates. "What that partnership means is that if you live in the Comcast area and you call them up, you get ESPN 3D. And we didn't have that with HD."
The partnership of ESPN and Comcast to show 25 World Cup games in 3D also demonstrates the way the media world has changed in the past decade, with the biggest companies getting even bigger and more vertically integrated. ESPN is Disney, and Comcast is likely to soon be Comcast- NBC-Universal. Such entertainment companies can control the flow of programming from the studios in Hollywood that provide the best feature film and TV products available — down to the very piece of wire from the utility pole in the alley that brings these productions into homes.
As Fred Graffam, a senior regional vice president for Comcast, explains it, subscribers with an HD receiver box can be upgraded to 3D service by calling the company. There is no added subscription charge and no need for a special receiver-converter, only the 3D TV and glasses.
