103-inch Plasma

[Christian Lett]

Was in London yesterday. Had a wander up Oxford Street and found myself drawn into John Lewis. There (on floor 5) was a thing of beauty - the world's largest plasma screen. A 103" Panasonic hooked up to a BluRay player.

For the first time ever i was proper wowed by high definition. The picture from this TV was simply stunning - no horrible artifacts or noise, just beautifully rendered colours and detail. The disc playing was showing film trailers, so proper stuff rather than the deliberately-shot-to-show-off-high-def footage of cloth being dyed, nature, etc.

The cost: £50,000! :eek: One day...

[Alan Roberts]

Just you wait, NHK are currently working on the next generation of HD and aiming to get SMPTE recognition for standardisation. The project is "UHDTV" which will trundle in at HDx4 (i.e. 7680x4320). Dr Fujio, at IBC, was talking of 200" displays in homes, to be viewed at about 0.75 H.

While UHDTV might well happen eventually, I really can't see how to get a 200" display into any normal home, it'd be 8 feet 1.5inches high, not allowing for the housing, surround and mounting. I haven't got a room big enough, not to mention the 22.2 channel sound :(

[oddball]

I suspect that it would be an accessorie with the penthouse or the yaght darlings, mwah mwah.

I dont think that will fit thru many doorways, not unless its flexible as well or comes in kit form.

If you are thinking about one, can I pop round with the Xbox360?

oddball x ;-)

[Christian Lett]

The mind boggles. 7680x4320 pixels! Making a display is one thing but then you've got to produce imaging chips to capture the footage in that res; you've got to have hardware and software to manipulate that data (just imagine that uncompressed in 10-bit 4:4:4!), and then bandwidth to transmit it!

I look forward to the day when I can afford to shoot with one of those cameras!

[Dave Jervis]

"....you're gonna need a bigger house...." (..with apologies to Peter Benchly..)

[DV_Ed]

I just cant help feeling that the push for ever greater pixels is a waste of time. I'd much rather better use was made of the existing ones!

[Alan Roberts]

I agree with all that. When I first heard about UHDTV I was convinced that they were gunning for IMAX, but Fujio claimed they were aiming at the consumer. I'd far rather have DTV improved by junking MPEG2 and going to MPEG4 at least for SD, and wavelets for HD. That would make more efficient use of the bandwidth and release space for HD.

[infocus]

When I first heard about UHDTV I was convinced that they were gunning for IMAX, but Fujio claimed they were aiming at the consumer.
I really can't see it for the consumer (although......... :)), but apart from IMAX can see it being of value in commercial applications. Everything from medical, through industrial to military.

[Alan Roberts]

Just so, museums, cinema, simulators, but I can't see it getting into homes for a while yet.