Critique on Three-Dimension Television from Economical Aspect

Background

Three-Dimension Television (3D TV) is a television type with Stereoscopy Technique. Images modified by Stereoscopy Technique produce an “illusion of depth” to people, and 3D images can be seen with a pair of special glasses.

Due to the fact that the movie Avatar had a very successful box office record in 2009, 3D imaging technique was then heated up and many electronic products companies were eager to grasp a share in the market by developing this cutting-edge technology. So many 3D TV were then being pushed into the market.

Stereoscopic image of a piano, the viewing angles of the two pictures are slightly different

Nevertheless, according to the statistics on the internet [link], there was just a low purchasing rate recorded in some technology leading countries such as Japan, America and England. People in those countries do not appreciate this technique and are not passionate to own a 3D TV. This significant contrast does not create good impact on the economy. The following paragraphs will detail the reasons why this newly invented television technique cannot become popular, followed by an economic analysis.

Reason 1: 3D media is not common in the society
Because of the mentioned reason, electronic companies put a considerable amount of time and effort to invent and improve 3D television technique. Under a rapid developing progress, fully developed 3D TV had been prepared for the citizens. However, 3D media cannot keep up the pace. Media producers did not provide enough peripheral supports, such as 3D television channels, 3D movie recordings and 3D games, to this newly invented stuff. By common sense, consumers always wish the products they bought can be fully utilized. But in this case, there is no such opportunity for them. Properly they would not think that it is worth to buy this product.

Reason 2: 3D is not a major consideration for making the purchase decision
Besides a small amount of people with technology fever, most people in the society are not enthusiastic on special technologies. For this reason, we may know that 3D will not be the leading factor for people to enjoy a TV program. Instead, being a common leisure of the general public, the content of TV program would be more important than brilliant technologies. Therefore, having great 3D technology equipped cannot generate enough momentum to encourage people buy a 3D television.

Reason 3: Price is high for the general public
3D TV can be sold from around HKD$ 15000 to HKD$ 70000 in Hong Kong (Prices of Sony’s 3D TV were takes as a reference of the market price. [link]). When we compare the price of 3D TV with the income of a general Hong Kong citizen, we can easily notice that the price of 3D TV is relatively high. Many people agree that watching television is just a basic entertainment. Ordinary citizens may not be willing to pay for an item using nearly a whole month of salary. Therefore 3D television is deemed to be an unpopular product.

People watching 3D television

Economical analysis
A basic economic theory is that the market will be most efficient when it is at equilibrium, which is supply equals demand. In short, we can say that success can be reached if the equilibrium point is reached. If there is too much supply or too much unsatisfied demand in the market, the product cannot be counted as a good element for the economy. In the situation of 3D TV, its supply is extraordinary high compare with the demand.

In addition to the above points, we need to take into account the cost of Research & Develop. Given the enormous investment in Research & Development, it may be not beneficial to the company even if the market is at equilibrium because there exists a possibility that the company still cannot recover its cost (still have not breakeven) at that particular point. 3D television technique was still immature in 2009. But after the hurricane of Avatar, the electronic product companies devoted a lot to the invention and the improvement of new 3D television technique. A very significant amount of resources had been spent. But still, those companies would get a far way to break even. 3D TV actually cannot provide positive impact to the economy. 3D television can be considered as a failure at this stage.

Conclusion
Owing to the aforementioned reasons, at this stage, 3D TV cannot become popular in the society. Having just a few numbers of interested consumers thus leads to inadequate demand. In reality, 3D television cannot produce positive effect on the economy of the society. Launching 3D television technique in a hasty way in 2009 should not be considered as a good option for the economy. However, fortunately, the above mentioned bad reasons have the room to be eliminated as time passes. Maybe 3D TV can demonstrate their value when peripheral supports are ready in the consumer market in the future.

References

1. Wikipedia – 3D television Website: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3D_television Retrieved on 22nd November, 2010
2. Wikipedia – Stereoscopy Website: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereoscopy
3. Retrieve on 22nd November, 2010
4. A&T (sam的多媒體園地) – 認識「3D TV」廬山真面目 Website: http://sam52888.pixnet.net/blog/post/4629445 Retrieved on 22nd November, 2010
5. 中國經濟網 – 叫好不叫座 3D電視遭遇”寒流” Website: http://big5.ce.cn/cysc/zgjd/kx/201011/05/t20101105_20538191.shtml Retrieved on 22nd November, 2010
6. Sony Bravia Website: http://www.sonystyle.com.hk/ss/product/tv/index.jsp?lid=topmenu_icon_bravia Retrieved on 22nd November, 2010

3D-TV: an environmental aspect

World is always changing. Not long ago, High Quality (HD) TV has just showed up, now, an even more high technology Television is developed and put into the market – the 3D television. Such new technology and items claimed that they are improving our quality of life, indeed, is the other way rounded. They are improving the entertainment we enjoyed, but they are deeply destroying the environment of the world, which highly affect our quality of life too.

3D TV is an emerging technology that allows consumers to enjoy three-dimensional movies, television programs and video games in their homes. The technology requires the purchase of new television equipment, including a 3D-ready TV, a 3D-capable Blu-ray player and also a 3"D glasses” (http://tv.about.com). If we want to enjoy movie, TV programs or video games, what we got now can already allow us to do so. But if you want to step into the 3-D world, you need to buy for the new one even thought the one you are using is still running quite well. Such additional action will lead to more serious of electronic waste problem. Those disposed TV or electronic devices will expose some destructive substances such as lead, mercury and hexavalent chromium, which will cause bad effects on human body through air, water, or other ways. So when you decide to step into the 3-D world, you are actually using the surrounding environment and your health to exchange the slightly more joy from the new technology. But the environment will be deeply destroyed because of your slightly more joy.

Despite causing water pollution or air pollution, 3D TV also limit the use of land. To store more disposed e-waste, more land are required, so more trees might be destroyed because of this. Even the land can be free after few years, the land cannot be reused because there will accumulate lots of destructive substances, trees cannot grow, people cannot live there, no houses will be built on the top. At the end, the land become useless except storing rubbish, a large piece of land will be wasted. Also large quantity of trees are being destroyed with no reverse action can be done.

One more concern is about the additional equipment used in watching the 3D TV, which are the 3D glasses. When you need to watch TV, no longer as simple as before, not just sitting in front of it but also need to wear 3D glasses. If each family got 4 members, there should be 4 glasses in house. And we got thousand million of families in the world, the demand for 3D glasses would be very great. That means, a very large amount of resources will be used in producing this extra equipment. The world is already running out of resources, people are seeking for reusable resources, but the appear of 3D TV lead to the extra waste of resources on those extra glasses needed, without the 3D TV, such resources can be saved to do some more meaningful things.

At the end, what 3D TV can bring to our environment is waste, destructive waste and pollutions.

Reference

1. http://tv.about.com/od/frequentlyaskedquestions/f/3DTV_FAQ.htm
2. http://earth911.com/news/2007/04/19/throw-away-your-television/

3D-TV: Societal Concerns

3D displaying technology is more and more popular in recent years, although at this moment it is mainly applied in the film industry. It is foreseeable that it will soon go deep into society and houses and influencing people.s life. Among these impacts, some are positive while some are not. In this critique, few societal issues concerning introducing of 3D-TV into daily basis will be discussed.

Although 3D-TV gives viewer a fantastic experience, not all people can enjoy this technology. Those who are poor cannot really get a grasp of this technology. The first problem is money, currently the minimum spending for installing a 3D-TV set in Hong Kong is around HKD$20,000 ("3D",2010), including at least a displaying unit and "3D Goggle". How could people expect those who are getting financial assistance from the government can have a 3D-TV set? Another problem is space, the recommended viewing distance, for a common 40 to 55 inches 3D-TV, is 9 feet to 12 feet and 6 inches (D. Briere and P. Hurley, 2007). For those who are poorer, they cannot find such a large empty space in their common tiny houses. This will lead to a further differentiation between poor one and the rich one because the poor one can.t enjoy the better televisions, which is just the basic equipment in modern world.

The second issue is about the usefulness of 3D-TV in the daily basis. Since the release of the film <Avatar> in 2010, many people start appreciating the magnificent visual effect created by 3D technology. In order to take advantage to this enthusiasm of 3D displaying technique, many new films used 3D filming techniques, but turn out the visual experience of those films did not differentiate too much with the common filming techniques. In fact, 3D displaying works better in the cartoons film because the images are more simple that those human-casting films. The first difference is the background of images, for those human-casting films, they usually filmed under natural setting, which caused too much object to be displayed on the screen at one time. Another difference is that some scenes in 3D cartoon films could be specially design to fit the 3D effect while the human-casting films cannot. This shows that 3D displaying technique is not always that useful in enhancing visual experiences. This leads to the result that the broadcasting companies and film producers are not willing to produce all programmes using 3D technology as the cost is very high. With this little amount of programmes available, it seems it is unnecessary to get a 3D-TV at home.

Another issue is concerning the biological aspect of users. Many people feel dizziness("健康", 2010), nausea and headaches after watching. Moreover, according to Samsung (2010), watching 3D-TV may cause impended visual ability, directionless, unconsciousness or even apoplexy. For the children, since watching 3D-TV requires a ※3D goggle§ , which force the eyes to focus in an abnormal way, this could lead to the loss of depth perception of those children (Xin Hua Net, 2010, as stated in "叫好", 2010). Depth perception is extremely important for human to survive as this could let us know the distance between object so that we know how far the object we want to take is , or we could know walking forward 1 step more we would fall down to the hill, for example. Also, according to a survey done by Nielsen (2010, as stated in "健康", 2010), 50% of the responders feel uncomfortable in wearing the 3D goggle. We can see that watching 3D-TV affects our health, both in short-term or long-run.

The fourth issue is fear of abuse. Given that the visual effect generated by this 3D technique is that fantastic and great. It would seem like .real. for the viewer. However, the production of these films actually undergone computer processing. During this process, additional object are easily added to fake people, just similar to the problem of digital imaging. It is extremely dangerous as television programme play an important part of human.s life. It is an important channel for us to know the things happening around the world (passively). If someone actively and purposively alters the film, for example, for political or illegal use (like to slander someone or to attack the government), the public may support their act as the film act as an "evidence". Therefore, it is very important for the public to bear in mind that the film is not always real and we must not trust them entirely and try to get a wider picture through other channels.

The final issue is concerning the use of 3D technology in medical field. Having talked about few less positive issues of 3D-TV, it could actually be used in medical imaging. Like HDTV, combined with a suitable camera it can be used to show a clearer image of inside our body (Yang, 2003). In the future, 3D-TV could also be used in the field to display 3D view of our organs inside our body. This could help health care practitioners to get a clearer picture of how is going on inside our body.

In conclusion, at this instant, when 3D-TV is immersing into the society, it is great to see that 3D-TV could become a useful tool in medical field that could be beneficial to the public. At the same time, there are few issues that the public should concern, including whether the poorer can afford the cost and enjoy this technology, the health issues, the low amount of programme available, the misleading content that may be displayed. It is hoped that with more improvement on this technology, these drawbacks can be diminished in the foreseeable future.

 

References

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2. Briere, D. & Hurley, P. (2007). HDTV for Dummies. Indianapolis, Indiana : Wiley Publishing, Inc.
3. Samsung. (2010). Viewing TV using the 3D function. Australia: Author.
4. Retrieved Nov 13, 2010 from http://www.samsung.com/au/tv/pdf/3D-tv-warning.pdf
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7. 健康貼士：幾類人群不宜觀看3D電視購買需謹慎.(2010, Nov 12). 科技日報. Retrieved Nov 12, 2010 from http://big5.chinataiwan.org/xwzx/Technology/201011/t20101112_1599704.htm