Philips Demonstrates 3D On Blu-ray

Philips will demonstrate 3D on Blu-ray at IFA 2008. The demo shows that the company's 2D-plus-Depth content format can be applied to Blu-ray enabling a great 3D movie viewing experience on a variety of displays.

With the growing amount of 3D movies currently on theater release, people now want to enjoy the 3D viewing experience in their homes as well. In order to bring high quality 3D content to the home, the 2D-plus-Depth format offers a solution that can be applied to Blu-ray.

Subsequently, these discs can be enjoyed on both stereoscopic (special glasses needed) as well as auto-stereoscopic 3D displays, which do not require glasses.

Philips 3D Solutions provides end-to-end 3D system solutions ranging from 3D displays for professional use, 3D content creation and conversion tools to technology licensing. Jos Swillens, CEO of Philips 3D Solutions:

"This demonstration of 3D on Blu-ray is a clear proof point of the flexibility and sustainability of our 2D-plus-Depth content format. It can bring high quality 3D content to the home on a variety of displays and offers a solution to the need for interoperability in 3D".

Philips 3D displays are suited for professional use in digital signage for retail, point-of-sale advertising, gaming applications in casinos, games and 3D visualization. Thanks to the WOWvx technology used in Philips 3D Displays, no special viewing glasses are needed.

WOWvx technology is developed by Philips 3D Solutions and indicates the use of technology related to 3 dimensional viewing experience. This technology comprises the technology to manufacture autostereoscopic lenticular 3D displays, display signal processing to generate multiple views for 3D displays, interface specification for 3D displays based on the 2D-plus-Depth format and 3D content creation and conversion tools.

The 3D data format used by WOWvx is in the form of 'image+depth' (2D-plus-Depth). The depth information indicates the position of each 2D image pixel on the depth axis in or out of the screen plane. Rendering of 9 different views out of the 2D-plus-Depth data is done within the display by means of integrated hardware. These 9 views are spatially dispersed in front of the display by the microlens layer.

Alongside this 3D on Blu-ray demo, Philips 3D Solutions will be showing 3 new 3D display products for professional use, the 52", the 22" and the 8". These products will be commercially available from Q4 (52") and Q1 (22" and 8") onwards. The impressive 132? 3D WOWzone will also be on show at IFA 2008.

All 3D demos and products can be seen in the Futurezone of the Philips booth, which is located in Hall 22A and B of the Messe Berlin, Germany.