People were still amazed by the sight of Superman.

Dwight Howard’s sensational display of athleticism and imagination in the slam dunk contest, highlighted by a dunk while donning the Man of Steel’s cape, was still being talked about yesterday.

It was the first time a high-tech vote system had been used to crown an NBA slam dunk king, although five former NBA greats such as Julius Erving and Magic Johnson who had judged the first round unanimously saw Howard as the winner.

Howard wore a blue Superman tunic and red cape on a first-round alley-oop dunk after having electrified the crowd by slamming in a left-handed dunk after first bouncing the ball off the rear side of the backboard.

“People like to see that. They don’t want to see the same old dunk. People want something with some spice,” Howard said. “This year all the guys tried to bring some spice to the dunk contest.”

Howard, who will start for the Eastern Conference in Sunday’s 57th NBA All-Star Game, received perfect scores of 50 for both first-round dunks to advance while Memphis’ Rudy Gay and Toronto’s Jamario Moon were eliminated.

“The first one I’ve been working on it for about two years but I could never really get it down. I had my legs under me and got it down,” Howard said.

“The Superman dunk, I wanted to get the crowd into it, put some of my personality in it with the Superman cape. To make the dunk after that was unbelievable. The cape and the Superman outfit, I think it really worked.”