ESPN in 3D is Awesome

The best justification for 3D displays that I’ve seen at CES is at the Panasonic booth…they’re just showing clips from ESPN 3D. I’ve spent the whole show being skeptical of the technology, but WOW. The football field in 3D is cool, ice skating is gorgeous, and watching Roger Federer serve in 3D blew my mind.

Got me thinking about how sports videography will adapt to a possible 3D era. Early adopters will often choose to consume the content that best shows off their superior technology–guys with big subwoofers in their car will blast music with heavy bass, while hi-fi snobs will look for music with high dynamic range.

So 3D TV owners might gravitate to sports that look amazing on their TVs. And I’m thinking the best-looking sports for 3D might be baseball and tennis. Big distances between players can be accentuated by 3D, and it’s easy to get good camera angles…the next step will be finding the camera angles that really play it up.