As of now, shoppers can buy Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs on 3D Blu Ray as a standalone purchase, and not accompanied by a 3D TV, Blu-ray player, or starter kit.

This film was originally received fairly well by critics, and currently has a score of 86% on Rotten Tomatoes, giving it an overall rating of “Fresh”.

As the film was originally created to be shown in 3D there shouldn’t be any quality issues with regards to the stereoscopic effect, and although aimed more at children it’s entertaining enough to to act as a good introduction for the whole family to the world of 3D films.

E3 has come and gone, and Nintendo have shown us all that the way forwards for portable gaming will be in 3D! Using auto stereoscopic technology, which means you don’t need glasses, the 3DS will bring portable 3D gaming into the anxious sweaty palms of millions late this year or early next, we would bet on it having a release date of before Christmas to maximise any festive sales.

Also boasting twin cameras for taking 3D photos the 3DS is certainly something above and beyond anything Apple, or Sony currently have in the works, at least as far as we know, with regards to portable gaming. The specs are all very impressive, and Nintendo have pedigree when it comes to breaking new ground with gaming systems and concepts, you need look no further than the Wii or the DS for evidence of that.

What is equally, if not more exciting however is the list of developers lining up to throw their weight, and titles, behind the ground breaking system, after all you can cram in all the great specifications you want, but if you haven’t got the media to back it up, people will lose interest very quickly! When reporters got a first look at the 3DS in action at E3 all of the buzz was very encouraging, with many noting how well the 3D was implemented, as well as the comfortable feel of the system and the possibilities it presents.

The future of gaming certainly looks to be 3D.

In what should be great news for all amongst us looking to get onboard with 3DTV technology, Virgin Media‘s executive director of digital entertainment, Cindy Rose, has told the Telegraph of plans to provide a rival 3DTV service to that supplied by Sky. Set to launch later this year, presumably pretty much at the same time as Sky’s offering, details are scarce at the moment but will no doubt comes as good news for Virgin subscribers looking to the future of their television viewing.

We would envisage sports, films, and regular programming being made available in 3D. Also expected is Virgin looking into bringing 3D to the TV on demand market that they have, up to now, spearheaded so successfully.

In possibly one of the more stand out 3D TV related announcements of late, Sharp have announced that their new Aquos Quattron 3D LV model television will go on sale around July 30th.

The model will be available in four different sizes, but what makes this exciting, and immediately different to most other 3D releases at the moment is the use of Quattron technology. What this means is that instead of using the standard three primary colours of red, blue and green as all other televisions do, the Quattron adds yellow, working instead with a quartet of base colours, which allows more faithful reproduction of colours.

The company has also stated that its new 3D-capable Blu-Ray player will be released at the same time. With plenty of other 3D television releases scheduled for this summer, Sharp will certainly be hoping that the addition of Quattron technology will help their models stand out from the crowd. Personally they could well be on to a winner here as surely all consumers, no matter how technologically inclined (or not) will realise that four base colours must be better than three?

Earlier this month, iSuppli, indicated that following market research they expect the worldwide shipments of 3D TVs to reach 4.2 million units in 2010. This is down to acceptance from high levels of enthusiastic early adopters of the new technology.

As if this wasn’t staggering enough, with demand set to propel ever upwards shipments are forecast to triple to 12.9 million units in 2011, followed by another doubling to 27.4 million units in 2012.

This is still currently small numbers compared to the numbers you would be looking at when taking into account all shipments of LCD TVs, for example, but for an emerging market the signs are certainly encouraging. Following research in the US, iSuppli found that out of consumers buying a new television in the US in the first quarter of 2010, 4% indicated they would be acquiring a 3D capable model which, considering there would have been very little media available at that time, is a solid figure.

With the regards to the future growth of the market, the principal analyst for television systems at iSuppli, Riddhi Patel, had the following to say:

“Although robust growth of 3-D television sales appears to be assured during the next few years, mass consumer acceptance will not come until three critical issues are resolved concerning standardization, content availability and interoperability of the 3D glasses used to view the sets.”

With more manufacturers gradually entering the 3D TV market, a real melee is set to break out with the various manufacturers competing for consumers. Of course this will only be a good thing as it should signal both an upturn in quality, not that there isn’t quality at the moment but more competition means manufacturers having to outdo each other, and the technology progressing at a quicker pace. The other upside is that of course the new TVs will have to be price competitive, so there will always be a good deal out there.

On Monday Sharp and Mitsubishi both announced plans to release their 3D TV ranges this summer. This will see them join the ranks of the likes of Sony, Panasonic and LG who have all already made clear their intent to assault this particular market, and the future importance it may hold. With all the big boys backing the 3D revolution it looks like it’s here to stay!

At the Society for Information Display (SID) 2010 LG unveiled the world’s largest Ultra High Definition (UHD) 3D panel. At a massive 84 inches and with a resolution of 3840×2160 it has four times the resolution of previous full HD panels.

Of course as well as this monster television LG are also displaying a range of more home and budget friendly models at around the 47 inch mark. Interestingly they will also be showing off their new 47 inch ‘liquid lens’ 3DTV. Although there are no details on just how this works at the moment, it does do away with the need for any sort of special eye wear, enabling the viewer to get a stereoscopic effect just by watching it.

It has been announced that Microsoft have signed a “strategic partnership with LG that will signal the intended arrival of 3D gaming on the XBox 360. The move mirrors Sony’s move to bring the 3D gaming revolution to their existing platform.

To take advantage of this you will require a 3D TV capable of displaying the latest advance in gaming and this partnership will see 3D LG TVs sold alongside XBox 360s in consumer bundles, the first of which will see the LG LX5900 teamed up with the Microsoft console. Initially these bundles are only set to be available in Korea, but with the demand for 3DTV on the rise, and Sony likely to do something similar in all territories with its own line of 3DTVs we consider it only a matter of time before similar bundles are available here also.

With the E3 show opening tomorrow we would expect many further announcements regarding the future of 3D gaming to be forthcoming, some of which will no doubt be ground-breaking.

With every 3D movie release doing well in cinemas, how will the content and technology transfer to the home market, will it be as effective, and the image quality as good on a smaller scale? Well, the future looks bright for home 3D as Consumer Reports found that the first available 3D TVs indeed presented “compelling” 3D pictures that live up to the hype surrounding the technology.

This will no doubt come as welcome news to the likes of Hollywood and Sky who have been investing vast amounts in both producing and distributing 3D content to home users. Of course this particular publication has a heavy consumer slant and is thus advising people not to rush out and buy a 3D-compatible HDTV now, as once there is more competition the prices for televisions and compatible 3D Blu-ray players are sure to drop. However they are still not ludicrously expensive at the moment and don’t have that much of a premium over new HD TVs. It should also be remembered that every new 3D TV is also a top of the range standard 2D Hi-definition TV.

Indeed if you are one of those who likes being at the cutting edge of new technology this report would suggest to us that there is no reason for you not to go ahead, provided of course price isn’t an issue.

If you are thinking about investing in a 3D TV you may be concerned that, currently at least and until the flow of 3D Blu-ray discs and 3D television programming becomes more common, there isn’t going to be a massive amount of content for you to display in three glorious dimensions on your brand new hi-tech television.

Toshiba obviously had this thought in mind when developing their forthcoming ZX900 Cell TV range. Due to be available in September in 55 and 65 inch screen sizes this TV not only displays 3D images, but has the ability to convert 2D displays into 3D ones. Using innovative new technology called Trivector you will be able to view all manner of games, sports, and other TV programmes in 3D. The conversion works using the Frame Sequential System that changes the refresh rate in 3D to 120Hz for your right eye, and 120Hz for your left eye.

Of course the ZX900 also packs in all the features you would expect from a top of the range television, but with the Trivector technology it would seem to have an added ace up its sleeve.