One Touch Intelligence: 3D TV: A Post-CES Perspective - Stewart Schley - MediaBizBloggers

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The 3D mania pouring forth from January's Consumer Electronics Show has subsided enough to allow entertainment industry executives room to consider something the nascent 3D medium itself promises to deliver: perspective.

While it's true (and exciting) to realize that 30 motion pictures will be shot and produced in 3D this year, from a living-room television standpoint the hype over 3D must now give way to the slow grind of progress. Even though a constellation of disparate industry participants (studios, TV networks, video distributors and electronics manufacturers) is aligned in support of 3D at large, the economics and adoption rates associated with the medium remain very much in question, in our view. And as our recent White Paper, 3D Entertainment: Dimensions of an Emerging Market points out, much work remains to be done to vault 3D video technology into the consumer mainstream.

Even among the believers, there are signals that the technology's ascension will be more incremental than immediate, and that despite the unmistakable grandeur of 3D images, there are limits to how deep it will reach.

Comcast CEO Brian Roberts encapsulated the post-CES mood surrounding 3D in comments at the Congressional Internet Caucus's "State of the Net Conference" in late January. Although he agreed 3D has a bright future in the living room, Roberts offered a reality check on how pervasive 3D viewing is likely to become. For one thing, he said, viewers are likely to be highly selective about wearing viewing glasses for the purpose of watching TV. "We don't eat chocolate sundaes three meals a day," he said.

The ice cream analogy is fair, and in fact it may be more appropriate than comparisons between 3D and high-definition TV. Although the two technologies have much in common – the convergent show of support by the programming and the CE industries, for one thing – there's a limit to their kinship.

HD offers a clear improvement to the legacy TV viewing experience that – and this is the important part – can easily be appreciated and enjoyed without requiring significant human behavioral change. A swap-out of the family TV set, a new box from the cable company and there it is: a better, clearer, more captivating presentation of visual information over television. But it's an improvement that requires no particular new behavior from viewers. Although the 3D faithful tend to gloss over the impositions demanded by the donning of special viewing glasses, in truth the requirement demands a significant change not just in the presentation of television but in the behavior associated with television – something HD never asked of us.

As our report points out, the intrusion of viewing glasses presents one difficult obstacle that may be too demanding for many viewers to accommodate. Another related obstacle is social. Television – at least the living-room variety –remains for many a communal medium, shared by people who watch together. It took only a day or two after the first breathless reports about 3D from CES for rank-and-file sports fans to crack jokes about the farcical idea of sitting around with buddies for the big game while everybody wears silly glasses.

We'll caveat our perspective by observing that breakthroughs in delivering 3D images without the need for viewing glasses could overcome some of the technology's social challenges.

But even then, it's important to realize 3D isn't optimal for all types of video content (such as news, talk shows and even some episodic dramas). As Comcast's Roberts seems to realize, 3D is an astonishing technological feat and makes for an astonishing and immersive viewing experience – but only sometimes.

If you buy the argument that 3D video content will be deeply enjoyed and appreciated, but only in selective instances, then your business and economic assumptions surrounding 3D must be very different than those that surround HDTV. For one thing, it may be prudent to presume (shudder!) a slower adoption curve for 3D video than that displayed by HD. In other words, 10 years or longer to achieve presence in even one-third of U.S. homes. That sort of projection is anathema to the fondest wishes of the consumer electronics industry, which is looking hopefully toward a profitable second act even as the consumer upgrade cycle for HD remains in its midpoint. But it may be a more realistic view. Meanwhile, the astounding breakthrough that is the film "Avatar" may not be the precursor to an all-3D, all-the-time world that some have boldly ordained. It may be, instead, a delicious, immersive, joyous treat, but the kind of treat we can appreciate best in relative scarcity. You know, kind of like a chocolate sundae.

Stewart Schley is Senior Director of Industry Intelligence for One Touch Intelligence,a leading provider of competitive intelligence, business analytics and market assessment services for leading providers in the cable telecommunications, TV content and filmedentertainment industries. He can be reached atstewarts@onetouchintelligence.com. The One Touch Intelligence report,3D Entertainment: Dimensions of an Emerging Market, is available through February 2010 as a complimentary download. Feel free to share with your team.