Panasonic Submits 3D Standard Proposal for Blu-ray Disc

Panasonic has been reported to have submitted a proposal to the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) concerning a Blu-ray Disc standard that would store movies in 3D. Basically, the idea involves the company's 3D full HD System which includes a Blu-ray Disc player able to distribute 1080p full HD images to left eye and right eye, recorded onto a BD. The technology has been developed by the Panasonic Hollywood Laboratory (PHL), and allows recording 3D images onto a single, standard BD.

The BD player is said to be able to decode and reproduce the left and right full HD images recorded to the BD in real time. Thus, viewers will experience 3D images when wearing active shutter glasses that work in synchronization with an HD TC screen, while also enjoying them together with high quality surround sound. According to the news, 3D images would be formed with twice the information volume than regular full HD images.

The system was showcased at Ceatec Japan last September. The Nikkei Electronics Asia publication reports that the company has submitted its system to the Blu-ray disc Association for evaluation, expecting it to be approved as a Blu-ray disc standard. If standardized, the technology would begin to be commercialized starting with 2010. In addition, Panasonic is also said to plan submitting a proposal for a High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) standard which would be able to transmit 3D imagery.

Panasonic's proposal comes ahead of other firms and is aimed at preventing patent conflict related to other 3D imagery standards. It is already a known fact that film companies are working on solutions to handle 3D images and that they are also developing packaged 3D media for home usage, while expecting this move to provide massive revenue. The move has been developing in the background lately, with a number of companies working on owning their proprietary 3D imagery standards adopted by the BDA.

Another 3D Blu-ray proposal was demonstrated by Philips at the IFA 2008 show in Berlin in August, based on the 2D-plus-Depth format applied to Blu-ray. The company said that its 3D Blu-ray discs could be viewed on both stereoscopic (special glasses needed) as well as auto-stereoscopic 3D displays, which would not require glasses.