Brian Gainor
Founding Editor
Partnership
Activation

"3D will change everything and its not that far away from being reality." - David Hill, Fox Sports Chair & Executive Producer.

Are you ready to look at sports from a totally different point of view? It's time to get ready because sporting events will soon be televised in 3D. A few major sports media outlets have begun experimenting with 3D film equipment as a way to provide fans with a new perspective of sports in action.

The NBA and a few of its member organizations began flirting with 3D technology in 2007. The league held a private 3D watch party for the 2007 NBA All-Star Game and later aligned with the Cleveland Cavaliers to host a 3D NBA Finals telecast in Cleveland that attracted 14,000 fans. In March of 2008, the Dallas Mavericks followed the NBA's innovative efforts by collaborating with FSN and Pace, a production company, to televise the first NBA regular-season game live in 3D HD at the Magnolia Theater in Dallas.

But while many sports fans eagerly await the chance to see their favorite teams featured in 3D, there is already one type of 3D technology making a big splash in the sports marketplace; 3D signage. Sports marketers looking to capture the attention of television viewers have turned to 3D signage as a new, effective means to drive brand messaging and awareness. The new inventory piece is said to outperform traditional 2D field boards and static advertising at the performance level.

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Users have found that 3D signage significantly impacts the viewer experience because it causes logos to appear to be standing upright when seen on television. The effect makes sponsor logos pop on television, giving the signage a ‘wow' factor that is not experienced with traditional signage.

logopaint.com

3D signage has rapidly become a mainstream inventory piece in major markets across the globe. Yet despite its popularity in foreign markets, 3D signage has surprisingly still gone unnoticed in the United States. The technology has been implemented in a variety of sports (soccer, cricket, rugby, racing, basketball, hockey, handball, and volleyball) with two companies, Logo Paint and Mirage, leading the charge. Look for this inventory piece to be adopted in the United States in the near future!

logopaint.com

Here are a few other examples of how 3D technology is being utilized in the sports space:

· CBS used 3D renderings during its coverage of The Masters (Archiform 3D).

· NASCAR created a "NASCAR 3D: The IMAX Experience" sports documentary.

· The Golf Channel was the first network to use 3D Doppler radar technology to measure data on ball launch, ball flight, and ball landing in regular-season PGA telecasts.

· The NBA featured a virtual 3D theme park on Second Life that included advertising for the new Toyota Tundra.

· The National Sports Museum in Australia features a 3D hologram of Shane Warne, a former international cricketer, who tells visitors of his most memorable moments.

Brian Gainor is the founding editor of PartnershipActivation.com, a site that identifies best practices in the sports marketplace. Brian can be reached at .

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