Sky broadcasts UK's first live 3DTV event

The UK's first broadcast of a live event in 3D to a domestic 3DTV set took place last night.

Sky successfully operated a live 3D transmission of a Keane gig at London's Abbey Road studios over its existing satellite infrastructure to a standard Sky+ HD box connected to a 46 inch high definition 3D-capable television set.

A live test broadcast via a satellite downlink to a Vue cinema equipped for 3D presentation also took place, as did a separate 3D webcast using traditional red/green glasses. Sky's system requires a 3D high definition TV set and polarising glasses.

"We’re excited to have worked with Keane and their innovative management team to explore how our 3D TV technology might be used to offer a totally new viewing experience for live and recorded music," said Gerry O'Sullivan, Sky's director of strategic product development.

"Being able to broadcast a live event in 3D is a real breakthrough as previous demonstrations have relied on recorded material. This is the first time we’ve broadcast a live event in 3D over satellite and it shows the significant progress we’re making with our research and development activity. The Keane event not only gave us new insight into our ability to deliver a rich and immersive live 3D experience into the home, but also confirmed that arts programming is another genre which has the potential to benefit from 3D.

"We are continuing to talk to a range of different partners and content owners to find out how far we can take this technology and most importantly whether there is future consumer demand for 3D TV services."

Sky first demonstrated its 3D development efforts in December and confirmed in March that it was pushing ahead with research in the area.