Olympics in 3D, and rate it

[Rich Schaefer]

I have been watching some of the olympic events in 3d and I wanted hear some of the opinions here on peoples thoughts about it.

My take so far: The opening ceremony was cool in design and direction... but the 3d was not really there. There were obvious stereo cameras up in the stands but they were so far away from the subjects, perhaps 100m., their the depth was flat. The cameras in the action were 2d with some fake stereo applied, which I think is fine sometimes, but there was just no real stereo in the event.

I also saw some gymnastics where there were only a few stereo cameras but it looked really cool! The image was converged on the gymnasts doing their thing and the audience was deeper behind them. It had depth! and I really dug watching it! I would have preferred the cameras to be wider and closer, but I am not complaining, I am happy to have 3d programming!

I also have to add it was well done 3D, meaning, all of it was easy to watch. On a scale of 1-10, with 3d events just coming in to their own, I give it a 7.5... so far.

What dose everyone think?

Prost,
Rich

[Rich Schaefer]

Uh-oh no one? It's not good news that even the 3d professionals are not watching 3d?

Why not guys?

[Brian Iannone]

As with anything shot on broadcast-style S3D cameras, the 3D effect is just "all right." Not quite what I'd call impressive. Unfortunately, a large portion of what NBC (and ESPN) broadcasts on their 3D channel is 2D converted to 3D as the stereo rigs are too large to fit in many of the locations where they need to shoot from (i.e. underwater, on the cranes of the gymnastics stage, etc.). Of course, *much* of what's shown is indeed 3D (I'd say about 70%, from what I've been able to tell on NBC's 3D channel), but quite a bit is just converted from 2D.