Some of you seem to think that two-eye stereoscopic 3D isn’t “real 3D” because it doesn’t alllow you to move significant distances. If so, your definition of '3D doesn’t fall in accord with mosdt other people’s definition. Two-eye stereoscopy, whether using ble/red or green/red anaglyphic filters, polarizers, rotating shutters, liquid crystal shutter, lenticular arrays, individual scrteens/images for each eye, or other means of presenting each eye with a different image is 3D. It’s not a “trick”. It’s the same 3D that has been used for well over a century, and is just what your eyes see, if your head doesn’t move.
If you want to be able to move around, then you need something that can send your eyes views fromk more than two directions. Holograms do this, of course. They reconstruct the original wavefront, so looking at one is like lookin g through a window. Unless you blur the reconstructing laser, or limit yourself to things like white-light Benson holograms, you’ll have to put up with laser speckle.
There have been 3D Holographic movies. I’ve seen one at the Holography Museum in New York 9before it went bust), and there has been at least one made in (surprise!) Moscow. The problem is, you can’t project these movies – you actually have to be looking at the actual hologram, which gets substituted for the next frame, and the next, and the next. It’s as if you had to watch a movie by looking at the actual film, illuminated from behind. This a.) Uses a lot of film, and b.) doesn’t let more than a handful of people watch it. Perhaps in the future digital holographic fabrication will allow us to turn a theater wall into a computer-addressable hologram, but we’re not there yet.
Another alternative is to use a lenticular screen with more than two views. Lenticular screens aren’t restricted to only two images. There have been patents filed for 3D television systems using eight or even more views, directed toward the eye by the lenticular screen. there;s nothing wrong with the idea, which would allow you to move more to left and right, but it’s still a restricted range of motion. And you don’t change views by moving up and down.
If it requires special glasses, it’s not true 3D. You don’t need special viewers to see things in 3D in real life. True 3D should ideally not require any special glasses or other viewers at all.
I’m not a fan of 3D movies because the 3D effect is slight and the glasses cut too much light from the screen. So for the past few years, I’ve opted for the non-3D showings of any movies I’ve attended. It’s cheaper too.
I’ve tried a few 3D movies and have not enjoyed it. I find the experience quite fatiguing after about 15 minutes or so. I also find the 3D effect to a bit “off”. Sometimes characters seem to be animated “paper dolls” - flat images animated into a third dimension (maybe these are movies shot in 2D and “converted” to 3D?). My hypothesis is that my eyes are a bit further apart than most people (due to having a rather outrageously sized coconut), so the amount of parallax used in shooting the film is different than I am used to seeing. My brain just gets tired trying to compensate.
Also, I have never seen a movie where 3D has been integral to the narrative - I have never come out of a regular movie and thought, “Gee, if that were only in 3D it would have been much more satisfying.”
The ones that look like flat things moving in front of other flat things are, in fact, conversions of 2D movies. But some movies (including all CGI movies) are 3D to begin with, and some are conversions but are really well-done conversions, and those don’t have that problem.
Are you sure it wasn’t in reference to specific singles and albums? I recently bought the mono edition of the Beatles CD collection because I hate the way they did their stereo recordings. But that’s really a special case.
The thing is that 3D movies don’t exhibit live parallax. The parallax is static and defined at the moment the movie is recorded. It is an illusion of parallax but if you move the illusion is broken because you can not change your view of the scene by changing your position. Something that was truly 3D would be a holographic type projection that allowed you to see different aspects of a scene depending on where you are sitting/standing.
Whoever invented modern 3D should get an award. To me the old 3D looked like a blurred red mess. That being said the only movie I’ve seen so far that used it effectively was “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs.”
But the same is true of 2D. A “true” 2D film would allow you to change your perspective as well. E.g., if you moved the foreground and background would shift positions (while still staying a 2D image the whole time). I.e., you could do your own panning.
We are happy with fixed perspective with 2D films, why not 3D ones?
There is nothing about a 2D image that should require you to be able to see different aspects of it by moving. In fact if you could do this it would be something different from a normal 2D image. A painting on a wall is a 2D image and is real as real can be.
A 3D movie is not actually 3D, there is no real depth to the image, only the illusion of depth. The illusion is broken when you try to focus on things that are out of focus, and when you move your head position. But I’m not saying I’m unhappy with 3D movies, they are what they are.
I don’t have the objection the (now banned) OP does. Glasses are fine. I don’t particularly like the current 3D trend though, except that it has thinned out the crowds for the 2D movies so I can watch those in relative peace.
But how often do you move about significantly during a movie, anyway? If you’re staying in your seat, then the different images to your left and right eyes should be enough.
Not if you tilt your head. My teenage son made himself sick that way a few years ago. He was tired and started out watching a 3-D movie with his head tilted slightly to one side. When the messed-up parallax started making him queasy, he rested his head on my wife’s shoulder, not realizing that tilting more would only make it worse. By the time the credits rolled he was too sick to stand.
You just don’t see it, do you. You accept one premise for 2D but refuse to accept the same premise for 3D. 2D and 3D images work the same. 2D and 3D reality work the same. But the rules for 2D images aren’t the same for 2D reality, and ditto 3D images and reality.
You can’t alter the viewpoint for images of either type. Get used to it.
(2D reality: As you change viewpoint, the foreground/background positions shift. E.g., like cel overlays in animation.)