I think a major problem with 3D right now is that you don't really know what you're paying for. Are you getting a movie where some real effort was put into the 3D, or are you getting a half-assed version? The (increased) price is the same.
This is a great point. Theaters are pushing 3D because it means more money for them. Apparently Avatar was amazing in 3D, and theaters used that fact to make a lot of money off of underwhelming 3D experiences.
I saw Tron in 3D and suffered very mild side effects -- facial tension and a headache that went away after a few glasses of wine. The 3D effects weren't enough to make even those mild side effects worth it. I'm not even sure the 3D effects were a net plus for the experience without considering the side effects. Add a 40% premium on the ticket price, and it was a great deal for the theater and a lousy deal for me.
Until the technology changes fundamentally, I'm starting to think 3D movies are like heroin: we'll see a periodic resurgence and decline as the lessons fade away with one generation and are relearned by the next.
I have yet to go to a 3D movie where I felt 3D really added to the experience. Avatar came close, and there were times when it was really cool, but there were also times when I turned my head or something didn't line up right and 3D took me out of the movie. Maybe a part of that is that right now the tech is immature, but I know that every time I've paid for 3D it's felt like a ripoff.
Ebert's point on focus really hits home for me. When you are watching a movie in 3D it feels like I should be able to focus my eyes anywhere I like, instead of accepting the focus the director has chosen in traditional movies. When I want to look at something in the background in a 3D movie, I expect to be able to focus on it. So either all 3D movies need to be filmed with really high depth of field, or 3D will always feel broken.
But the US market is also filled with 3D crap. In the theaters as well. Pretty much everyone I know opts for the non-3D one when available. I guess they just want to justify gouging us for the extra $5 by forcing 3D on us.
Yeah 3D is a bit different than the strict resolution increase because it isn't just an upgrade to the cameras it changes how things are filmed and framed (look at every 3d movie it always has the obvious "ooooh it's coming out of the screen" shot you can pick out even in 2D).
Paying $5-10 extra per person for 3D is overrated, especially for movies that aren't shot explicitly for 3D. Animated films like Toy Story and Despicable Me are ideal, and possibly worth an extra few dollars. Alice in Wonderland was not.
The novelty has worn off - it's a premium experience for some films, and a detractor for others.
I suspect that the studios want 3D to be no more than a blockbuster gimmick. Right now 3D can't be pirated, which probably sounds like a good thing to every studio head in the world. It's an experience that 60" tv's and home surround can't emulate. It's a reason to go to the theatre, and they probably want to hold on to that as long as they can.
I watch movies in 2D exclusively, including the big Marvel features. I have watched my fair share of 3D movies, but never noticed it except when the crew went out of their way to include a scene where a sword blade comes very close to the camera for a split-second. I'm not paying extra charge for this. Plus, with 3D, if you're not in the center of the room, you will have weird distortions because the separate images do not match the perspective from your location.
Some 3D theaters are great, the IMAX ones tend to be the best because the projection equipment is top-notch, but others are really awful. The picture's dim.
Some 3D movies are great, like Avatar that actually shot things using 3D cameras. In other movies, like Captain America, they add the 3D in post and it looks like garbage. I appreciate a 3D movie done well, but too many are half-assed.
The real problem for me is if I can't see it in IMAX I'd rather see a film in not-3D but because the theaters have a hefty 3D surcharge, they're not interested in running the 2D version. I'm paying a ridiculous tax for something I don't even want, and I have no options other than going way out of my way to avoid it.
Maybe you like everything in 3D. That's fine. There are a lot of people that don't care for it and yet are forced into paying for it for lack of options.
It seems that at any given time about 1/3 of my local theater's screens are 3D. Also non-3D movies have broken the $10 mark, which I think is a fairly important psychological barrier.
This was pushed more by the theatres (extra fees on the ticket price) then pulled by the customers who wanted it. I personally really dislike the 3D experience and always seek out 2D showings - and fortunately that's easier and easier to do. The 3D sequences were often randomly tacked on and not critical to the story, and the rest of the time you had to watch the movie through tinted shades. No thanks.
The worst thing about 3d is that most 3d movies aren't even shot in 3d. It's all "fake" and done in post. So it adds even less in that case than a movie that's actually shot with 3d in mind.
It's more of a hint of how much money 3D makes the theater. As far as I can tell, most of my friends are pretty neutral on 3D. I don't like 3D, but I'll go to a 3D movie with my friends, especially if the only time we can find that works is a 3D showing.
I personally think 3D sucks because it is a gimmick that affects the cinematography of a movie. Even if you can see a movie in 2D, you are consuming a product that was creatively compromised by filming it in 3D. I've seen a lot of films in both 2D and 3D, and I do appreciate the gee-whiz factor of 3D for some kinds of movies, but it's really unnecessary for movies where spectacle is not the primary consideration.
Plus, 3D is really immersion breaking. When you are watching a 2D movie directors force you to look at a certain part of a shot by using a shallow depth of field. In a 3D movie, this results in a really disorienting effect where something in the foreground can be out of focus, and despite trying to focus your eyes on it, it will continue to be out of focus, while the part of the image that is further away is still in focus.
Realism isn't the goal of movies, telling a story is, and 3D gets in the way of telling that story.
My biggest problem with 3D movies is that although 3D means you're supposed to be seeing the action as real in front of you, they keep using weird camera lenses that have weird effect on the scene.
Take for example Thor 3D: most of the scenes involving wide shots are good if you take off the glasses, but if you put them on, the combination of 3D and the wide angle lens makes your brain think that you are watching small puppets, and not the intended "people next to huge rocks".
There are lots of bad 3D movies because of this, and I cant believe nobody complains about it. The only movies that seem to work in 3D are animated cartoons.
Perhaps I don't get it, but unless 3D movies become "interactive", there really doesn't seem to be a point to 3D. I've seen the latest slew of 3D movies in 3D just because I'm a sucker, and I have to say my overall impression was something like this:
1. "This is kind of irritative to my eyes".
2. Completely forgot I'm even watching it in 3D to the point that my memory is of the movie being in 2D.
And frankly I feel that short of gimmicky scenes where a ball "flies right at you!", this will always be the case. 3D is cool in the real world because I interact with the real world. If you had a video game that was 3D it would add a new dimension of playability, but not so much in a passive entertainment environment like movies.
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