They hooked you with their slick technology and now the prices go up.  This is probably a good thing because this will incentivize more theaters to add 3D technology to their theaters.  An estimate from a movie exec told me the average outfitting for a theater is $250,000.

From CNN:

Ticket prices will be going up at movie theaters across the country this weekend as the entertainment industry looks to cash in on growing demand for 3-D movies following the success of “Avatar” and “Alice in Wonderland.”

Starting Friday, prices for adult admission to 3-D movies will increase an average 8.3% at box offices nationwide, according to market research conducted by investment firm BTIG. Ticket prices for IMAX movies are expected to jump 10%, while prices for regular 2-D movies will rise about 4% on average.

http://money.cnn.com/2010/03/25/technology/3D_movie_ticket_price_spike/index.htm?hpt=T2

On Tuesday, the same day Samsung unveiled the pricing and availability of its new lineup of 3D TVs for the U.S., Sony revealed that its 3D sets will arrive June 10, at first in Japan and soon after in other regions. Rival Panasonic’s first 3D TVs begin selling Wednesday in Best Buy stores in the U.S. LG’s 3D lineup arrives in May, while Vizio’s is set for August.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-10466032-260.html

The Singapore government has created the 3D cinema support fund. The sum is over $6,5 million.

3D Disney World

3D Movie Festival

On the 3D movie festival opening the information minister Ly Bhun Yan has commented the initiative in following way – “We are intended to support appropriate movie projects, creating of 3D infrastructure, manufacturing process and special training programs during next 2 years”.
On minister’s opinion the 3D industry potential is not just in cinema. Such technologies can be applied in military, medicine and so on.

Shanghai citizens are lucky to be the first Chinese people to watch 3D TV programs. The 1st of May is the day, when Shanghai TV company “Wenguan” is opening the first digital channel, which will open to the spectators the higher reality of sensation.

As the company workers said the new channel’s principal topics are documentary films about nature and animal world, entertaining news, like celebrity life, and sport events.

All these programs are developed using special technique, and for obtaining stereo effect the subscribers will need to use special glasses.

Editor’s Note:
Glasses needed…but let’s face it.  We won’t have 3D televisions in houses until we have quality 3D TV programming.  Let’s see how quick it develops in China now that they have their own 3D TV channel.

FogScreens technology allows creating an image in air with the help of liquid drops. It was developed by scientists from Santa-Barbara University. They invented the new variant of 3D image creating with no use of stereoscopic glasses. 3D images, created by special devices, will just hang in air and one can easily walk it around and take a look from different sides even walk through it. The scientists used already known FogScreens technology, by means of which 2D images are created in the air on the thin layer of liquid drops.

Applying 2 devices – FogScreens and projector, which run the motion of 2D images, 2 flat pictures, transforming into 3D, can be obtained.

3D Cartoon

So far the size of displayed object is just 1 sm due to small angle of 3D view – 2 degrees. During the further 3 years the scientists are about to enlarge the size of 3D image up to 4 sm.

Phillips managed to create 3D TV with no special glasses to be used to see 3D image. Its 3D TV needs a special signal — two similar, but a bit out-of-position images in each frame, a color one and a background one – in gray tints. The lenses, located on the screen direct the image to the left and right eye of a spectator, that results in stereo effect. To see 3D image a spectator must sit in single position, that is the disadvantage of the technology.

3D Glasses - No longer required?

The specialists from Berlin Institute by the name of Genrich Gerts in collaboration with scientific groups from Britain, the Netherlands and Czech work on the salvation of this problem within the project, financed by European Commission. They managed to create the system, following the spectator’s look and adopting the image on the screen accordingly.

The first 3D TV entered the Japanese market. It is based on TriDef technique, which builds an image for each eye. The kit includes special glasses, combining the image and providing 3D effect. Without glasses the image doubles. The TV provides 3D image not only in special 3D programs, Japanese television started to produce, but, as developers said, in general 2D programs. In this case the 3D effect is not so noticeable.

The special 3D programs are translated by several cable TV companies. They are released 4 times a day and shot considering 3D viewing. Despite 3D technique is known for a long time already, this is first full-grown 3D television project in the world. The price of such a TV is $3960. the producer is Hyundai company.

The most famous Hollywood producers, such as James Cameron, Jeffrey Katzenberg and John Lasseter, have announced, that soon all the movies will be shoot in 2 formats – general 2D and the new 3D.

3D Computer Games

This tendency is assisted by the growth of 3D cinema popularity and significant progress in stereoscopic shooting. The TV industry has both high-speed 3D-cameras and powerful software allowing practically avoid optical distortions during demonstrations. 3D-cinema is, in fact, the reincarnation of good old stereoscopic cinema, with the difference of not showing the 3D image, used to cause headache and nausea at times, but the full-fledged presence effect.

Katzenberg Says 3D Will Be A Landmark In Cinema History

Due to this, Jeffrey Katzenberg has sad the conversion to 3D to be a landmark in cinema history, comparable to sound appearance only. This landmark is not overtaken yet, and the entertainment industry is defining the new, more ambitious, task – provide 3D technology not only to cinema visitors, but for TV auditory as well. Furthermore, the records of sport events and shows of celebrities are becoming as popular as blockbusters.

The problem of digital content for 3D video is very urgent now. Very few TV companies have started shooting 3D programs, and these efforts are only experiments. The leading movie companies annually produce several movies compatible with 3D displays. It is worth noticing that Pixar studio, has planned to produce about 10 animated 3D movies. Disney promised all Pixar movies soon will be compatible with 3D screens. If we glance the market of PC games, we’ll see the most encouraging situation. The NVIDIA GeForce 3D Vision system has recently hit the market and is already compatible with great amount of existing games, and soon all the upcoming projects will assimilate 3-rd dimension.