At the National Association of Theatre Owners’ (NATO) annual CinemaCon confab last month in Las Vegas, leading filmmakers were bullish on the prospects for 3D, the most publicized prediction coming from Star Wars creator George Lucas who firmly believes 3D will eventually take over the movies akin to the way color replaced black and white.
Lucas made his remarks during a panel discussion which also included director James Cameron and DreamWorks Animation chieftain Jeffrey Katzenberg. The latter noted that DreamWorks Animation decided that all its movies–such as How to Train Your Dragon and the upcoming Kung Fu Panda 2–would be made in 3-D. He said that 3D’s reputation suffers when hasty conversions from 2D to 3D are made as an expedient way to up the ticket price, compromising the movie-going experience.
However well planned, top drawer conversions can produce desired results. Cameron is converting his Oscar-winning Titanic to 3D for release next year. Lucas is converting all six of his Star Wars films.
Fast times In a separate CinemaCon session, Cameron touted the virtues of high-speed filming for 3D, showing theater owners 3D footage he shot at 24 frames per second (the standard film rate), then 48 and 60fps. The latter two were superior, reducing a blurring effect that can crop up at 24fps, particularly when lensing 3D.
Cameron affirmed that Avatar 2 will be shot at 48 or 60fps. However that shoot won’t get underway for at least another year and a half, estimated Cameron who is still penning the script for the sequel to the movie which generated a record-setting $2.8 billion in theatrical revenue worldwide.
Another benefit of faster frame rates, noted Cameron, will be the elimination of eye strain for those 3D viewers normally prone to such visual fatigue. He added that the new digital projectors being installed in theaters can with a relatively minor software upgrade readily accommodate presentation of movies shot at higher speed rates.
Small screen perspective While 3D is gaining a higher profile in the feature world, what of the smaller screen marketplace?
Though the splash isn’t as big as what’s going on in the cinema arena, there’s some 3D movement in the home entertainment field which in turn could have a ripple effect on the advertising/marketing community. For example, 24/7 stereoscopic channels are reportedly coming this year, manufacturers are rolling out TV sets that figure to approach a more feasible price point, and the NAB confab, which is just wrapping up, could have some related breakthrough technology. And then there’s the prospect of 3D cinema advertising emerging to accompany the 3D fare that is becoming more prevalent in movie theaters.
Indeed experimentation is popping up in the postproduction community as reflected in the comments of Brian Bowman, creative director: design at Nice Shoes, New York. “I choose to look at stereography as a creative medium among many mediums,” he related. “We have screens that we can show anything on, big and small, with instantaneous digital delivery. Early testing of the Nintendo 3DS is indicating that a small hand-held screen is very capable of using stereo to experience gaming and passive content and with the benefit of no glasses. This is very exciting!
“To explore these possibilities further, we created our own films at Nice Shoes,” continued Bowman. “Original concepts and script, filmed and directed by us, and finished at our studio. We created two films and both were filmed in stereo with a beam splitter rig but one was finished in Flame and Nuke while the other was finished in After Effects. This was due to the skill sets of our respective teams, but what it revealed to us was two different pipelines. This allows us to scale for any creative while allowing for a range of budgets. Being able to put creative first, especially when it comes to stereo (still regarded as a technical medium), is artistically and financially rewarding for everyone. Making those films has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my career. We’re looking forward to sharing them with the world soon.”
Aron Baxter, creative director: VFX at Nice Shoes, added, “We are already helping to bring 3D commercials to life. One of the latest 3D spots we finished, that aired, was the BCS National Championship promo in conjunction with Sony and ESPN. The buzz over sports entertainment in 3D on TV is the most prevalent at the moment. Some of this content is staggering.”
Looking to provide our readership with a better sense of what is going on in 3D and what the future may have in store, SHOOT posed the following multi-pronged question to a cross-section of the visual effects/post community:
While 3D stereoscopic production is hardly the norm in the advertising/marketing content arena, do you see the need to prep for this possibility and if so what are you doing in terms of educating yourselves and your clients, other courses of action, etc.? If you are already working in this area, please give us an example of a recent advertising-related project (if you have not been involved in a recent advertising project, tell us about an entertainment-related project) and share your thoughts on the future of 3D for advertising/marketing content.
Here’s a sampling of the industry feedback we received:
 Jeff Blodgett, executive producer, Brickyard VFX, Santa Monica, Calif. Brickyard has invested in a few 3D television models, one with active shutter glasses and another with polarized passive glasses, each with unique viewing experiences that need to be accounted for as the convergence settings are figured. Although we’ve finished a few stereoscopic pieces recently, the opportunities from our clients have been minimal. That said, we have showcased the work and our research in stereo finishing to small groups to educate them on the technology.Brickyard has completed a few stereoscopic projects in the last year. Beyond having honed our skills on recognizing stereo issues, correcting them, and integrating traditional visual effects, we’ve learned how to budget our time and manpower appropriately for what can be a very time-intensive process. We’ve also found it important to read and watch everything we can about this newly popularized medium. There are many schools of thought and choosing the technologies and methodologies that are proper for your end product is crucial. |
 Dan Glass, senior creative director/VFX supervisor, Method Studios, Los Angeles Based on our stereoscopic experience in the feature world, we have provided consult for some commercial projects and created a stereo version of our award-winning Halo spot to illustrate the challenges and techniques. Many of the considerations are the same, although in some ways stereoscopic work for commercials can be even more challenging because of the different display technologies and screen sizes that a spot might be seen on.As with feature film work, planning is critical and one of the first questions to address is whether you want to shoot in native stereo with a two-camera rig or shoot “flat” and convert it later. Native stereo tends to result in better-looking material but the rigs can be quite unwieldy and expensive, and there will be a significant impact on shooting time because of the calibration required to do it properly. Conversion works best if the scene combines a significant amount of CG material and the elements in the frame lend themselves to being “carved out” and isolated onto separate planes. It can be very problematic in scenes containing a lot of atmospheric effects, motion blur or semi-transparent material. It is very difficult to convert that type of imagery after the fact and you may need to create additional elements as a CG effect in post to make the dimensionalization work. Recently, we’ve been seeing a hybrid approach become more popular. It’s more expensive to shoot but it can spare a production a lot of potentially difficult issues in post by using the best technique for each shot. |
Because education is essential, 3DFilmland and Zoic Studios conducted a 3D seminar in agencies across the country to standing room only audiences. Those in attendance were from the creative, production, account-services and media departments. We discuss considerations when creating a concept, producing, editing, and visual effects in 3D. We also review strict network standards and legal disclaimers featured on 3dFilmland.com. For greater efficiency, we suggest the idea of creating a concept specifically for 3D, then adding or adjusting a few scenes for a 2D option. The need to bid experienced 3D directors and editors is essential. Directors or editors with no experience place your project in cost and content jeopardy. 3D dedicated networks want the audience viewing experience to be pleasant. If a commercial causes eyestrain or headache, it will not air and you will either re-shoot or re-edit. Currently in 3D production are theatrical, broadcast, and motion graphics for a gaming company, and editorial work for 3D dedicated networks. We see boards from auto, package goods, and 3D television manufacturers and have been contacted for television and theatrical content. |
While working on the U23D concert film, we learned very early on that in order for a piece of 3D work to be amazing, it has to be amazing 2D work first. There’s a limit to what the human eye can process before being over-stimulated, so the key has been, and will continue to be, leveraging the new technology in such a way that the addition of the third dimension is an enhancement rather than an intrusion. Ideally, when 3D technology is used to its best effect, the viewer is no longer conscious that he or she is watching 3D. The second the viewer stops thinking about the content and is focused on the technology, the artist has failed both the material and the audience. That being said, the arrival of 3D as a comfortable viewing medium is as significant an advance as color or sync sound. It’s not going anywhere, and as artists, learning how to evolve with it is going to separate the novel from the amazing. At Spontaneous we’re currently working on a 3D documentary, leveraging what we learned from U23D with a desire to see how far we can push layering and composition in a way that expands the language of how people can experience a film. |
Some of our clientele have shot with traditional methods only to discover they are being asked to repackage and deliver in stereoscopic. We’ve been doing a great deal of research with manipulating traditional 2D print film into a realistic 3D world using proprietary techniques. In doing so, it has become completely obvious that certain angles or lighting techniques will hinder the final result, forcing us to go back to the film–if possible–and re-transfer 4:4:4 flat to maximize the acquisition of color and light information. Over the next 12 months, I expect to see a strong push in this market as consumers become acclimated to this format and retailers become more forgiving with the price tag. |
In the early days of HD when it was gaining some momentum, our clients were slow to embrace that new technology. Optimus jumped right in though and made some substantial investments that quickly became obsolete. This time around we are going into the 3DStereo production more cautiously. Any new equipment we purchase today, we make sure to understand what its 3DStereo capabilities are but we don’t base our decisions solely on those answers. Recently we upgraded our finishing and graphics departments. The equipment we installed, Smokes, Flames and shared storage, all have the tools and bandwidth to work in 3DStereo. As the rooms were updated, they too were designed to handle the requirements of 3DStereo monitoring. With our in-house production company, ONE at Optimus, we are starting to develop and shoot some 3DStereo tests. We will use the tests to educate our production staff as well as develop a 3DStereo workflow on the post side. Like anything new, we will make mistakes, at least on our own work, and learn from those mistakes. When our clients are ready, we will be too. |
Making sure that clients know how to shoot for this format correctly is also a priority, so it’s important for Nice Shoes to be involved in the production process. A job can easily go wrong if it’s not shot correctly. That’s why we did those spec pieces, to train ourselves in the 3D production process in order to be better consultants for shooting in 3D. What cameras to use, what rigs to use, how the piece is shot is integral to how it comes out. There is a growing number of 3D channels, but as more devices like the Nintendo 3DS are released, it will open things up more for content. Similar to HD, as more content is available, clients will want their work to be in 3D. If the consumer is watching a 3D basketball game, it cuts to commercial and the commercial is in 2D, they’ll question why its not like the rest of the commercials and programming. |
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We continued on to collaborate with Sony in the world’s most prolific broadcast event in the form of the Shakira S3D smash hit “Waka Waka,” the official song and video of the 2010 world cup soccer competition, then Avril Lavigne’s S3D hit “What The Hell.” We have also spent time working with other countries to help establish a better international pipeline for 2D to 3D conversion. Recently we contributed to the launch of 3Net–Sony, Discovery and Imax’s joint S3D Network that first aired February of 2011. We continue to create promos and several on air graphic elements that have helped 3Net become the first fully programmed 24 hour S3D channel in the USA. S3D is definitely the next big thing in TV. It will spur the arrival of many new channels and we also believe it will revolutionize the gaming industry more than any other technical development before it. Many post houses are still on the fence with S3D. Some believe it still to be a fad and will not adopt the new technology until it has proven itself industry wide. Others, like ourselves, recognize the potential of riding the crest of the wave and will continue to embrace changing technologies and strive to remain at the tip of the sword. |
We finished a Bud Light campaign for DDB Chicago, which gave us our first major foray into stereo finishing. Part of preparing for the inevitable adoption of this technology on a wider scale is equipment. Our workflow at The Mission is already stereo-friendly with software like Flame and Maya, monitors, and an hdcam srw 5800 deck with a dual stream card that allows layback for left and right eye. You may quickly realize that effects and compositing tasks, which are de rigueur in 2D deliveries, can become complex in stereoland, where shutter sync, flares, and color can be quite different in each “eye”. Until these disparities are resolved, watching stereo sequences can give you a “bad 3D” hangover. We learned on the fly and under the gun of our deadline. Heavy research into the new tools packaged with these softwares is a must, and I confess my nose was buried in the manuals leading up to the job. Stimulating interest and selling our clients’ product is the goal, whether it is achieved through beauty, shock, humor or otherwise. It’s not so much that everything looks better in stereo (many times it’s ultimately distracting), but when the stereo technique becomes part of the story, the metaphor, the design, it uniquely engages the viewer and delivers the message in a more immersive visual manner: that’s the real power of this sensory experience. |
Jane Jacobsen,co-founder/managing director, 
John Leamy, creative director, 
Mark Leiss, owner, 
Knox McCormac, director of operations, 
Chris Ryan, colorist/partner, 
Westley Sarokin, joint head of 2D, 
Jerry Steele, creative/technical director, 
Rob Trent, creative director, 