Entertainment Technology News
Sonic Announces 'Total 3D' Initiative
By Staff
posted Apr 28, 2010, 13:00
Fuels 3D Home Video Growth with Technologies for Hollywood Studios, Over-the-top Entertainment Services, and PC OEMs
Fuels 3D Home Video Growth with Technologies for Hollywood Studios, Over-the-top
Entertainment Services, and PC OEMs
(Novato, CA) Sonic Solutions® (Nasdaq: SNIC), announced a broad program
to support the "next big thing" in home video — the arrival
of 3D in the home — with new professional and consumer solutions for the
creation, publishing, and playback of 3D digital video content. Sonic is unique
in its focus on "Hollywood-to-Home" solutions that enable the growth
of new video formats, and Sonic's new 3D offerings will help to fuel the availability
and consumer adoption of 3D video.
"With Stereo-3D hits blowing the doors off the box office, it's clear
that this new format has strong consumer appeal," said Dr. Jon Peddie,
President, Jon Peddie Research. "Now that Stereo-3D displays can be delivered
to the family room, the industry needs a technology supplier who can handle
the content chain from authoring to delivery and playback – and that's
far from a trivial task. With a strong track record in helping to establish
new formats, Sonic is ideally positioned to deliver on this challenge."
3D Authoring Technologies for Hollywood
On the professional side, Sonic has developed tools that allow Hollywood studios
to encode video, author interactivity, and format titles for release over the
internet and in the new Blu-ray 3D™ format. "We fully anticipate
that the tremendous consumer interest in 3D movies at the theater, will translate
into high demand for 3D home-video titles," said Lee Evans, Executive Vice
President, Ambient Digital Media, Inc. "Armed with Sonic professional products,
we are ready to meet that demand and deliver reliable, consistent, and exciting
3D home experiences."
Digital 3D Entertainment Delivery
The RoxioNow™ entertainment platform serves a broad range of premium
content, including new movies and next-day TV programs, to a growing, multi-manufacturer
ecosystem of home and mobile electronics including PCs, connected TVs, set-top
DVRs, Blu-ray Disc players, smartphones, and mobile media devices. RoxioNow
already powers digital storefronts on 3D-enabled HDTVs and Blu-ray Disc players
and is primed to deliver 3D content once titles become available for online
distribution.
3D Consumer Playback
For consumer playback, Sonic's has released a new version of Roxio CinePlayer®
BD that allows users to play 3D Blu-ray titles as well as content downloaded
from on-line video providers. CinePlayer BD also supports real-time conversion
of 2D video to 3D, allowing 3D viewing of a user's existing library of standard
DVDs and personal home movies. ASUSTeK Computer, a leading manufacturer of personal
computers based in Taiwan, will be shipping CinePlayer with its new line of
3D-enabled notebook computers. "ASUS' new G-series notebooks are the first
3D notebooks with 3D glasses and 120Hz special panels to ship worldwide. With
the inclusion of Roxio CinePlayer BD, the 3D notebook can deliver an even richer
3D playback experience," said Ellis Wang, Director Software Planning &
Management, ASUS. "With its ability to play new 3D titles as well as convert
standard DVDs and video from 2D to 3D, CinePlayer greatly enriches the user
experience for both Hollywood movies and personal home videos."
3D Personal Videos
Roxio Video Lab 3D, a new consumer product from Sonic, allows consumers to
edit and burn personal 3D content on standard DVDs; these discs can then be
played back on any standard DVD or Blu-ray player connected to 3D-enabled HDTVs
or PCs.
"Sonic has a long history of enabling new entertainment delivery formats
– CD, DVD, BD, web-based video distribution, and now 3D," said Mark
Ely, Executive Vice President, Strategy, Sonic Solutions. "Our 'Total 3D'
initiative is the next step in our Hollywood-to-Home strategy. With our professional
tools, we can enable the Hollywood studios to publish their content in the 3D
format, and the expertise we gain on the professional side allows us to engineer
better consumer products with higher performance and broader compatibility."
Sonic executed a similar Hollywood-to-Home strategy with the launch of DVD when
Sonic's professional tools first became the industry standard for publishing
movies on DVD, then the de-facto standard for consumer DVD formatting with hundreds
of millions of copies distributed by PC and CE manufacturers.
The Sonic professional tools for 3D encoding and 3D authoring and formatting
were announced earlier this month. Roxio CinePlayer BD was released this month
for PC OEM shipments. Roxio Video Lab will available to PC OEMs in May. Sonic
plans to release additional 3D products and services later this year.
Resources:
http://www.sonic.com
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