2010 is an important milestone year for television manufacturers. It's not only the transition to Led backlighting, which Samsung started last year, but also the introduction of 3D. The next important step in television. At CES 2010 last January, 3D displays were unwrapped and shown to the public for the very first time. Sony, Samsung, LG and Panasonic showed their 3D colors and Sony was kind enough to offer me the opportunity to experience it in person. This is my 3D preview of the Sony LX900 series.
To experience 3D for myself I was welcomed to the Sony headquarters in the Netherlands, which is where I live. In the morning I checked the Sony e-mail for directions to the building. It was a 2-hour train drive followed by a couple of miles in the bus, at least according to the directions. I made it to the train station, stepped into the train, and found the classical public transportation horrors. It was really crowded, dirty and the people next to me were as awkward as can be. Really, trust me.
It was nothing compared to the bus though because well there wasn't a bus in sight. With just 20 minutes to go until my appointment at the Sony building, I got anxious. Luckily a bus came and I asked the man behind the steering wheel if it stopped near Badhoevedorp. He nodded and I stepped in nervously. I had no clue when to step out, but I was saved by the huge Sony sign as the bus neared the building. It stopped just a few meters after and like a miracle I made it in time.
So what does the Sony headquarters looks like? Well it's gorgeous. The building looks modern and huge. And it only got better inside. Upon entering I saw a huge backlit Sony sign with their slogan: make.believe. The reception was the first thing I saw and two ladies behind the desk warmly welcomed me. They walked me, a little further into the building, to a bar with coffee, tea and some small luxurious snacks. It was perfect.
Another girl said that a short video was ready downstairs and that I was welcome to see the showroom or eat some snacks while they waited for the others. I did both and walked downstairs to find a new definition of home theatre. Towards the darkened room I found movie posters of films produced by Sony pictures including rainy with a chance of meatballs. Once seated a short presentation ran about Sony's vision for 3D. It included a short explanation of the magic of the glasses and how Sony was involved in every chain of the production. It also showed a kid on a couch dropping popcorn as he was consumed by the supposedly beautiful 3D image. It was kind of weird but funny to see.
Next stop was the showroom. Here I and a few other groups gathered in front of the Sony LX900 television. This is the highest end version. A nice man stood before the television and explained about the remainder of the tour. He said that Sony had prepared a few short 3D videos. He turned on the glasses and handed it out to everyone. It was a nice touch because he could've just said, "take the glasses." It showed real appreciation of the interest.
And sure enough the demo began. First it showed a football match (or soccer!) that was converted to 3D real time. It was pretty impressive. A player ran towards the camera and he popped out a bit. All in all the conversion is a nice touch but it's seems to use 3 or 4 layers of depth. Not true 3D so to say. But the next video was.
I was shown a 3D video about fishes, polar beers and other animals that swam in the sea. It was kind of magical to see the difference between objects in the back and in the front. It was all so sharp and the colors remained completely intact, but slightly darker. A shark of some sort, friendly looking one, swam by the camera and I almost looked to my side to see it swim by. It wasn't there obviously.
Games were also shown and it was somewhat impressive. Not all games worked great. LittleBigPlanet for example barely benefitted from 3D. Killzone on the other hand was impressive to say the least. A nice touch was that Sony also made the XMB in 3d. It just showed the water thingy (What is it called?) floating in the back and the icons in the front. It wasn't mind blowing but I like to think that it could be. Obviously it's still work in progress.
The nice man wrapped up the presentation and invited me to look around in the showroom. He also handed out the expected prices of the models, the Sony LX900 60" will sell for a whopping ?4000,-. During my time in the showroom I had some time to further inspect the glasses. They were very light and comfortable. On the side it said Sony and it made me smile because I like the brand. The battery goes for 100 hours and are easily replaceable, and cheap. Sony said that they hadn't made it rechargeable because it'd make the glasses much heavier. Although I liked the glasses I could noticing some sloppy build quality aspects. The on /off button is present on both sides (operating both glasses I assume) but the switch on the left side couldn't go off. And the glasses don't give any indication of being on/off or out of power. One pair of glasses even stopped working, I assume the battery ran out.
The showroom showed all Sony products and it made me want to stick around a little longer. I had a good look at everything and realized that Sony really makes a lot of products. I left the showroom, drank a coffee and headed for the exit. The nice lady at the reception handed me a goody bag to go. It included a Blu-Ray movie of Michael Jackson: This is it. And the basic things like a pen and a book.
Overall it was a really nice experience and 3D is really impressive. The image stayed sharp, the colors intact and all that while the objects came really close to my head, or so it seemed. I couldn't help noticing though that the diagonal becomes more important than ever. 3D is most impressive when you can't or barely can see the borders of the screen. I sat really close to a LX900 40" in the showroom and the 3D was more impressive than the 52" at way more distance. And it's a shame that the 3d televisions won't come out until late June or July. That's after the world cup football... which Sony wants to partly broadcast in 3D.
So 3D looks great on the Sony LX900 and I can't wait to read some comparisons between the different 3D solutions.
I'm Robin Chung, author of the dutch book Tegenlicht. I have a website that brings interesting reading material from all kind of subjects like health and gaming. The website also includes a forum, so you can discuss the articles, and you can order my book from there.
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