If you’ve been to the movie theater at all in the twenty-first century I’m sure you’ve either watched or seen a preview for the newest 3D film.
While 3D originated in the 1950s, the success of the 2009 box office record-breaker, “Avatar,” specially designed to wow the technology world, seems to have sparked a Hollywood obsession with 3D films.
Take “Alice in Wonderland” for example. The film was converted from 2D to 3D before its release on March 5th after director Tim Burton jumped on the bandwagon from seeing “Avatar’s” success.
“If you’re shooting a film in 2D and aren’t thinking of 3D space and someone later converts it to 3D that absolutely shows a profound misunderstanding of how movies work. It not only doesn’t add anything, it destroys the whole rationale behind the original representation of space in that film,” said Dr. Peter Lehman, director of the ASU Center for Film, Media and Popular Culture.
Three-dimensional films are a great way to grab attention of the younger crowd by making them feel as though the animation is practically alive; which is why it seems perfectly acceptable to release “How to Train Your Dragon” and “Shrek Forever After” in 3D.
But seeing movies like “Clash of the Titans” and “Jackass 3” while wearing plastic glasses (not to mention paying about $3 more per ticket) has shown just how ridiculous this has gotten.
Yet despite the increase of ticket prices for consumers, profit to the film industry is soaring.
According to Time Magazine, movie-maker James Cameron plans to rerelease “Titanic” in 2012 this time with 3D effects. Even George Lucas hopes to revamp and rerelease his “Star Wars” movies with 3D technology.
The obsession doesn’t stop at the cinemas either. Major technology companies see 3D effects catching on in the film industry and are making an effort to keep up with the trend in their products.
Panasonic is unveiling plasma 3D TVs this year targeted for home theater systems that will be compatible with encoded 3D Blu-ray discs, according to Computerworld.com.
“People don’t like to change media formats. One of the problems that Blu-rays had early on was that most people didn’t really understand difference from their regular DVDs. If you take that idea and apply it to 3D, is it that much better than what we already have? It’s cool and people like the idea of it, but will it end up being too much trouble for viewers, especially if they need to wear glasses or buy new equipment in their homes?” said Joseph Fortunato, professor of Theater and Film at ASU.
In addition to home theaters, Sony plans to add 3D technology to its PlayStation 3 games and a product from Nvidia called the “GeForce 3-D Vision Kit” will create a 3D effect on existing PC displays, and will work with about 400 PC games.
Looks like this is going to be the year that 3D goes overboard. You don’t need the plastic glasses to see how carried away this is getting.
Monique is using her PC without 3D effects. See how she likes it at monique.zatcoff@asu.edu
