The Digital Eye: Stereoscopic 3-D and the Future of Visual Storytelling

In VFXWorld's final "The Digital Eye" column, Autodesk's Sebastian Sylwan discusses how stereo 3-D can flourish if it becomes part of the toolset and not just a gimmick.

By now, every reader of this column must have heard about the resurgence of cinema. Many industry players are putting their weight behind it, touting it as the biggest revolution in cinema since the invention of sound or color.

DreamWorks Animation's Jeffrey Katzenberg has been one of the most vocal advocates, calling 3-D "the next great frontier for filmmakers." I believe 3-D movies will flourish if stereoscopy moves beyond a gimmicky effect and gets used as an integral part of the storytelling toolset, developing its own grammar, and helping tell more compelling stories that could not otherwise be told.

Reasons Behind the Push
Studios have been the strongest backers of this resurgence, slating more than 30 stereo releases in the next 18 months. Considering that there have only been around 20 stereo releases in the previous four years, this makes a significant statement; and despite the fact that those 30 films only represent about 5% of the total number of movies produced, the films coming out in 3-D are primarily tentpole and larger releases, further reinforcing the studio commitment to the medium. Although some might suggest that this is just a move to bring audiences back to theaters, I tend to think that the reality is much more complex.

One argument that has been cited is that 3-D movies are more difficult to pirate. This has merit, but only for the casual pirate since, with enough motivation and resources it is not much more difficult to pirate a 3-D movie than a 2-D one, and as home 3-D devices get more common (the NVIDIA glasses are a perfect example), the argument that there may not be a way to display pirated 3-D content will eventually fade away.

Another reason for the studios to drive 3-D projects could perhaps be to push the adoption of digital cinema projectors, which will, in turn, introduce much more flexibility into distribution and reduce costs for all films.

All these initiatives try to solve the dilemma between not having enough content to justify a somewhat-costly installation of 3-D projection systems by the theater owners and not having enough screens to make it worthwhile to produce the content.

3-D films represent an added value to exhibitors that might entice a larger number of them to install digital projectors even in today's difficult economic climate. This is probably the main reason why, even as the current downturn and associated credit crunch has slowed down the rate of deployment, studios have reacted by boldly stating that they're in this for the long run, and that the lower adoption rate doesn't matter much since their push for stereoscopy is part of a long-term strategy.

This cannot be the sole reason, however, since nowadays more than half of the studio revenues come from home theater and syndication rights; consequently, in my opinion, there isn't a viable business model for media creation that can stand exclusively on either theatrical or home entertainment releases alone.

While all of these reasons have helped the rise in stereo filmmaking, I think the strongest motivation within the industry is in striving to make better and more interesting movies. This is after all part of the competitive differentiator for studios, and the biggest factor that makes a good year vs. a bad one. It's all about achieving greater suspension of disbelief.

There are skeptics who say that 3-D is just another fad, and of course that is always a possibility, but I believe this will not be the case, provided good movies get made, making good use of stereoscopy as a storytelling tool.

3-D: A Historical Perspective and Overview
The use of 3-D as an entertainment medium is far from new, and has been evolving since the late 1890s. It has come in and out of popularity, first in the 1920s, and then in the 1950s and 1970s with varying degrees of success.

The basic concepts of stereoscopic 3-D projection are very simple. Any technology wishing to display depth needs to provide a different image to each eye; however, these two images need to be very similar to each other, differing only because of parallax effects. (More background information can be found at Autodesk's website.)

Any difference not due to horizontal parallax in the two images, whether in projected light intensity, alignment, synchronization or any image defects, will cause strain to the viewer's eyes and must be avoided.

The advent of single projector in digital stereoscopic exhibition has solved many of the difficulties with previous stereoscopic projection technologies that gave 3-D movies a bad reputation. The introduction of DLP projectors allowing fast frame rates has enabled many separation technologies based on a single projector to emerge. These newer technologies intrinsically solve any time synchronization problems and most light intensity, alignment, lens distortion and operational problems that would have been common with the older technologies.

All of these issues contributed to the eye strain viewers perceived and were central to the challenge of making stereo 3-D films more popular. I am personally very sensitive to poorly-executed 3-D, but am still optimistic for the potential of good 3-D. While I think that past projection technologies exacerbated the problems experienced by viewers, I do not believe that technology is the full answer.

There is no doubt in my mind that the stereoscopic technologies of 2009 are infinitely better than those of any past iteration, but this on its own doesn't make for better movies. I am also convinced that the stereoscopic effect can be a very powerful storytelling tool in the filmmaker's arsenal. There are, however, a number of obstacles that need to be overcome before stereoscopic 3-D movies can meet their full potential. In my opinion, some of these obstacles are technological, some are procedural and some are semantic.







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