Scott Wilkinson

The Big Picture
NAB 2012: Christie High Frame Rate 3D Demo
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 20, 2012
By far the most important demo at NAB was presented by Christie, one of the foremost makers of digital-cinema projectors for commercial theaters. It was a comparison of the effect of shooting and displaying 3D movies at different frame rates—24, 48, and 60 frames per second. The entire demo was created and narrated by James Cameron, who started by pointing out that digital cinema cameras and projectors are fully capable of shooting and displaying higher frame rates, which greatly reduces or eliminates the motion blur and stuttering endemic to 24fps.
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The Big Picture
NAB 2012: Planar 4K Flat Panel
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 20, 2012
Outside the Red Digital Cinema demo theater, I saw this 60-inch quad-HD (3840x2160) flat panel made by Planar. No one could tell me much about it—the Planar rep wasn't around at that moment—except that it's an LED-illuminated LCD, probably edgelit. It did look mighty crisp and sharp.
The Big Picture
NAB 2012: Dolby 3D
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 20, 2012
Dolby was showing several items in its booth, including an update to Dolby Digital Plus for mobile devices as well as its LED-backlit LCD professional reference monitor with local-dimming control of each LED rather than larger zones—very cool, but very expensive. What interested me the most was Dolby 3D, a new technology developed in collaboration with Philips Research and introduced at NAB.
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The Big Picture
NAB 2012: NICT 200-inch Autostereoscopic Display
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 20, 2012
And now for something completely over the top—an autostereoscopic (glasses-free) 16:9 rear-projection display measuring 200 inches diagonally! This behemoth was developed by Japan's National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) and consists of 200 small DLP projectors behind a special diffuser screen and Fresnel lens. Amazingly, you can walk around and see objects from different angles and even behind them, much like a true hologram. There was some obvious vertical banding in the 1920x1080 image, but I found no one who could explain why.
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The Big Picture
NAB 2012: Epson Moverio Wearable Display
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 20, 2012
Epson had a small booth way in the back of the South Hall, and along with some commercial projectors was the Moverio wearable display. Inside the temple pieces of these glasses are tiny LCD microprojectors with a resolution of 960x540, and the image is directed through special diffusers to appear in front of each eye. The glasses are transparent, so you can see the surrounding environment with the video image superimposed over it.
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The Big Picture
NAB 2012: The Future of TV Panel Discussion
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 20, 2012
Each year at NAB, NewTek, maker of the TriCaster video switcher, hosts a panel discussion about the future of television called Broadcast Minds. This year, the panel was moderated by Leo Laporte, head of the TWiT network that produces my Home Theater Geeks podcast among many others. Seen here in the center, he is joined by (left to right) Jeff Hawley, Director of Customer Experience for Yamaha; Bill Chapman, VP of Creative and Engineering Technology for Turner Broadcasting; Jeff Jacobs, Senior VP of Production Strategies for MTV; and Kevin Pollack, comedian, actor, and host of a popular podcast called Kevin Pollack's Chat Show.
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Home Theater Geeks Podcast
Podcast 107: Live from NAB 2012
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 17, 2012
In this special episode live from the 2012 National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) convention in Las Vegas, Leo Laporte and I walk the show floor, talking to representatives from Canon, Panasonic, JVC, and Sony about new technologies that will improve the consumer experience of TV and movies. Particularly interesting is the rapidly falling cost of 4K digital-video cameras from Canon, JVC, and Sony as well as a new 3D conversion technology from JVC. We also talk to Panasonic's Peter Fannon about the upcoming Summer Olympics in 3D and see 4K flat-panel reference monitors in the Canon, JVC, and Sony booths that look amazing even at relatively small sizes.

Run Time: 1:40:15

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Ask S&V
PIP No More
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 16, 2012
Are there any current or upcoming LCD, plasma, or OLED flat-panel TVs with a two-tuner picture-in-picture feature? Several years ago, many manufacturers offered this feature, but it seems to have disappeared. I do not choose to purchase another tuner device to obtain a PIP image.

A. Craigson

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Vote
Is 3D Conversion of Existing Movies Worthwhile?
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 13, 2012
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The Big Picture
Titanic 3D Floats
Scott Wilkinson  |  Apr 13, 2012
Last night, I saw Titanic in its new 3D release at an AMC ETX (Enhanced Theater eXperience) venue. Using two projectors and RealD passive glasses, the image was brighter than single-projector RealD and way brighter than Arclight's Xpand active-glasses system. So how was the 3D conversion?
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