Last week Portuguese and Belgian sports fans experienced the first live sports broadcasts in stereoscopic high-definition 3-D.
On May 8, in Belgium, Belgacom TV broadcast a game, produced by Outside Broadcast, making extensive use of 3-D on-air graphics generated with new software systems from wTVision (http://www.wtvision.com/) and stereo graphics rendering engines from Vizrt (http://www.vizrt.com/). The historic 3-D Belgian football match (a Jupiler Pro League contest between Anderlecht and Sint-Truiden) used special 3-D rigs comprised of two Grass Valley LDK 8000 HD cameras on a Swiss rig — provided by Outside Broadcast — could be viewed in several bars and cafes in Belgium equipped with 3-D screens.
That same week, the Estoril Open tennis tournament in Portugal was broadcast in 3-D. These were the first true 3-D live broadcasts in Portugal. Produced for MEO IPTV distributor by Medialuso and wTVision, with the support of RTP and Lagos Sports, the graphics appeared to float outside viewers' TV screens.
