The latest wave of 3D technology seems destined to fail, unless the industry changes the way it presents 3D content.
3D technology is nothing new—and honestly, neither is this sort of column. What is new, however, is my recent shopping experience at a big box electronics store. The retailer had a Samsung 3D monitor on display with two pairs of those flapper glasses, comprised of LCDs that turn on an off with the pulses of the monitor, so one eye sees an image, then the other gets opened to see the image meant for its side.
This happens rapidly enough to fool the brain into forming a 3D image. I don't want to get into the health effects, but the technology seems to have a negative impact on kids' optic nerves. But this doesn't seem to be a problem for the marketing people. There's a "who cares?" attitude about the whole thing. But let's get back to the store.
Here was the world's latest and greatest technology, and not a single person wanted to try it out. Nobody, not kids, adults, teens—they all took a glance and kept walking. So I put on the glasses and watched a demo. It was probably as good as it gets, but it was still boring. Who cares? Everyone is playing 3D as nothing more than enhanced 2D. The cool 3D gimmicks aren't being exploited. 3D had a similar fate in the past. After a while, it became too cumbersome and boring. It wasn't worth the price.
The problem begins with hit movies released in 3D. First of all, they're not in real 3D, because the viewer is not allowed to focus on what he or she wants to. Scene after scene is shot with a narrow depth of field—everything is out of focus except for one thing in front. This is classic 2D cinematography trick designed to add the illusion of 3D. The technique doesn't belong in 3D technology. The viewer should be able to choose what to focus on.
The reason for this choice is financial. The new 3D technology is designed to be backward compatible, so it can be shown in 2D without seeming weird. This backward compatibility will kill the technology. I say this because I am actually a fan of real 3D films.
In the late 1950s, when filmmakers were starting to get serious about 3D, a monster would come flying out into the audience, or a spear would poke at you constantly. The technology was taken to an extreme with the various 3D productions shown at Disneyland and Disney World, beginning with Captain EO. When you watched these films, you could tell they were shot from afar, so objects could hover a foot or two in front of your eyes, clear and sharp.
The frame rate and resolution were both high. Serious thought was put into these productions. I was expecting that sort of thing with Avatar and Alice in Wonderland, but got nothing close to it. I recommend going to any 3D movie shown at either of the Disney parks to see what can be done with this technology.
When Hollywood makes the same movie backward compatible with 2D, it takes the fun out of the equation. If it continues to do so, 3D will fade away as another expensive gimmick. I do have a solution, however. Edit two movies, instead of worrying about backward compatibility.Avatar brought in over $1 billion. I'm sure the studio could have afforded double editing.
With 3D computer monitors, the process changes. When most people are within two to three feet of the monitor, there is no benefit to having the image jump off the screen. It's already too close. The opposite effect might be useful—looking into an abyss. I suppose that, if I looked at my monitor and saw a bottomless pit, I might be impressed. But the dimensions and distances to the actual screen preclude the effect from actually working. You do get a lame 3D image off the computer screen, but there is never a sense, for example, of actually looking out of an auto into the distance. There is never a sense of genuine expanse on the other side of the screen.
I don't see anyone talking about this. There is nothing compelling about this generation of 3D. It continues to have an artificiality that can't be ignored. It's kind of like a Broadway play. It's in real 3D, because it's the real world, not a screen. When they do an "outdoor" scene, you never get the sense that the set is really the outdoors, no matter what trickery is employed.
Thus no one at the store was very interested in even looking at the 3D demo. It seems that this is just another false start for 3D.