The future of 3D TV looks uncertain

This is guest post.

Radio, black and white television, colour film, a TV in every living room, a TV in every room of the house, flat screen, plasma screen, 3D, smart, smart 3D – all these advances in televisual technology and affordability have happened in the past century, with many occurring in the last 20 years or so.

The rate at which new technology is being developed seems to be speeding up rapidly. Watching television is no longer a passive act of entertainment but a full immersion activity.

A smart TV found at Appliances Direct is no more expensive than a plasma TV these days, and as the technology becomes more widespread the price comes down all the time. Despite this sales of 3D and smart TVs have got off to a poor start.

The struggles with sales being experienced by 3D TV manufacturers are being put down to two reasons. The first is the need to always wear special glasses to watch in 3D.

At the cinema, people don’t seem to mind, but indications show that the vast majority don’t want to commit to that in the privacy of their own home. Toshiba is pioneering the first non-glasses 3D television next year, using parallax screens to transmit different depths of image to each eye.

However, the drawback here is that the image quality suffers as a result. The second problem manufacturers are up against is that there are only a limited number of films and programs being made for 3D.

Many consumers would rather watch the full range of programs on a Panasonic TV from Appliances Direct than fork out for 3D only to have a very limited choice.

Manufacturers of 3D are working on ironing out these problems, so it looks like if they succeed 3D will be here to stay.

Leading manufacturers Sony, Samsung and LG have already got together to form an industry standard when it comes to the glasses. At present, Sony glasses only work with Sony TVs and so on, but these industry giants plan to release a universal pair of specs that can be used to view any 3D program at all.

This may take away one element of inconvenience, and is certainly a step in the right direction, but there still seems to be a long way to go before the vast majority of people will think owning a 3D television is worth the money and the effort.