2012 Olympics in 3D from NBC & Panasonic

Cool. This would make me switch from Dish to Directv.

Will NBC carry any of the 3D events?

NBC To Broadcast London Olympics in 3D

Network teams with Panasonic to announce plan

The London Olympics will air in 3D, bringing the games right into living rooms equipped with cutting edge televisions.

NBC, which won the rights to broadcast the games, and Panasonic announced the plans Monday at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. In addition to having a 3D-capable set, viewers must have service with a carrier that will provide the enhanced coverage. Presumably Comcast -- which owns NBCUniversal -- will be in the mix, along with DirecTV, which has aimed to be the leading provider of 3DTV in the U.S.

"NBC has a history of utilizing technological innovations to distribute the Olympics in new ways for viewers," NBC Olympics president Gary Zenkel said in a statement. "We are proud to continue that tradition by partnering with Panasonic and Olympic Broadcasting Services to distribute the first 3D broadcast of the Games in the U.S. in partnership with our multichannel video programming distributors."

Panasonic is the exclusive Flat-Panel HDTV and Blu-ray Disc Player advertiser for NBC's coverage of the 2012 Summer Olympic Games. Last year, Panasonic announced it would partner with the International Olympic Committee and Olympic Broadcasting Services to make the London 2012 Olympic Games the first ever 3D Olympic Games.

The more than 200 hours of 3D telecasts, to be produced by OBS and shown on next-day delay in the U.S., will span multiple competitions throughout the games, including the Opening and Closing Ceremonies, gymnastics, diving and swimming. OBS will produce the 3D coverage using Panasonic's 3D production technologies.

Hmm, wonder whether my local cable co (Brighthouse, associated with TWC) will carry this. Friends have indicated interest in seeing sports in 3D on my home-theater set-up, but I've been shy of spending $10/month on a few games I may or may not have time to watch. I suppose the BCS champ game last night was a good candidate, but didn't think of it in time to get service enabled...

shinksma

Fantastic. Definitely looking forward to this. I am a full on sucker for the Olympic Games. Next best thing to being there hopefully.

3D should lend itself Very Well to the Olympics.

Crossing my fingers U-Verse picks this up. Not holding my breath though...

Have there been any more updates on this?

-JR

There are 3D Blu-rays available for the Olympics held in China. Hopefully there will be 3D Blu-rays for these Olympics as well so that those of us without a 3D cable service can at least experience 3D viewing within a reasonable time after the events.

Where can you get 3D blu rays of China olympics?

Have you checked out that 3D Blu-Ray of the Olympics held in China? I'm curious how it looks.

All I can find on the current status of 3D for the upcoming Olympics are light articles starting to define what will be covered in 3D, primarily revolving around European coverage (BBC, Sky). I can't seem to find any updates on stateside coverage.

-JR

I hope NBC carries the 3D events on their sports-only channel.

EBay was my source and it was bundled with a Bolt 3D Blu-ray by a seller in Hong Kong or China back before the 3D Bolt became available in the U.S. It included selections from the ceremonies and a lot of gymnastic events and some field and track. I have seen shorter selections from the China Olympics on various demo discs for 3D TV's both here in the U.S. and in Japan. You might want to check out the YesAsia website as they have an increasing selection of Asian produced 3D Blu-rays that are not marketed for the U.S.

I wonder if I can get the 3d broadcast on my local NBC affiliate via OTA?

AFAIK there are no OTA 3D broadcasts in North America. Of course, I'm happy to be proved wrong on this topic!

shinksma

Bummer. Dish won't be airing it? They offer select 3d VOD movies, I would think they could offer select programming (e.g. the 2012 Olympics) as well.

Well, Dish could air it, but that's not OTA. It seems that the NBC-affiliated media companies are the primary sources. I have no idea whether Dish is affiliated with NBC, but I'm guessing not, since last Nov there was a tiff between the two that resulted in Dish not carrying NBC.

So, my bet would be no...

shinksma

does anyone know if fios will be airing the Olympics in 3d

My findings so far
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showp...postcount=1392

TWC here is San Diego is mum on this subject

And how about the Indianapolis 500 in 3D
Anyone ?

AFAIK At this time OTA does not have the bandwidth for Mpeg4, required for 3D transmission.

The more than 200 hours of 3D telecasts, to be produced by OBS and shown on next-day delay in the U.S., will span multiple competitions throughout the games, including the Opening and Closing Ceremonies, gymnastics, diving and swimming. OBS will produce the 3D coverage using Panasonic's 3D production technologies.

You will have to avoid hearing results with the next day delay, wonder why they can not air the events live in 3D?

What the heck does that even mean?!?!
(I'm thinking fake 3D)
Would NBC actually be using 3D cameras???
[don't even think there'd be enough 3D cameraas anyway]

They're going to film the Olympics with 3D cameras. Doing a live stream real-time 2D-3D conversion would not be worth the investment.

If your right, that means NBC will have too do a 3D-2D conversion.

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A "little" more insight:
http://www.fareastgizmos.com/project...mpic-games.php

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There's how the BBC plans too do 3D:
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2400364,00.asp

Thanks for the links.

It's very possible that they will have separate 2D cameras for the 2D broadcast. If they wanted the 3D footage in 2D though, all they would have to do is isolate a stream of either the left or right stereo images. Not really a big deal.

Wrong.

OBS is the Olympic Broadcast Service, which coordinates and produces the 'pool' coverage for global TV distribution. Panasonic is providing the 3D technology, as they are one of the larger broadcast technology providers and have a heavy investment in 3D.

Yes. The OBS will be using Panasonic 3D hardware, including cameras, for the 3D production. NBC will pick up the OBS 3D feed, but they may also supplement that with their some of own 3D content.

Wrong.

The Olympic Broadcast Service will produce both 2D and 3D broadcasts, which in the US, NBC will supplement with lots of their own 2D content.

Just a curious question, If Panasonic is the company that is producing it, would their products that are 3D capable have access to the games? I only ask since I cut the cable and use OTA, I just got a Panasonic TV so it would be awesome if Panasonic came out with a smart tv app to play the 3d games.

I did an online chat with DISH Network and the CSR says DISH will NOT be carrying the Olympics in 3D, that really sucks!

For those of you with Time Warner Cable, a CSR just "confirmed" for me that TWC will carry the 3D broadcast of the 2012 Olympics. It will be on Channel 1801, which is "3D Events Channel 2." This channel is not part of TWC's "3D Pass" (which currently only contains ESPN 3D), so it will not require an additional subscription to view.

A word of caution, however, this is the third CSR I've asked in recent weeks, and they've all been complete morons. For example, the above CSR first informed me that the 3D coverage will be "on NBC channel." I only got the info above after explaining that 3D is not the same as HD and will require a different channel from the main NBC feed. One of the other CSRs invited me "to check after soon."