3D Stereoscopic - Format of the Future or a Gimmick of Today?

[arroway]

3D is the next logical step, just like color was the next logical step, just like "talkies" were the next logical step. 3D is no more a gimmick than any of the technological milestones that preceded it. If cinematic history is anything to go by, the future will make fools of the naysayers.

 

[Evan S]

How can something that is a trick not be a gimmick? Putting films in color is not a gimmick because we see in color. However, 3D is a trick because we're taking a two dimensional image and putting glasses on to TRICK our eyes into seeing 3d.
We don't need to trick our eyes to see in color.

p.s. Does anyones eyes water a lot while watching 3D? Also, I'll get motion sickness if it's "Bad" 3d. Avatar was okay, but my eyes were bright red when I left the theater from strain.

 

[MattinSTL]

You gotta' see it in REAL3D or DOLBY3D... this matters. Ordinary 3D uses linear polarizer glasses, which means you must keep your head fairly still to maintain the 3D effect... otherwise normal motion in your head will have the 3D effect "wavering" in effectiveness... and encouraging a headache in some people.

Read3d and Dolby3d use circular polarizer and a little different tech which is more visually stable... Dolby is supposedly slightly better... so if you can't see it in Imax, go Dolby, then Real, then check another theater.

Imax is probably the most immersive experience but not necessarily the best 3d BTW... the other 2 technologies (I believe) can be combined with Imax... but for normal theaters look for those instead of simply 3d.

Now you know *bing*

 

[J.R. Hudson]

3D is the next logical step, just like color was the next logical step, just like "talkies" were the next logical step. 3D is no more a gimmick than any of the technological milestones that preceded it. If cinematic history is anything to go by, the future will make fools of the naysayers.

:thumbsup:

Here here

 

[Stephen Mick]

I've seen at least four movies this year in "Real3D," and I don't care to ever see another one. Wearing glasses during a movie is just plain annoying.

When the glasses are no longer necessary, then I'll say Real 3D has arrived, and I'll be excited about it.

 

[arroway]

Putting films in color is not a gimmick because we see in color.

We also see in 3D so what's your point?

If your eyes are giving you a 2D image then you should immediately cut your drivers license in half and schedule an appointment to see an optometrist.

However, 3D is a trick because we're taking a two dimensional image and putting glasses on to TRICK our eyes into seeing 3d.

And cinema itself is based upon the trick of taking individual frames and playing them in quick enough succession to TRICK our eyes into seeing motion where there is none.

Every single facet of movie making is a "trick".

P.S. The 3D glasses we use now are just an early stage of implementation and there is nothing to suggest they will still be a requirement five years out. The advent of color and sound were not overnight accomplishments either. Both of them went through a number of inferior technological stages suffering their requisite detractors pessimism and short sightedness along the way until finally plowing through some final hurdle and achieving industry wide acceptance and adoption. There will come a time when new 2D films are as prevalent as new silent films are today and my guess is, most of us in this thread will probably live to see it.

 

[Mark Harris]

I'm not so sure. The thing that's different about 3D from things like sound and color, is it's been here before - LONG AGO - and failed once already. If it really was the next logical step, we would have it already, and more than that, we would have all grown up with it, since it's been here since the 50s. If it was the next logical step, the industry would have advanced the technology long, long ago. But they only really pull it out when something threatens the box-office. Before it was TV. Now it's the web. No one ever cares about 3-D unless there's a perceived threat to getting people out of their houses and into the theater. No one is sitting around working on improving it when times are good for movie theaters. I think that's largely what makes it a gimmick.

The glasses will forever kill wide-spread adoption. Until they get rid of those, it will never be here to stay. Maybe they are doing that now, I dunno. But it's an absolute must.

And yeah, I do think color and sound are kind of gimmicks. They're nice, but certainly not necessary to good filmmaking. But I think it's the added demand of wearing the glasses for 3-D that will keep it forever in the gimmick-ghetto.

Where I think it will really catch on and actually be good, would be in video games. And I think people would not mind the glasses there. Unless they have that already, do they?

 

[ChipG]

It's the future of hollywood, that's for sure.

 

[dufloorman]

The glasses will forever kill wide-spread adoption. Until they get rid of those, it will never be here to stay. Maybe they are doing that now, I dunno. But it's an absolute must.

I don't see how the glasses could ever go away. It's the only way to enable one eye to see a different image than the other eye sees. I often hear folks predict 3D viewing without glasses, but I've never heard one plausible theory on how that would be achieved.

How could 3D viewing be achieved w/o glasses?

 

[Evan S]

I guess they have TV's that can do it without glasses. I'm pretty sure someone posted a link in this thread.

And also @arroway, I pretty much figured that someone would say something like that. However, I'm more or less talking about the fact that we have to put something on our head to see 3d. I don't need special glasses to see a regular film. I just need a device that can play the movie. Which doesn't involve me putting something on myself to be able to view it.

Like someone else in this thread has already said about 3D being more realistic.

But why stop there? Why not bring back smell-o-vision? That will make it more accurate, right? Might turn us off from pornos for a while, but...

Why not make gunshots accurately loud? So that the typical gunfight would leave you deaf? That's accurate.

Why not make all shots of the sun leave you blind? That's accurate, right?

Hell, if you want REAL accuracy, NO EDITS! Everything plays in real time!

Movies have absolutely NOTHING to do with accurate representations of reality. The old quip from Hitch is right. Except for mumblecore, where it's reversed.

I do think 3-D will become a larger and larger part of spectacle movies. But I hope to God it stays there. I don't think it adds anything to a movie at all.

I don't mind 3D, although it adds NOTHING to the STORY. Which is what the real heart of anything worth watching is about. A good story. 3D can't make a story better, neither did color. However, 3D at this point has most exclusively been used as a gimmick. I honestly don't feel I've received information better from watching a movie in 3D. I don't feel that I've lost any information watching a movie in black and white.

3D has it's place, but I don't really feel like I want to watch Schindlers list in 3D. (like someone else said.)

What would be the point of watching a movie like that in 3D?

Really think about Avatars story for a moment. I want you to tell me that you think based on STORY ALONE that it's one of the best movies to come out last year.
I can think of a lot of films that I thought were better story wise than Avatar was. Just because 3D exists doesn't mean we need to use it on EVERY flipping movie. Just like not every movie is color, even today movies still are shot in black and white (okay, considerably less. I think I'm right in saying though, that you don't need to use every tool because it exists).

 

[Jawa Ex Machina]

3D is the next logical step, just like color was the next logical step, just like "talkies" were the next logical step. 3D is no more a gimmick than any of the technological milestones that preceded it. .

That's exactly what they said about "interactive movies" in the 90's.
You were going to be able to choose your ending or the way the story went, kind of like a "Choose Your Own Adventure" book.

Or more recently, the video call thing with 3rd generation cell phones. Who does that? Other than deaf people.

 

[Postmaster]

3D is the next logical step, just like color was the next logical step, just like "talkies" were the next logical step. 3D is no more a gimmick than any of the technological milestones that preceded it. If cinematic history is anything to go by, the future will make fools of the naysayers.

They preached that line at least 4 times in the last 100 years.

Actually I experienced nothing in Avatar that I haven't seen in amusement parks 20 Years ago. Same old technology including circular polarizer glasses.

I found it fun and amusing back than, I found it fun and amusing in Avatar - but nothing "groundbreaking" (as they say).

So where is the novelty?

Does it immerse me more into the story (what story anyway?) - Not at all, it constantly distracts me because of the funny experience to see things pop out of the screen.

If you have a well told story, you can watch it in 400 x 300 pixel on a tiny bad screen, on the headrest on the backseat of a car and got totally sucked into it.

So much that you completely forget all the tech aspects of your "viewing experience" and just see the film - that´s the magic of movies and it does´not need any gimmicks.

A good movie plays in your head anyway, not on the screen.

Will they do more 3d flicks? Probably yes.
Will they look like a 3d PC-game? Probably yes.
Will it be "the next big thing"? Probably yes.
Will it bring us better movies? Probably not.

I think it will wear out pretty fast, and I´m already tired of it.

So yeah - Gimmick!

Frank

 

[Jawa Ex Machina]

If you have a well told story, you can watch it in 400 x 300 pixel on a tiny bad screen, on the headrest on the backseat of a car and got totally sucked into it.

...or even worse - Pan&Scan on a 20" tube TV from a jumpy VHS cassette!

 

[arroway]

I'm not so sure. The thing that's different about 3D from things like sound and color, is it's been here before - LONG AGO - and failed once already.

As I said before, that's not at all different from the history of color motion pictures. The first color photo was developed in the mid eighteen hundreds. Color motion pictures went through a number of embarrassing stages where only one or two wavelengths would be exposed or each print would have to be individually filtered or painted by hand etc etc etc

Sound "in" film went through similar growing pains over as many years.

However, I'm more or less talking about the fact that we have to put something on our head to see 3d. I don't need special glasses to see a regular film. I just need a device that can play the movie.

But you do need a screen of some kind to see the film. And speakers of some kind to hear it. I don't see the distinction that makes screens and speakers okay but condemns 3D via glasses as a gimmick. Recorded sights (2D or 3D) and sounds all require machinery in order for you to experience them.

Does it immerse me more into the story (what story anyway?) - Not at all, it constantly distracts me because of the funny experience to see things pop out of the screen.

And early cinema viewers literally checked themselves for wounds after that iconic cowboy fired his pistol directly at the camera.

Pretty sure that kind of reaction didn't last long.

If you have a well told story, you can watch it in 400 x 300 pixel on a tiny bad screen, on the headrest on the backseat of a car and got totally sucked into it.

I don't think I saw anyone arguing that 3D was needed to tell a good story so I'm a little confused who you're replying to, certainly not me. If a "well told story" is all you care about then I doubt you're that finicky about color or sound either, right? Hell, cinema itself seems like a rather extravagant and wasteful way to tell a story come to think of it! Why don't we all just read books instead? After all, a good STORY plays in your head, not on the screen...

If you think 3D is a gimmick, then you must concede color, sound, and indeed the entire medium of cinema is a gimmick as well.

 

[Jawa Ex Machina]

But you do need a screen of some kind to see the film. And speakers of some kind to hear it. I don't see the distinction that makes screens and speakers okay but condemns 3D via glasses as a gimmick. Recorded sights (2D or 3D) and sounds all require machinery in order for you to experience them.

Yeah... but you wouldn't be wearing a screen or speakers though, would you?

If going to the cinema required you to wear uncomfortable headphones all of a sudden in order to get 5.1 sound, 5.1 wouldn't be as popular today and this argument would have existed in the 80s about sound.

I'm sure there's a place for 3D, but not in movies and not in the cinema.
Imagine though something like this: http://itvgoggles.com/ in RealD with surround audio combined with a video game like GTA or Microsoft Flight Simulator and Wii technology.

NOW we're talking.

 

[arroway]

Yeah... but you wouldn't be wearing a screen or speakers though, would you?

So...headphones are gimmicks now too?

Or wait, are they only gimmicks when worn in certain places?

The definition of gimmick then, is location dependent?

While we're on the subject isn't it WEIRD how so many people wear clocks on their wrists these days? Don't they know clocks only belong on the front of centrally located urban buildings and in man-sized, mahogany contraptions in dusty home corridors?

:grin:

 

[Jawa Ex Machina]

So...headphones are gimmicks now too?

If wearing them was the only way to experience surround sound, and they were trying to sell me a movie ticket for 30% over the original price just so I would wear them in the theater by telling me how kewl and awesome-o it was, then yes. That would be a gimmick.

I would be saying that I can hear stereo just fine, thank you very much, and go to the regular showing which was cheaper and didn't force me to use disposable headsets.

This by the way comes from a home theater audiophile.

 

[Evan S]

I think the point we're trying to make is that seeing a movie in 3D right now for the extra price is a gimmick. When you can see the movie for less and see it in 2D with nearly the same experience. When color was created, they didn't have a choice in theaters to pick the color version or the black and white version. If they had the choice to watch it in color for an extra 50% do you think they would have?

 

[Evan S]

Yes, the would pay the extra 5 cents, Evan.

 

[J.R. Hudson]

I think the point we're trying to make is that seeing a movie in 3D right now for the extra price is a gimmick. When you can see the movie for less and see it in 2D with nearly the same experience. When color was created, they didn't have a choice in theaters to pick the color version or the black and white version. If they had the choice to watch it in color for an extra 50% do you think they would have?

I disagree

Seeing Avatar in 3D is almost bumming me out; knowing that on DVD or even flat, it just will not be the same. There definitely is a certain magical visual-visceral quality to watching that film in 3D.