Hisense 55 Inch 3d Smart Tv

3D streaming is coming to your smart TV

Could nosotros soon run into 3D movies and live TV sent over broadband to smart TVs?

When Samsung recently confirmed that it had started streaming 3D Idiot box content via at app on its Smart Hub platform, it was unexpected - and a bear upon disappointing.

The appearance of the latest 3D blockbusters would accept been a genuine game-changer, but the drove of DreamWorks film trailers and other curt 3D clips could still requite some consumers their showtime taste of 3D in the home.

Movie streaming in 2D is well underway, with most smart TVs from the major manufacturers hosting either Lovefilm or Acetrax - or both - but 3D streaming is only available from Virgin Media'south FilmFlex service, and even there it's express to ten or and so 3D movies.

Will other brands follow Samsung's instance and bring 3D streaming to living rooms?

"We do have the capability to do information technology, but nosotros've not announced services as yet," Steve Lucas, consumer AV & imaging product specialist at Panasonic, confirmed to TechRadar.

"The likelihood is that we'll start with a demo channel streamed on Viera Connect with Panasonic-created content."

More than 'goldfish-in-a-bowl' 3D, so, though it does seem harsh to expect Television manufacturers to broker content rights deals. Actual broadcasting should surely be upwardly to existing film streaming services such as Lovefilm or Acetrax, the latter of which streams 2D movies on Viera Connect (as does Eurosport for sports news, a broadcaster that now has a 3D channel on Virgin Media).

Lucas agrees: "If Acetrax had the streaming rights for streaming in 3D, then we would host information technology. It's non something that we would go out to secure. We would exist reliant on third political party suppliers."

Technical issues

There are, however, a few technical problems that put the brakes on the 3D streaming hereafter.

Although at least a tertiary of the UK's 200,000 3D TV owners are signed-up to Sky, the Uk's newest 3D host, Virgin Media, could be well poised equally it also runs a super-fast fibre optic broadband network.

Bandwidth is a major factor in TV manufacturer's indecision over 3D streaming. "A 3D side-by-side format broadcast takes the same space equally a regular 2D Hard disk channel," explains Lucas, "and then if that'southward the example for 3D streaming so the TV would cope with it perfectly well."

"Frame sequential 3D - a Full Hard disk drive image to each eye - will be possible in the future when bandwidth speeds are much greater, but today it would be difficult to make sure consumers get a good service that'southward not interrupted."

Lucas points to the BBC iPlayer'due south 'higher def' service as an example; it's better than SD, but stops short of being HD quality because of bandwidth restrictions.

GROWING PAINS: Samsung'south Explore 3D App could be the start of something big, though bandwidth limitations and content rights threaten the 3D streaming future

Offering a stable stream and brokering rights deals is the bread and butter of motion-picture show streaming companies like Acetrax and Lovefilm, merely is the UK's digital infrastructure up to it?

"We would need a lot of bandwidth for 3D video on demand," says Leslie Golding, Chief Marketing Officeholder at Acetrax, "but we would probably do some kind of bandwidth detection, with a 'Y'all tin buy this 3D film, but beware' bulletin."

Golding likewise thinks adaptive streaming would be crucial for 3D, so if the bandwidth suddenly reduces, the moving-picture show could go 'less 3D' or more grayscale for a few seconds or minutes rather than the movie buffer and stutter.

Content and quality

Simply bandwidth, says Golding, is only 1 part of the jigsaw. "The numbers of 3D TV owners are lower than many expected a yr agone," he says, "and while in that location is some 3D content available from National Geographic and the History Channel, popular 3D movies are much harder to get. Someday at that place volition exist a button upwardly at that place on Acetrax for a 3D version, simply at the moment the content owners want to keep hold of information technology for a 3D Blu-ray disc."

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Jamie is a freelance tech, travel and infinite journalist based in the UK. He's been writing regularly for Techradar since information technology was launched in 2008 and besides writes regularly for Forbes, The Telegraph, the South China Forenoon Mail service, Sky & Telescope and the Sky At Nighttime magazine every bit well as other Hereafter titles T3, Digital Camera Globe, All About Space and Infinite.com. He too edits 2 of his own websites, TravGear.com (opens in new tab) and WhenIsTheNextEclipse.com (opens in new tab) that reverberate his obsession with travel gear and solar eclipse travel. He is the author ofA Stargazing Program For Beginners (Springer, 2015),