3D Entertainment Industry Digital Revolution

3D Cashing In

By Brian Zink

HOLLYWOOD,CA(HollywoodToday)7/28/2010—Held on the Paramount Studios Lot in Hollywood Ca., 2010 and consisted of major players as panelists in the forefront of the 3D revolution.
KEY Note Speaker: Peter Anderson, ASC is a leading name in 3-D when it comes to the entertainment industry. He set the tone and agenda in covering the workflow and related subjects on 3D. His some 40 years experience gave the audience an in depth overview of 3D. An interesting beginning point on the history of 3D that Peter mentioned early on was that 3D …goes back 150 years. This is quiet a history lesson as not many of any technologies today go back that far.  3D became to known as the Stereoscope and was invented by Sir Charles Whetstones in 1833. Those were hand drawings that later became photo’s and that’s how an industry was born. In fact the first 3D Society was founded in 1893 The Stereoscopic Society in England and still going…  Peter then shared some of his experiences in some of the special venue, large format, theme parks and digital production, as well as a number of feature 3D films among the more than 40 of his feature films. Another technical points of Peter’s presentation how very specific 3D production is. The old idea of just re-purposing a finished film for different markets no longer holds true. One 3D market won’t work for another and will not work when delivered to another market.
The challenge here is to know your target audience. That audience is relative to the size of the screen your audience will be watching. For the most part production of 3D content is tied to the distribution and what that venue is. Each step of the 3D production has to be a very will thought out …scene-by-scene and the layouts. Some of the things you need to think about are Depth axis I/O; image relation to each scene; Vanishing points focal lengths; Focal differentiation and Focal convergence tied so consecutive scenes match.
3D Production Panel: Consisted of the Moderator Garrett Smith currently is the Vice President of Production Technology for Paramount Pictures; Paul Taylor, Supervising Stereographic EMMY award winner 3D includes an IMAX film; Howard Postley is currently the Chief Operating Officer and Chief Technology Officer of 3 Rality Digital Systems Systems; Pierre de Lespinois’ Co-owner of Evergreen Films, an action-adventure filmmaker and produced dozens 3D Television content; Jason Goodman, CEO of 21st Century 3D; Max Penner co-founded Paradise FX Corp with a new 3D Box Office Hit “Street Dancing”; Geoff Boyle, Director of Photography and has made a number 3D films with varying budgets.
Pierre de Lespinois’ of Ever Green brought an excellent perspective on 3D Television  production.  Ever Green has a track record in producing and packaging 3D music concerts. They are quickly spreading out into other venues with budgets that reflect cost efficient 3D production. These strengths have lead them to an amazing schedule of work and future 3D TV production. Pierre has a number TV ventures in the works presently for this year. Howard Portly of reality feels that every scene needs to me mathematically calculated to get the precise photographic effect that you want. He stated, “3D math is hard” !  Jason Goodman, of 21st Century 3D had another take on the “3D math is hard” statement in that with their ability to rehearse and blocked each scene they were are able to get the same results.
Groff Goodman was more in agreement with Howard Postley on the math set-up’s question. They did the math and found that after many tests that they had viewed the   Max Penner on the “3D math is hard” question found when they did the math after many tests they had were able to view the set-ups and rehearsals to the point where they could average the shoot day to approximately the same as 2D shoots. All the presenters agreed that different 3D scripting called for different rigging. Anyone shooting
Over 100 meters would be using _Parallel Rigs and much of the shooting under 70 meters with the Beam Splitter.
3D Post Production Panel: Consisted of the Moderator Kurt Schwenk VP Post Production Services, Paramount Studios.
Geoff Burdick, Light storm; John Nicolard, Head of Digital Production, FotoKem Digital Film Services; David Kenneth, I.E. Effects; Mark Smirnoff, President, Studio Services, Modern Video Film Inc; Mark 22 years both in the feature film as well as television and most recently 3D content preparation for James Cameron’s, Avatar
Nick Mitchell, Director Digital Cinema Mastering, Technicolor; Barry B. Sandrew, PhD Legend 3D – Alice in Wonderland.  Our Post 3D group here consistently reminded the audience that shooting in 3D is no problem unless the original production does not adhere to parameters for good technique.
A good leadoff question was the differences in production for 2D-vs-3D in pre-production through post. They all agreed what makes a good 2D picture will do the same for 3D.  John Smirnoff stated that a good 3D Depth Script is a must and would be the key factor to a good product. Depth grading allows the depth to be controlled so that the focal element in one shot can be repositioned to match the depth of the focal element in the next shot. Depth scripting makes what could be a jarring experience into an enjoyable one. Shooting any content must be done for the proper venue and is all-important as well ! 3D content shot for a 40 foot screen and then the same content projected on a 60ft screen you will see distant objects become divergent and can cause nausea inducing artifacts resulting in bad 3D. Your script becomes an important for over-all budget control; Object repositioning and shaping; Control of inter-shot depth and continuity. The panelists all agreed that it is always best to go over your Shooting script with the post facility you have chosen prior to actual production. Another important Post-production subject is that of Subtitling. A must here again is that the Subtitles have a proper proportion and position for the picture. Placing it in the Z-Axis with drop shadows and border can create problems. Nick Mitchell says burning in the sub-titles along with rendering helps. Location becomes very important when using dynamic movement and doing tests will make it easier on your final mastering.
All in all Cine Gears 3D event was an excellent experience for all of the attendees as they not only received an inside view of the production work flow but the many check points to stop problems 3D can create. The move to 3D is not just for those re-tooling via upgrading through re-education from what was 2D but a change that promises to be an exciting future for all the entertainment venues.  When the conference panelists were asked what was the number one thing that created the quick move to 3D they all agreed the number one thing making this transition is the Digital Revolution. We now just have to use it in a proper way and not cut corners or the audience will make a quick end to the 3D Digital Revolution.