Cable Firms Tee Off In 3D

Distributors Line Up for First Major Telecast In Format

By Mike Reynolds -- Multichannel News, 4/5/2010 1:02:07 AM

New York —

Depending on his tee times and performance, millions can watch Tiger Woods’s return to on-course action for the first time since infidelity cost him sponsors, and perhaps his marriage, at The Masters this week.

A much smaller group of TV and technology executives and early adopters will be able to see the world’s No. 1 golfer perform in a 3D format that aims to stimulate and titillate the visual senses from the famed Augusta National Golf Course.

At press time late Friday, Augusta National Golf Club, which hosts The Masters, had signed distribution deals with Comcast, Cox Communications, Time Warner Cable, Cablevision Systems, Canada’s Shaw Communiucations and a pair of European operators to provide 3D coverage of the Par 3 Tournament on April 7.

Tourney play from April 8 to 11 will showcase holes 14, 16 and 18, with rotating coverage of holes 10-13 and 17.

Continuing a string of technological firsts for the private club — including the first HD production in 1993 and the first golf tournament presented live in HD on network television in 2000 — The Masters is billing the upcoming coverage as the first live national event in 3D available online and on TV via multiple distributors.

The 3D Masters coverage will be produced by ESPN and Pace. Mike Tirico, Andy North and Terry Gannon will be on the 3D call.

Comcast will ingest the feed at the Comcast Media Center in Denver and then transmit it to customers using the 1080i, “sideby- side” frame-compatible 3D HD format.

Select Sony Style stores will host live 3D coverage of The Masters for demonstration purposes of its new 3D sets. Sony Electronics is the 3D sponsor of the telecast, and is supplying the advanced camera equipment around the course.

Comcast officials, speaking at the SportsNet New York studios in Manhattan on March 31 during a 3D demonstration of club pros playing Augusta National about a month ago, said the telecast will only be available to thousands of homes with high-definition settops and 3D-capable TV sets.

The Consumer Electronics Association projects about 1 million sets with that functionality will be sold in the U.S. this year, or less than 3% of total U.S. TV shipments.

Still, the enhanced coverage of The Masters will cap a flurry of activity in the emerging 3D space, where prospective stakeholders continue to plant their flags in the nascent field.

CBS, LG Electronics and Cinedigm Digital Cinema were set to tip off the Final Four — the national semifinals of the 2010 NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Championship — on April 3, as well as the final on April 5, in 3D to theaters around the nation.

DirecTV became the first distributor for ESPN 3D, which will bow in June alongside the DBS leader’s trio of dedicated 3D channels. According to sources, Cablevision, which declined comment, will also carry ESPN 3D when it kicks off on June 11 with the opening match of the FIFA World Cup between host nation South Africa and Mexico.

On March 24, regional sports network MSG sent out the first 3D hockey match in America exclusively to Cablevision homes with its coverage of the New York Rangers’ 5-0 win over the New York Islanders.

Although Comcast said ESPN and Discovery are talking to all affiliates about their 3D channels, the top cable operator for now seems inclined to tap the technology on a one-off and video- on-demand basis, rather than establishing dedicated channels.

Derek Harrar, Comcast’s senior vice president and general manager of video and entertainment services, said there is not enough product at the moment to support a channel commitment. But the response to five 3D VOD events Comcast has offered over the past two years — concerts from Miley Cyrus, star of Hannah Montana, and the Jonas Brothers, as well as theatricals Final Destination, My Bloody Valentine and Coraline — suggests an appetite for such advanced fare. Harrar said 3D accounted for 16% of the VOD views for that content, as opposed to the typical 20% to 25% in HD for theatricals.

In addition to live 3D airings of The Masters on an ad hoc channel, Comcast is currently making “Masters Moments” content available on-demand in standard and HD formats, with 3D highlights becoming available April 8 as part of its VOD offering, which generates some 350 million views per month.

Time Warner Cable won’t show the 3D tournament coverage live to its customer base on a linear network. Instead, it will be available on its local systems’ Web sites and via a 3D Masters VOD folder.

The nation’s No. 2 cable operator, though, will showcase the 3D event live at viewing parties at the Time Warner Center (two events) in New York, as well as golf courses in its service areas in San Diego (two) and Charlotte (three).

Cablevision will present The Masters 3D action on channel 1300 this week and will also be off ering Masters fare on-demand.

At the March 31 demonstration event in New York, the 3D footage depicted the club pros in action, which gave viewers a better sense for their skills in blasting out of sand traps and sinking long putts, and of the beauty of the picturesque course.

Mark Hess, senior vice president of video product development at Comcast, said he played Augusta National once and that standard and HD formats do not do justice to the course’s undulating greens, contours and dramatic shifts in elevation. But 3D does.

Although there was nothing scheduled, Hess anticipates that Comcast-owned Golf Channel could jump onto the 3D course.

“[Network president] Page Thompson is a big golf fan. That’s a natural,” said Hess, who anticipates that other marquee events like the Academy Awards and the Big Game will soon be shot in the format. “I’d be really surprised if the Super Bowl isn’t in 3D.”