Pixar to Release All New Movies in 3D

emcron writes "The Walt Disney Co. said Tuesday its Pixar animation studio will commit to 3-D by releasing all of its movies in the format beginning with "Up" in May 2009. Chief Creative Officer John Lasseter made the announcement in New York at a presentation of Disney's upcoming lineup of animated movies."

3D or Stereo?

For me it can only be 3D if you can walk around the projection and see other sides as if it was a solid object.

The linked wikipedia articles talk about ways of making stereo movies from mono movies but I think our brains already do that without the help of extra hardware.

And for the DVD release ...

And for the DVD release Pixar will ditch the old 2D disks and will release the movie on the newly released 3D DVD Sphere.

4D for 3D again?

If I wanted the experience so real I could touch it... I'd go outside and touch them. When I go to the movies, I suspend my belief for 2D. Even a live theater gives a flat 2D feel to the stage to a degree. 3-D makes me think the 80's... Next thing you know they'll resell "he-man" and "my little pony"...oh wait

Re:4D for 3D again?

3-D makes me think the 80's...

It's okay. When you were growing up in the 80s, the 3D stuff that was coming out was reminding your parents and grandparents of the 50s and 60s.

Oblig. Futurama reference:

Fry: Wow, the 3-D's great!

Leela: Mine's not working!

Why has it taken so long?

Since they already render the movies in a 3D world, I've always wondered why they don't make 3D versions of everything.

At least because of this, it should be little trouble (and very profitable) for them to go back and re-render their library in 3D.

The real question

The real question on everybody's mind is...

When will we see 3D porn in theaters?

The meaning of 3D

It's pretty obvious here that the meaning of 3D is stereoscopic, but it can be confusing to just throw around the term 3D. It can have three meanings in this case:

1. The movie is rendered using 3 dimensional data onto a 2 dimensional plane. yes I know all pixar films have been computer generated, but the less informed might think they might actually do hand drawn cartoons.

2. The movie is rendered/filmed from two perspectives, and viewed for a stereoscopic effect

3. The image is actually projected out into 3 dimensional space. This sounds unlikely, but there are actually some 3 dimension display technologies already available that allow for viewing from from any angle.

Anyway, you get my point, let's be specific when we use the word "3D".

LS

Re:I hate 3D glasses.

So let me know when the 2D versions come out?

The FA did in fact state that there will be 2D versions of the movies as well. The real question it what will theaters decide to show? Both, or just the newfangled 3D version?

Re:I hate 3D glasses.

Forget 3D.

I'd like Disney to revive its traditional 2D hand-drawn animation. Even if that means they produce only one movie every 3-4 years, I'd still like to see it revived. Hand-drawn art is gorgeous.

Re:I hate 3D glasses.

The big advantage to them doing 1 film every 3-4 years is they might put a bit more thought into the script, and not churn out the same load of cheap gags and unorigional shit all the time.

I have only one eye

3D does nothing for me ever since I lost an eye in a mugging.

Re:I have only one eye

That means that somewhere out there is a mugger with three eyes. He can see in 4D!

Re:I have only one eye

I have only one eye (Score:5, Funny)

It's all fun and games until someone loses.. oh, right.

Re:I hate 3D glasses.

I see better out of my left eye than my right. Maybe we should go to cinema together.

Re:I hate 3D glasses.

...I can easily move around in your seat...

Note to self: never sit next to fluffman86.

Circular versus orthogonal polarisation.

you have to sit perfectly still at the correct angle for them to work. Great for a 5 minute clip, terrible for a 90 minute movie.

The glasses and movies at Disney are absolutely top notch...if you ever go you have to see Mickey's Philharmagic Orchestra, It's Tough to Be a Bug, etc.

The old polarised glasses use linear polarisation. [wikipedia.org]

The filter that separates left/right pictures only works if you head is perfectly aligned (vertical). If you tilt the head, the polarisation of the pictures relative to your glasses will be tilted instead of vertical/horizontal and you'll see "ghosting", i.e.: each eye see both left/right frame instead of the correct one.

Modern glasses use circular polarisation [wikipedia.org].
Now the filter works whichever is the angle of your head. Clockwise and anti-clockwise polarisation remain the same even if you tilt your head.
Now the problem would be that the /parallax/ of the source will be wrong (if you completely tilt your head 90Â on the side you eyes will need to have top and bottom view of the scene, whereas the screen will be still emitting left/right).
But, you will still have a lot less problems because your eyes won't be receiving 2 image at the same time.

The worst glasses are the old anaglyphs (red/blue) : Only the intensity line up between your eyes, the colors are different for each eye and the result looks weird. Some people can use it and see 3D (I do), but most people only get a headache.
The only advantage of the anaglyph is that the movie work with existing technology. It's just frames with weird-colors. Whereas the other needs polarised filters on the projector(s)

Re:Why?

Just because 3d is often used as a gimmick doesn't mean it always has to be that way. It's perfectly acceptable to compose the scenes as though it were a normal movie, without all that objects flying into your face nonsense. The 3d effect will still work, and as it becomes more common people will expect a more subtle treatment. Color was a gimmick once, but now we don't expect every movie to be as colorful as The Wizard of Oz.

Re:w00t!

They use polarization separation instead. Two images, each with opposite polarization and with a slightly different viewing angle get to the viewer. Each lens of the glasses only lets in one polarization. For Beowulf they used right and left circular polarization. Which was surprising to me as I thought that circular polarizers cost too much to just be given away to moviegoers, but I guess those things are cheap now.

Obligatory Wiki article [wikipedia.org]

Re:w00t!

Depends on which you saw...

If you saw the IMAX 3D, then you got the standard polarized version (one left projector with vertical polarization, one right projector with horizontal polarization, and matching cheapo glasses).

If you saw the other one (RealD?), then you got a fancy set of glasses that had to be initialized first to match the current rotation angles for single-lens single projector, which projects both fields at once with rotating polarization. More than likely, you have to give those back (I did; NL). The main advantage is that you don't have to keep your head level... you can rest your head on your SO's shoulder and still enjoy the 3D effect instead of it being lost, muddied or getting ghost images.

I wouldn't call it 'circular polarizers', btw... tends to get confused with circular polarizers in photography which are just standard polarizers with another layer that 'de-polarizes' the result so that optical autofocus systems and such don't get confused.

Re:w00t!

How it works? Light polarization. Each lens has a different polarization, so it only lets through the right light.

Neat trick: take modern 3D classes, hold them flat in front of an LCD monitor, and rotate them on the axis perpendicular to the monitor. You'll see the display behind dim and brighten as the lenses see it at varying angles.

Re:w00t!

The entire point of theaters going to 3D is to entice people away from their HDTVs with something that is unique and compelling can can't be as easily experienced at home.

That's why Pixar is doing it, and why George Lucas, James Cameron, Robert Zemeckis, Robert Rodriguez, Randal Kleiser, and Peter Jackson "implored the exhibition community to invest in digital projectors" to show their upcoming 3D movies.

Of course, at the same time Lucas also told Variety, "We don't want to make movies. We're about to get into television. As far as Lucasfilm is concerned, we've moved away from the feature-film thing because it's too expensive and it's too risky."

If 3D doesn't help get viewers into the theater, there will be fewer blockbuster movies coming out, and entertainment will shift further toward TV.

Five Ways Apple Will Change TV: 5 - George Lucas Talks Movies [roughlydrafted.com]

Re:w00t!

This technology isn't "newer", it's been around for decades.

I have a book published in the late 1930s or early 1940s at home called "The Marvels and Mysteries of Science", which is a very interesting read given our modern perspective. It has a complete section explaining how 3D movies work, including the polarization technique. Definitely nothing new!

Re:Camcorders

Or you just get a projectionist in one of the non-3D theaters to film it. Just because they're releasing movies in 3D doesn't mean that they'll exclusively be in 3D. In fact, TFA even says so: "...Pixar movies will be released in 3-D and the traditional two-dimensional format..." Not that I'd expect anyone to bother trying to understand what they're commenting on.

Re:Future news

Nice comment, but (a) 3D movies have no more (or less) flashing lights than 2D movies (b) No one reported seizures in 3D showings of Chicken Little, Monster House, Nightmare Before Christmas, Meet the Robinsons, Beowulf, etc. (c) "Wall*e" is about lovelorn robots, "Up" is about a geriatric superhero (d) Obama FTW