It's funny, when I saw "Phantom" in the theaters I left feeling like I had just played a video game and not been given any controls to actually play! The same with "Attack" too, but it had a little more movie appeal in it.

The classic trilogy is different, of course..

josh, where are you! we need to come defend the prequels!

Aside from some cheesey romantic moments, I liked Clones a lot. And for me, it wasn't Jar Jar that ruined Phantom, it was mannaquin Skywalker.

heath

<<<-- Originally posted by Heath McKnight : And for me, it wasn't Jar Jar that ruined Phantom, it was mannaquin Skywalker.
heath -->>>

HAHAHAHA!


I agree with Chris, the first 2 were ass. The second slightly more attractive ass than the first, but ass nonetheless.

Aaron

<<<-- Originally posted by Yi Fong Yu : josh, where are you! we need to come defend the prequels! -->>>


I turn my back for five seconds . . .



I don't know where the cartoon rub comes from other than the fact that people know that there's a lot of animation in it. It still doesn't look like a cartoon or a video game. Particularly Phantom Menace, its got a lot of sets and that crisp 35mm look. Sure it's got some vibrant colors, but it's not the only film that's ever done that. It hardly looks like a cartoon. Clones has that HD look, but it still doesn't look like a cartoon.


It's uneven storytelling wise, but there's nothing wrong with the craft of the film. Phantom Menace is a monument of design. Whatever other problems it has, it looks incredible.

Josh and Yi..

Guys, even on the DVD for "Phantom" isn't there a moment when Lucas and his posse are in a theater looking at the latest cut and they're all saying the same thing we are??? They knew it when they were making it...I think Lucas said something like "wow, that's just to much" and "well, we can't go back now" and "we've come to far with it and that's just the way it's going to have to be". That's paraphrasing, so feel free to get the quotes..

That scene where Anakin is a kid and does that race...it's the longest "movie" commercial I've ever seen. It was there to sell video games. Also, the "Attack" scene where Anakin and Obi Wan are racing around....same thing. It was a commercial for his games. I felt cheated myself because his other Star Wars films didn't have games until afterwards - the movies came first. (I know I'm a dickhead for thinking this way.) These new ones seemed like one long commercial for his junk.

Remember now, I have an objective view! I grew up on Star Wars, so the last thing in the world I want to do is slam it. I LOVE the original trilogy.

I didn't like Phantom Menace but the one cool thing I do remember fondly WAS the pod race. It was a great ride.

I didn't buy any of the games either.

Was the speeder bike chase in Return of the Jedi a game commercial too?

Exciting concepts can just happen to work for more than one medium.

What is funny is watching how movies have been influenced BY games.

<<<-- Originally posted by Joshua Starnes : That's awefully cynical, don't you think? -->>>

Actually, no. It's merely an observation. In the 28 years since the first Star Wars film was released revenues from cross-marketing of affinity products and events may have equalled or even exceeded actual box office revenues of these films. Consider Star Wars books, magazines, t-shirts, toy light sabers, Darth Vader helmets, baby juice cups, diapers, conventions, calendars, video games, etc., etc., ad nauseum. I suspect that some little colleges probably even offer courses (if not degrees) in Star Warsology.

By comparison "Western" adventure films, on whose shoulders Star Wars stands, had a 25-30 year run as a popular genre. Westerns spawned the basic cross-marketing concepts for toys and other paraphernalia, although those campaigns look meager by comparison with Star Wars' (whose licensing proceeds all travel to one man's organizations: George Lucas).

Significant technological developments and sociological shifts have kept the Star Wars marketing machine going strong for nearly thirty years. Look at this thread as ready evidence: 4 pages and still growing as the result of one small announcement. I'd bet that many, probably most, of the participants weren't even born when the first Star Wars film was released. Throughout all of these years devotees (nearly all of whom are males) have shown an insatiable appetite for immersive paraphernalia and "gimmicks". I imagine that there are families whose basements are full of grandpa's Star Wars junk, followed by the son's junk and now the grandson's junk. ("Wow, look at grandpa's old light sabre and Darth Vader helmet!")

So while you can debate the visual and story quality of the films as a recreational pastime, you can be sure that Lucas' coffers will again runneth over if he releases a "3-D" version of the movies. Then again in 10 years when he re-releases them in "3-D Smell-O-Vision".

So, no, it's not cynicism I'm expressing. It's speculation well-grounded on historical fact. More power to George Lucas. He single-handedly spawned perhaps the most powerful, family-friendly entertainment genre in history. I do not begrudge him of any of the wealth he has accumulated, and continues to accumulate, from this venture.

<<<-- Originally posted by Ken Tanaka : <<<-- So while you can debate the visual and story quality of the films as a recreational pastime, you can be sure that Lucas' coffers will again runneth over if he releases a "3-D" version of the movies. Then again in 10 years when he re-releases them in "3-D Smell-O-Vision".

So, no, it's not cynicism I'm expressing. It's speculation well-grounded on historical fact. More power to George Lucas. He single-handedly spawned perhaps the most powerful, family-friendly entertainment genre in history. I do not begrudge him of any of the wealth he has accumulated, and continues to accumulate, from this venture. -->>>


That's not what I mean. While its certainly true that he has made and will continue to make plenty of money off of Star Wars, it seems that the observation is that he does what he does first and foremost to make money. As if he were looking for some new technological spin he could through onto to the old movies to give him a plausible reason for putting them back in the theaters. That seems cynical to me, and not really in keeping with his personality.

Considering, on the other hand, his lifelong obession with the technology of filmmaking and with the desire to create the best possible image for viewing and preserve that image as long as possible in order to create the most immersive viewing process possible - a train of thought that led to the creation of THX and their services, and eventually to his current desire off keeping things digital from acquisition through exhibition in order to keep the viewing experience as pristine and immersive as possible - that the 3D thinking is just a further extension of that, not necessarily some lame ploy for money.

While your facts are true, it seems, to me, that you're coming to an incorrect and cynical conclusion.

<<<-- Originally posted by Christopher C. Murphy : Guys, even on the DVD for "Phantom" isn't there a moment when Lucas and his posse are in a theater looking at the latest cut and they're all saying the same thing we are??? They knew it when they were making it...I think Lucas said something like "wow, that's just to much" and "well, we can't go back now" and "we've come to far with it and that's just the way it's going to have to be". That's paraphrasing, so feel free to get the quotes. -->>>

I think it's pretty obvious, based on the conversation directly after that between Lucas and Burtt, that they're talking about the tone of the film and how uneven it is, not the look of it or the quality of the picture. It is uneven movie, and somethings in it, no matter how good the idea behind them may have been, just plain don't work.

<<<-- That scene where Anakin is a kid and does that race...it's the longest "movie" commercial I've ever seen. It was there to sell video games. -->>>

By that logic the attack on the Death Star at the end of the first Star Wars must have been a commercial for toys as well. Certainly the battle against the AT-ATs in Empire must have been. And I can certainly see how, just watching the scene, if you don't like the movie, it could seem that way.

On the other hand, if you look at Lucas' history as a director and person, and consider that he has had a life long obsession with cars and racing to the point where he has included some sort of racing scene in every filme he's ever directed (even THX-1138, which is about as incongrous to car racing as any movie I could imagine) and two his short films in college were devoted entirely to car racing, I think its easy and more logical to come to the conclusion that he just loves racing scens, and car racing in general, and that scene was created as part of his particular style as a person and director, not some nefarious scheme to market toys and video games.

When the Death Star scene was shot for Star Wars - there was no such things as "video games". If I recall they started to pop up in arcades in the early 80's....the Star Wars one kicked ass if I remember right!

Who here is 30+ and remembers arcades? Lol, we used to pay to play video games and they lasted only a minute sometimes! lol

The advent of popular video games and Star Wars is almost contemporous.

Star Wars (1977), Space Invaders (1978).

'Consumer' Pong versions came much earlier (1971 Magnavox) but it wasn't the phenomenon that Space Invaders was.

Like I said, there were no such things as "video games" when the Death Star scene was shot in "Star Wars".

What's your point?

even willow and the indy films had "chase" scenes. in fact, even lucas knows this very fact himself and starts to make fun of himself, whether consicously or not, in his new episode 3 webdocs. he says that his job is only to say, "faster and more intense" and "action". =). you go Josh! =). i think you're one of the few star wars fans that changed my opinion of ep1&2.

If I can get just one person to change their mind about the prequels, then I'll consider that mission accomplished.





So . . . mission accomplished, then, I guess.


Yep. Think I'll just head on home now.

no,no,no, you need to "convert" the rest of the padawans into Jedi Knights =^).

Robert what are you on about? As an engineer and amateur filmmaker I have to add my 2 cents.

The first movies were black and white and had no sound. I'm sure when sound was first introduced there were traditionalists like you saying it would never fly. Then came colour and now 3D.

George Lucas is known for revolutionising the use of special FX in his films. I have to admit it is this which captivates me more in Star Wars then the actual story.

Having said that improved technology does not mean less emphasis on storytelling. It means an ever greater tool set available to the story teller to get his/her point across. 3D is in its infancy but I'm sure it will eventually become a mainstream technique with its own unique nuances which we will one day look back on and wonder how we ever did without them.

There will always be people who resist change. But I'm afraid if you look back at the past change is inevitable and has for the most part brought an improvement to all of our lives.

Best Regards,

Geoff

I have to agree, like it or not 3D will make it's ways into our theaters.
Of course most of us are still waiting for film to finish it's slow death that most people were claiming years ago.

3D will happen, but I think we've still got quite a while.

"George Lucas is known for revolutionising the use of special FX in his films"

I found it fitting that you said "his films" and not just 'films.'
Lucas has indeed become known for revolutionising the special FX in his own movies.....
in fact, that's all his been doing since 1977.

:)

And on the 40 year mark, he'll do it again.

What is it they say?
Art is never completed, only abandoned?
Well, you gotta hand it to George, at least he's not a quitter.

I agree, he's not abandoning he's art.

It's almost like he's the first top level "artist" in film to take advantage of the opportunity to re-invent your past works on a large scale over and over. I think it might be that time now...you create something and continually re-visit it until the day you die.

He's not playing with these films - he's actually overhauling them on all levels so they become brand new again. If you think about Stars Wars in 1977 - if it was left as is...no changes at all just a new print made, well it would be awesome. However, he's actually taking advantage of film's ability to scale up. The actual film he used is scalable..unlike digital cameras where what you shot is it. He can use his master films and bring out the highest resolution not even possible in 1977 - he can make all 6 of the Star Wars work together fairly (not perfect of course) closely.

It's just interesting to see the whole process go from a simple film release...to re-releases on VHS, to DVD, to another re-release to theaters, to another planned 3D theater re-release. Someday he's offer implanted brain chips of Stars Wars that makes you think you're in the universe 24/7! That's coming in 2015!

<<<-- Originally posted by Luis Caffesse : "George Lucas is known for revolutionising the use of special FX in his films"

I found it fitting that you said "his films" and not just 'films.'
Lucas has indeed become known for revolutionising the special FX in his own movies.....
in fact, that's all his been doing since 1977.

:)

And on the 40 year mark, he'll do it again. -->>>

Well, he has written some ten films since then, produced some 15 or 16, and a television show. Some better than others, and some having nothing to do with special effects at all. I don't know about you, but when I watch Tucker, or Radioland Murders, I don't automatically think 'effects film.'

Unless you meant that's all he's been doing since 1997. But then, he's also made three extremly large and complex films since that time as well.

I think Lucas is responsible for digital filmmaking (HD, at least) but he predicted it in 1996, before anyone picked up a DV camera to shoot a film. He also brought us Pixar and Edit Droid, which went to Avid. Jurassic Park's dinos brought us great CGI (first seen in Young Sherlock Holmes, The Abyss and T2).

Lucas may have messed things up with the two re-do's of the original trilogy (1997 and the DVDs) and Phantom, but he's definitely responsible for what I'm doing today with filmmaking. It was the Wired magazine interview with him in 1996 that he predicted digital filmmaking.

When i read that while working at a movie theatre as a projectionist and going to film school, it changed my thinking and made me realize filmmaking wasn't something for the elite few, but, for better or worse, it's for all of us. And I didn't have to be rich or know rich people to do it.

heath

Hey, I didn't know you were a projectionist? I did that for a couple months myself. You learn alot about an audience and about the last link on the filmmaker chain. It's crazy to know 100's people and millions of dollars worth of production are in your hands...splicing together 8 reels wherever you feel like it. We had arc lights, so the brightness of the film was controlled by how much you payed attention to the welding rods. I felt depressed for the filmmakers who's babies are in the hands of kids and drunken projectionist's all over the world! (this one guy was totally drunk everytime he projected, so when the bell rang to change reels he was always way off) We had a platter system in one theater and two huge old single reel projectors in the other. You had to run back and forth to deal with them both...nuts!

"Well, he has written some ten films since then, produced some 15 or 16, and a television show. Some better than others, and some having nothing to do with special effects at all. I don't know about you, but when I watch Tucker, or Radioland Murders, I don't automatically think 'effects film.'"

When you think of the latter, you think "story film"? "Character study?" Radioland Murders is nothing but effects film, having been designed principally as an in-house exercise in testing digital compositing methods.

As for Geoffrey's "What are you on about?", I'm on about cost-payoff tradeoff, both on the personal and economic levels:
- When's the last time you saw a 3D film? Did you enjoy holding your head perfectly upright? If The Aviator was in 3D, would you hold your head upright for 3 hours? Would you do it for every movie you went to go see? Does viewing movies in 3D appreciably add to your enjoyment of the film, such that you'd be willing to take on the extra burden of dealing with the shutter goggles? Every time? What percentage of young children (ostensibly the very audience that 3D would appeal to most) have the constitution to put up with them?
- Those shutter goggles are expensive. Audience members muck them up and break them and steal them and they require maintenance and repair and replacement. And 3D production and post-production is not inconsquentially more expensive. Both audience members and investors will be called upon to fork over more money, making the whole filmmaking business a riskier endeavor. How much do you pay to see a non-matinee showing? $7.50? $8? Is it worth $15 or $16 to you to see Constantine in 3D? If going to the movies cost double what it does now for every movie, would you see as many movies on a whim, without having received a favorable review from a friend or journalist or internet buzz? Each time you plunk down your ticket money, you're essentially making a wager, gambling on your satisfaction or disappointment with the artwork you're about to experience. Studios and investors make the same wager from the opposite end. 3D films up the ante on both sides of the table.

As I said in a previous post, it's good that filmmakers of the calibre that took the stage together this month are advancing the state of the art and pushing forward both their artistic visions and the technical capacities developed to realize them. Fine. But until we get rid of the shutter goggles, it's not a revolution, it's merely another round of ballyhoo, a throwback to the '50s, from which we can expect about equipollent success, both in terms of adoption uptake and profitability.

Go into a Vegas casino, and for every high-stakes table, you'll find 10 low-stakes ones.

The only thing I'm gambling on, in my arguments here, is that audiences won't accept 3D presentations in any more significant numbers now than they did in 1955.

I worked at three theatres, all 3 platter systems, so I could get the movies started and, if I didn't have to build or break down the films, I read comic books, like Iron Man (www.advancediron.org).

heath

3D will eventually be like "in color" movies. They'll drop the "3D" and just call them movies. It will take years, but it will happen eventually.

Robert, 3D filmmaking exists and has for many decades and today it's more popular than ever. It's very profitable for many companies already - Imax being the one the public is most familiar with today. Why are you still ranting? You are so negative about the future of 3D filmmaking, but no one has the facts on the future.

The present day -- I saw "Mysteries of the Nile" at the "OmniTheater" in Boston last night. It wasn't in 3D, but a huge dome screen. Then tonight, I just saw Ring 2 at Loews in standard 1:85. They were both interesting to watch visually - both were films made by filmmakers today.

1-2 years ago there was a huge movie in the theaters -- Spy Kids 3D. It's just another way to make films - I'm done arguing. Spy Kids 3D made alot of parents and kids happy, so there you go.....it's 3D filmmaking today and forever just like every other filmmaking tool available.

I started this thread...can I close it now? lol

<<<-- Originally posted by Robert Knecht Schmidt : When you think of the latter, you think "story film"? "Character study?" Radioland Murders is nothing but effects film, having been designed principally as an in-house exercise in testing digital compositing methods. -->>>

I think of screwball 30s comedy when I see it. It was not designed princiapally as an exerciese in testing digital compositing methods. As it turned out, it wasn't a very popular movie, and that was one of positive things that came out of it for them, but that wasn't the reason that Lucas made it, any more than he created Young Indy to test digital compositing techniques. And the fact is, the digital compositing in Radioland Murders is so good, and used so seldom and in such small ways, that it's invisible - so no, when watching it you don't think effects film because most of the time you don't know that you're watching an effect until someone tells you later.

Out of respect for Christopher's closing of the thread, I'll say nothing more of my own, but I'll let George Lucas respond to Joshua's latest. (Quoting here from the Sally Kline Interviews book. All remarks are from 1994.)

"We did a shot in the TV series [The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles] for $1,500 that would have cost a studio $30,000 if they were doing the same shot for a feature film. Radioland Murders, the movie we're working on right now, is an experiment for us in that we're applying the cost-saving technology we learned on the TV series to the big screen. I don't think we can get that same shot done for $1,500, but we may be able to get it for $10,000 or $12,000. But even going to $12,000 from $30,000 is a major leap. And this is just the first step. We're inventing new technology that I feel very confident will allow us to cut that cost in half again. Within the next couple of years, we'll be able to take what was a $30,000 shot and do it on the big screen in full resolution for $6,000 or $7,000."

"...the techniques that we pioneered in the TV series that we're now using in features are going to be one of the major differences about the way movies are made. And we are obviously moving that forward considerably to develop 3-D sets and build less and less and be able to fill in more extras of people and surroundings and that sort of thing. We'll do that all digitally... Shot-wise, there are around 100 effects shots in the picture, which doesn't seem like much. But when you consider something like Jurassic Park, for which ILM did all of the dinosaur-generated shots, there were less than that. So it's a fairly high rate of special effects for a movie."

as i've mentioned before (and people keep missing), 3D will work only for interactive mediums.

the other thing i've mentioned is that the future of 3D is that you won't need glasses. the technology has been developed already for both home and cinema. i saw it once but dunno where the link is anymore, but it is available.

Last night I attended Hamlet. Which, as you know, is a 3D experience. It was interesting feeling that I'm five feet away from a guard waving a partisan that could very well lop off my head. It was a small production so I was in the second row. I could well imagine that in more expensive productions I wouldn't be able to afford a front row ticket.

<<<-- Originally posted by Robert Knecht Schmidt : Out of respect for Christopher's closing of the thread, I'll say nothing more of my own, but I'll let George Lucas respond to Joshua's latest. (Quoting here from the Sally Kline Interviews book. All remarks are from 1994.)

"We did a shot in the TV series [The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles] for $1,500 that would have cost a studio $30,000 if they were doing the same shot for a feature film. Radioland Murders, the movie we're working on right now, is an experiment for us in that we're applying the cost-saving technology we learned on the TV series to the big screen. I don't think we can get that same shot done for $1,500, but we may be able to get it for $10,000 or $12,000. But even going to $12,000 from $30,000 is a major leap. And this is just the first step. We're inventing new technology that I feel very confident will allow us to cut that cost in half again. Within the next couple of years, we'll be able to take what was a $30,000 shot and do it on the big screen in full resolution for $6,000 or $7,000."

"...the techniques that we pioneered in the TV series that we're now using in features are going to be one of the major differences about the way movies are made. And we are obviously moving that forward considerably to develop 3-D sets and build less and less and be able to fill in more extras of people and surroundings and that sort of thing. We'll do that all digitally... Shot-wise, there are around 100 effects shots in the picture, which doesn't seem like much. But when you consider something like Jurassic Park, for which ILM did all of the dinosaur-generated shots, there were less than that. So it's a fairly high rate of special effects for a movie." -->>>

That doesn't make the movie merely an experiment in compositing and nothing else. No one makes a movie to test one particular filmmaking technique. It's too complex, to expensive, and too time consuming. The difference between Murders and Jurassic Park is that the Park's effects (and there were more effects shots than 100 in Park, they just weren't digital ones done by ILM, but there were plenty of effects shots in it) are pretty out in the open and a major part of the story and the film experience, and the Radioland Murder's effects are not.

He's not saying Radioland Muders is an experiment for them. He's saying Radioland Murders is an experiment for them in that they are trying some new production techniques. That's two different things. I might try some new lenses on the next short I make to see if I get a different look. Am I experimenting with a new technique on my new film? Yes. Am I making my film mainly in order to experiment with new lenses? No. Some people do it with shorts, I concede. No one does it with multi-million dollar feature films. Did they experiment with new production techniques on the set of Radioland Murders? Yes. Is that the same thing as making a movie specifically to experiment with new production techniques? No. You can't confuse how a film was made with the reasons why it was made.

I believe Joshua is correct.

Indiana Jones IV may be 3D feature!

http://www.dvdfile.com/news/viewpoints/editors_desk/2005/03_21.html

That may help off set the age thing with Ford...they need to have a little extra to draw in the crowds. He's not holding onto his youthful looks to well...he looks his age!

This article talks a little more dollars and cents than we have done here:

http://www.variety.com/index.asp?layout=showest2005&content=jump&jump=news&articleID=VR1117919744&cs=1

I don't at all relish the role of enthusiasm-curber, but on the other hand I'd be remiss if I didn't take a moment to address the somewhat overly optimistic claims propagated by exaggerated press releases and inexpert media accounts.

...company called In-Three located in Agoura Hills, California has perfected image-processing software it calls the Dimensionalization Process.

This statement and the no less exclamatory ones that follow aim to imply that some magical automated algorithm can now perfectly recover Z-depth data from 2D images for all cases with no additional cues (such as information about light source position and intensity). Were this actually true, the company would have on their hands the most significant computer vision achievement in the history of the field. Especially where the camera is static (rendering unhelpful photogrammetry techniques as are used in matchmoving), alas, there is no magic wand to the depth problem, though there are a number of tools available for achieving photometric stereo, especially where the assumption of smoothness (on faces, for example), meaning that there are no discontinuities in depth or in the partial derivative, or even piecewise smoothness, provide a strong constraint. But most of these tools, even in combination, only provide good results under very specific lighting conditions--for example, a single point source like a keylight. (In addition, makeup work in films, especially on actresses, is invariably designed to thwart dimensionalization, "flattening" out facial features by attenuating shadow. This is one of the classic examples in any graduate-level CV class. Two images are shown of the same woman, one a Max Factor dollface and the other a homely Eliza Doolittle, and the class--or a computer shape-from-shading program assigned as a project--is asked is to recover the Z-depth of the face. The difference is, of course, remarkable, but I digress.)

Were it simply a matter of setting a render farm to work on the prequel trilogy and allowing it to chug away for a few, the cost of "dimensionalizing" legacy footage would not amount to upwards of $5 million per feature film. Undoubtedly whatever "software" under development poses heavy reliance on a small army of human users (read: unpaid interns) to matte separate features, assign boundaries, and provide guesstimates on depth and specifics about other cues.

None of this is to downplay the tremendous feat on In-Three's part of successfully commercializing (and, their shareholders hope, capitalizing on) 30+ years worth of work by computer vision academia, nor the wonderful fruits that are sure to be passed down to the movie-going public, such as the forthcoming Howard the Duck 3D.

The details of In-Three's process will no doubt remain guarded for the next several years at least. The details of how In-Three Inc. was awarded and intends to defend a registered trademark on the dictionary word "Dimensionalization" are another matter entirely.

Those wishing to learn more are directed to the Forsyth and Ponce text Computer Vision and Horn's slightly older Robot Vision, particularly chapters 10 and 11. Ramakant Nevatia's books are also good primers but slightly outdated, and therefore, out-of-print and hard to find.

Last of all let me repeat my assertion that there is nothing that any such algorithms can do that is not already done by the human visual system when perceiving a 2D image, thus obviating the raison d'être for the Dimensionalization process.

The most advanced computer graphics system in the world is already built right inside your head, as you prove to yourself each time you dream and the complexity and verisimilitude of what you see convinces you that you are experiencing reality.

Hey Robert, I think the next reality show I'd like to see is you and Mullen together on a deserted island together.

Steve would win all the reward challenges, starving me into submission, but it would take a while: by the grace of Chris Hurd Probst, I have been granted immunity. However, this is sure to be revoked, as pedantry isn't the best way to achieve ratings in the coveted 12-18 demographic.

(Incidentally, Kuror survivor Caryn is an associate of my mom's. They room together at the national conference every year for their branch of law.)

hi folks,

looks like we're gonna run into some lawsuit problems before the 3D stuff is ratified:

http://www.boston.com/ae/movies/articles/2005/04/22/imax_plans_big_role_in_3_d_film_resurgence/

Neil Feldman, vice president of In-Three, said the company has patent-violation concerns of its own. He said Imax had approached In-Three, which did some 3-D conversion tests for Imax. He assumed a business relationship would result, but obviously Imax decided to go its "own direction," he said.

"But before doing so, they came in towards us... then backed off away from us... then came in waaay close towards us again..."

I have re-animated this once highly animated thread to return to a topic that has seen many prophecies come true, and a few not. It's been a half-decade since this thread was hot, but let's review:

- 3-D actually is catching on in American theaters. Audiences really are paying a premium to put on silly glasses and watch a darker picture for 2-3 hours.

- Indiana Jones 4 wasn't made in 3-D, nor have any of the Star Wars movies been three-deified. Various folks affiliated with Lucasfilm have hinted that at present the cost-benefit analysis doesn't work out in favor of the process, but that it may happen sometime in the distant future (presumably once the relevant patents have expired).

- 3D is coming to the home but home viewers will have to wear bulkier, heavier shutter glasses that will need to be recharged periodically.

- A large number of animated, action, and super-hero films have been mandated by their producers to be completed as 3-D films even though doing so was not contemplated at the beginning of the process (e.g., Up, Alice in Wonderland, Clash of the Titans). Probably thanks at least in part to the success of 3-D with box office receipts, one studio (Disney) has said they're exiting the conventional movie business entirely to focus only on the types of kiddie movies that 3-D caters to.

- And I haven't changed my mind about 3-D. It's fun for certain films, and it's nice to have the option of seeing movies in 3-D, particularly Pixar movies, which are always great no matter what number of dimensions they're in. But it's still a gimmick; it didn't make Avatar a good movie; it's not the future of Hollywood (though it does seem to be a bigger sidetrack than I was expecting 5 years ago); and, like Roger Ebert (http://www.newsweek.com/id/237110) writes, it is unlikely that "adult" films, or in other words the films typically considered Best Picture-worthy, will ever be produced in 3-D.

- But above all, I'm surprised and impressed by how much things have changed in five years, and I have to hand it to James Cameron. Avatar and other recent films seem to have gone a long way in priming the format as something available in every town, if not quite yet every multiplex. So, bravo, and now I must off to work up an appetite, as I will be eating some off my words from five years ago.

But it's still a gimmick;

Would you say sound is a gimmick? It seems like for a long time the film industry did just fine without it. And adding sound to a movie did not turn a bad movie into a good one. For that matter, the early sound was terrible: It was monophonic and did not cover the entire frequency of human hearing. Yet, we do not see many silent movies made anymore.

Would you say color is a gimmick? When it first came, it was terrible. It seemed unnecessary. The old school filmmakers (and photographers) thought it was taking something away. Even back in the sixties, a TV expert seriously told me not to watch color TV because it was going to hurt my ability to see colors in the real world.

Everything new that made us see and hear film and TV more like the way we see and hear the reality around us was considered a gimmick. And we cannot even think of film and TV without it these days.

The only reason that stereoscopy has not been widely accepted and even demanded yet is not because it is a gimmick but because of the need for those darn glasses.

Technological limitations are the only reason we do not have smell in the movies and do not change the temperature in the room for every scene and we do not feel the touch the actors feel. Technological limitations are preventing us from fully implementing 3D. But a gimmick it is not!

Adam and Robert,

I'd say 3D is both a great new tool (animation, some films) and a gimmick (Clash of the Titans, Piranha 3D, etc.). If filmmakers and studios can make more money, then they'll go for it.

About 2 years ago I wanted to make my next film (a superhero flick) as 3D. People kinda looked at me weird. Now, it's so overplayed that it's "another one?"

If done right, it's great. If it's done for the wrong reasons, it's a gimmick. And I'm all about making more money, just not at the expense of quality. Ie, Clash.

Heath

Adam, while I appreciate your points, your basic premise, that movies are bettered by perfecting the human sensory experience, and that only technological limitations prevent us from engaging more of the senses, is, no pun intended, nonsense.

Engaging our sense of smell is nauseating and nobody would watch crime procedurals or horror films if they had to endure smelling morgues and rotting bodies. Nobody would watch war films if it involved inhaling gunpowder and smoke for two hours. These are extreme examples, but scent-sory perception in the movies as nausea-inducing holds true even for osmic stimulants that are visually innocuous, like dogs and meadows and bubble baths. And this would be true even if the technology allowed the scents to be cleared as quickly as they could be introduced, rather than lingering and accumulating as with present technology.

Likewise, enaging our sense of touch is annoying and no one would tolerate watching movies that poked, pricked, rubbed or wetted them. Similarly, no one enjoys watching movies in the presence of perceptible electric fields. Are shaker table rides not gimmicks? Was Percepto! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tingler) not a gimmick?

Sound and color are not gimmicks because the brain cannot in general accurately recreate missing sound or color, though this is more true for sound than for color, and in particular for music which is particularly effective and setting mood and eliciting emotion. It is no coincidence that music was paired with film long before synch sound, and synch sound long before color.

But the brain is perfectly capable of recreating depth information from 2-D images and this only fails in rare cases of certain optical illusions and trick images. Many perceptual cues (not just perspective, as Roger Ebert writes) contribute to this ability of ours, and 3-D doesn't really inform our brains in ways that 2-D doesn't. The sound of an actor's vocalization--whether a calm steady voice, or a shout, or whimper, or a whisper--may inform our brains in ways that are critical to the performance, and sound effects are almost as informative as to events on-screen as visual images. Color can help us vitally discriminate information that our brains in many cases would not be able to distinguish, but I don't maintain it is as important as sound in this respect, and for the most part color is similar to 3-D inasmuch as it is merely used to add versimilitude. But, especially in 2010, color does not come with additional expense or any significant disadvantages, so why not use it?

If 3-D could be produced without the glasses and without significant added production expense, I would be cheering it on. There would be no reason not to use it, even if it wasn't especially informative.

I haven't yet seen or heard of a movie for which 3-D was important to understanding the story. That is not true of sound and color.

OK, I'll bite: Please explain how color is important to the understanding of the story? Especially when so many people watch movies on their horribly misconfigured TV sets! Would you not understand the story of most movies if you watched it on a black-and-white TV?

There are so many things that seemed like unnecessary gimmicks at first. We used to make movies (well, those before us did) without moving the camera, without using wide angle lenses, without closeups. Not so long ago, we did not change the view every 2-3 seconds (and in Asia and much of Europe they still do not).

Just take a look at the 1902 Le voyage dans la Lune to see how a great movie was produced without all the "gimmicks" we use today. So, none of them are really necessary. But they sure are useful and good. And so is 3D.

3D is not a gimmick. It is a way of presenting what we want to present. It certainly can be abused, especially in the hands of someone who does not know what he is doing. And it that case it is used in a gimmicky way, but that does not mean 3D itself is a gimmick.

I don't know if 3D is the future of the movie industry, but I sure hope not. I can't stand the format. I hate wearing the glasses. I hate how dim the picture is. Worse, the effect gives me a headache, and doesn't add one thing to the movie experience, it just takes away from it. I think those 3D televisions are just stupid. No way am I going to sit in my own house wearing those awful glasses. I can't believe anybody would.

Here's Roger Eberts view on 3d.

Roger Ebert: Why I Hate 3-D Movies - Newsweek.com (http://www.newsweek.com/id/237110/page/1)

Critic Mark Kermode has his view on the subject

BBC - Mark Kermode's film blog: How to Enjoy a 3D Movie (http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/markkermode/2010/01/how_to_enjoy_a_3d_movie.html)

To be honest Avatar looks more impressive with the 3d glasses off.

OK, I'll bite: Please explain how color is important to the understanding of the story?

??? I specifically said that for the most part color is not critical to understanding a story, but that it contributes to verisimilitude without drawback (no added cost, no special glasses, no headaches, no dimmer picture). Then I said "I haven't yet seen or heard of a movie for which 3-D was important to understanding the story. That is not true of sound and color." Perhaps you misunderstood this to mean that color is essential to the story of every film. Instead, it means only that there exists at least one example of such. The Wizard of Oz, Schindler's List and The Matrix come to mind as having stories that benefited from color, each for a different reason: one mood, one symbolism, one simple differentiation of a plot device. In The Wizard of Oz, color signals a whole different land, with different rules and worries. In Schindler's List, a color film shot entirely in black and white, color is employed to strikingly underline evil and its effect on a people as exemplified by one member of that people. In The Matrix, Neo's choice early in the film would carry less meaning if the blue pill and the red pill were indistinguishable from each other. I'm sure there are other examples, and better ones, but these are the ones that came to mind most quickly.

Very well, then, I misunderstood you. I need to add, though, that those few movies where color was essential to the story only appeared long after color was a standard.

Threediness is still very new. I am not talking about 3D as such here, since 3D movies have been coming and going since before color. I am talking about threediness, that special quality that exists only in 3D movies and that has not been used much (though it has been abused for all those gimmicks I also hate).

When 3D movies are made because the marketing guys think it is good, the results are usually disastrous. When 3D movies are made because the director feels the need to express his creativity through 3D and he actually knows what he is doing, the results are great.

For an example of a movie that used threediness nicely and creatively, take a look at the 2008 Journey to the Center of the Earth and watch the scene where Sean (played by Josh Hutcherson) is crossing over an abyss on floating magnetic rocks. That scene would never have the same impact in 2D. Too bad they released the DVD using green/magenta glasses, though.

And yes, I agree the glasses are a drawback. Indeed, I said they are the reason why 3D has not taken off. Robert Rodriguez has an interesting way of dealing with that. In The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl 3-D he shows the real world in 2D (and has a "glasses off" message when he switches to it) and the fantasy world in 3D (and has a "glasses on" message shortly before switching to it). You could not do that with every movie, but it worked for that one.