Japan's KDDI Finds Way to Deliver Free Viewpoint Video over Web

KDDI R&D Laboratories has developed a system for delivering free viewpoint video over the Internet. The research arm of KDDI Corp. plans to use the system for a trial service on its Web site this year. Within fives years it hopes to integrate the system with the delivery of on-demand television programming over the Internet.

In free viewpoint video, the viewer can choose to watch events play out from any angle. This is accomplished by filming the action from multiple angles using multiple cameras and then synthesizing the image data to generate a digital 3-D view. The technology is actually being developed for free viewpoint television, but too much data is generated for delivery over the Internet.

The new KDDI system uses data-compression technologies and selective processing of image data to create a 300mbps data stream, which is small enough for delivery to household Internet terminals.

Source: TradingMarkets