“3D films require us to focus at one distance and converge at another.”

Have you watched anything Vince Pace has been involved in? Avatar? Heck, even the Hannah Montana 3D concert movie?

It doesn’t have that problem.

With the Vince Pace method, 90% of the time you converge what the camera is focused on at screen plane.

So your eye IS focused at the cinema screen -which is where you’re converging. This also solves a lot of 3D editing problems - you’re never cutting from one convergence to another.

Sure - there is cool 3D stuff happening in elsewhere in the screen, but it is a peripheral effect.

Bam! Back at you, Mr Murch

Bruce Allen
(who art directed the 3D titles in the aforementioned Hannah Montana movie - and had the great pleasure of working with Vince Pace)

Posted by Bruce Allen  on  01/24  at  05:54 PM

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That’s probably why I liked the light-sprite scene in Avatar so much (compared to a lot of other 3D I’ve seen): the 3D wasn’t the “focus”; it was a nice atmospheric around the primary action at the normal focal plane.

Posted by Chris Meyer  on  01/24  at  06:09 PM

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IMHO, the 3D tool in the right hands as was done with great artistry in Avatar in the RIGHT type of story such as fantasies and certain sci-fi does work. But the majority of stories don’t call for this artistic tool.

I mean really - who wants to be looking down the 3D barrel of Clint’s 44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world? 3D takes you out of he story here. But with the marvelous use in Avatar, it emebedded you very deeply into the story and gave a unique experience.

I just think 3D is a limited use effect that will get a bad wrap for overuse and then re-labled as a cheap and tawdry gimmick. I hope it doesn’t get ruined for it’s use in the right stories.

And the race for 3D TV ... so far a bust - glasses and headaches - not there yet and may run out of economic steam before it does. And maybe that would a be an economic boon to theater operators - an Avatar or Alice in Wonderland experience that can only be had at the theater?

(all personal opinion)

Posted by lightprismtv  on  01/25  at  08:53 AM

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I think color also draws away from the aesthetic beauty of black and white film.

3d is not my cup of tea, but I can see that there is definitely a receptive market now for some stories that involve 3d. Will it become the way everything is produced? I highly doubt it.

The more technology that is fed into this system, the more the counter anti-technolgy movement grows. Super 8 and film stocks are here to stay. The truth is now we have a ton of different mediums to produce moving images in, and that is exciting.

Posted by georgemanzanilla  on  01/27  at  11:03 AM

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@Bruce Allen. I’m pretty sure both Murch and Ebert have seen Avatar, in fact there was a lot of discussion around the cause of headaches and nausea of that film’s release (My wife complained of headaches after seeing it). Anyway what you’re saying is that any good 3d film should basically put key action at the screen plane and nowhere else). If that;s the case, what then is the point of 3D? it seems that to use it properly you’ll have to forego the elegant use of depth and space is a key element of some of the greatest and or most beloved films ever made.

But it does seem we’re talking about film grammar being driven by the technology, the problem then becomes when it’s the default, that all movies have to be shot in 3d of for 3d, just as all movies pretty much have to be widescreen and colour, it limits the vocabulary of filmmakers rather than extending it.

Posted by Dylan Pank  on  01/29  at  03:00 PM

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I wish I could have posted some links to images as examples but I’m not authorized to do that :-(

Posted by Dylan Pank  on  01/29  at  03:02 PM

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@Dylan - my response to your points:

1. I’m sure Murch saw Avatar BUT I’m don’t think he noticed that most of it was converged at screen plane - or else he wouldn’t have complained about folks’ eyes having to spend all of their time converged somewhere else. He just read that somewhere (or noticed it with other 3D movies) and blindly applied it to *all* 3D movies.

2. 3D should mostly put key action at screen plane - just as 2D should mostly put key action in focus. That does not mean the 3D stuff going around it has no point. By your logic, you are saying there’s no point to defocused background or foreground elements in a 2D movie. It’s about putting you into the world.

3. RE: limiting film vocabulary… there’s nothing stopping you from having a 2D shot inside a 3D movie. Or if you want to do a quickly-cut sequence, just dial down the amount of 3D by moving your cameras closer to each other. Again, look at Avatar - they did exactly that.

Cheers!

Bruce Allen

Posted by Bruce Allen  on  01/29  at  07:53 PM

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Well this is just wrong on so many levels. Your eyes DON’T need to convergence on the screen plane. That is the whole IDEA of 3d. That you focus on where the object is, not to the screen. 3d works on small monitors and big screens.

It’s basically fooling your brain but it doesn’t cause problems.

Now the REAL problem is the framerate. 24 is just way too little when you try to focus on fast-moving 3d-objects in a scene. They jitter and jerk. Very apparent in Avatars fast paced action scenes when you try to focus on a single object close to your eyes. In 2d it isn’t that much of a problem but 3d exacerbates the problem because you are actively trying to focus onto a moving target that is jerking.

48 fps would get rid of this problem and a lot of the headaches.

Nothing to do with convergence/screen plane distance.

Posted by hmcindie  on  02/01  at  02:52 AM

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