The same company that spurred the growth of portable music players may be able to capture the critical attention of younger consumers, said Bryan Gonzalez, a technology specialist at the Entertainment Technology Center at the University of Southern California.

“Why can’t we apply that to everything we carry around with us, including textbooks and newspapers?” Gonzalez said.

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Elsewhere on the 3D front, Panasonic announced that it will work with Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG) to create a 3D production studio at AEG’s L.A. Live complex in Los Angeles and that it will collaborate with the Entertainment Technology Center at the University of Southern California to study the psychophysical effects of 3D viewing in the home and create production guidelines for 3D content.

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Panasonic announced at NAB 2010 that it is joining a consumer-oriented 3D project at the Entertainment Technology Centera @ USC, which is part of USC’s School of Cinematic Arts.  The goal of the ETC 3D Project is to continually evaluate everything related to 3D  in an effort to provide insights to content providers and, in the end, hopefully make 3D better for the consumers.

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I spent the weekend in Las Vegas attending the SMPTE-sponsored Digital Cinema Summit, and as usual, found it a very interesting and worthwhile event. This event, which occurs just prior to the opening of NAB, covers more than just digital cinema, and includes content creation, mastering and post-production, distribution, standards, home-based displays and even future 3D displays. As expected, there were a lot of discussions around 3D. But perhaps the most interesting take away for me were the demos organized by ETC and CableLabs.

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Katzenberg instead was optimistic during some 40 minutes onstage taking questions from David Wertheimer, executive director of the Entertainment Technology Center at U.S.C.

He even took a sunny view of the suddenly-controversial practice of converting 2D movies to 3D, which he said holds promise for converting library titles for 3D homevideo.

Noting that the tools for creating stereoscopic 3D animation have improved rapidly, he said “That’s going to happen on conversion. Right now it’s just beginning to see big capital investments. So now it’s in the most rudimentary stage. It’s going to change very very quickly. I’m actually pretty optimistic that 12, 18, 24 months from right now there will be a quality process.”

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Students share their thoughts on 3D, both in the theater and at home.

College students hope that future in-flight entertainment systems feature internet access, personalization, and a large variety of content.

Session 7: Stereography and Storytelling

Moderator(s):

Rob Engle, 3-D Visual Effects Supervisor, Sony Pictures Imageworks

Panelist(s):

Bernard Mendiburu, Analyst, Author of “3D Movie Making”

Chuck Comisky

Eric Kurland, Independent 3-DIY filmmaker, 3-DIY.com

Phil Streather, Stereo 3D Producer and Consultant, Principal Large Format

Rob Engle

“All 3D is not created equal.  It is first and foremost a very, very powerful creative storytelling tool” Jeffrey Katzenberg

3D Storytelling Choices

- Overall depth (interaxial spacing)

- Subject placement in depth (convergence)

- Roundness

- Where the screen edges are (floating windows)

- Traditional 2D composition

- Atmosphere (ex. smoke, clarity, etc.)

- Editorial pacing

- Depth transitions

Bernard Mendiburu

(Bernard worked on Meet the Robinsons, Monsters vs Aliens)

We are trying to “overcoming Millenniums of flatness” (Ray Zone).  We are where color movies were in the late 1930s.

What have we found:

- There is no screen.  We see through the screen

- Depth does not need to be realistic

- Big challenge is ‘snake oil vendors’, 3D experts since 2010

- Depth treatment must be integrated into the story

Chuck Comisky

It is really important to determine genre and style early in the process.  With Avatar the goals early on were 1) not to tire the audience’s eyes out, and 2) to within 10 minutes have the audience settle in and forget that they are watching a 3D movie.

Journey to the Center of the Earth had a lot of fun with 3D.  Early on they chose to play with the 3D in an obvious manner.

Make sure that the content is shot well; either performance capture or real capture.

In his remote stereography suite he relied on controlling knobs for three things; interoccular, convergence, and focus for the stereo pair.

They did use depth-of-field for creative purposes – soft focus in front and behind the point of interest.

3D @ Home Consortium has 10 rules for 3D that were developed by Chuck and James Cameron (http://www.3dathome.org/webpage.aspx?webpage=1952 ) (Phil Lelyveld note: there is more advice at http://www.3dathome.org/webpage.aspx?webpage=1946 )

Phil Streather

The two really interesting areas of z-space are 1) just in front of the screen to give a sense of intimacy and 2) positive parallax with parallel interoccular going to infinity rather than keystoning to infinity.

What is it about good 3D that makes it good?  Getting the math right.  He likes the idea of a depth budget.   Keep it to 1 ½ to 2% for the bulk of the feature (which works for all genres) and 5-10% for the special effects.  Ask yourself ‘who do I want in my personal space and who do I want in the behind-the-screen space?’

Eric Kurland

(Eric is a microbudget 3D filmmaker and a leader in the Los Angeles Do It Yourself 3D moviemaking community.)  There is a lot we still have to learn, but I have definitely learned that if you want to tell a good story in 3D, first and foremost you have to tell a good story.  The 3D must support the story.  3D does have a language that is different from 2D.  We all need education and practice.  I’m a big proponent of always practicing my art.  Try things and make mistakes on your own small pieces, so you don’t make mistakes on the big features.  YouTube has a 3D player now that works great.

Q&A

Do we want subtle or in-your-face 3D?  (Phil) When the seeds of life appeared around Jake in Avatar, they stayed behind the screen. If they came into the audience, the scene would have been about the seeds instead of about Jake.  (Bernard) A 3D gimmick is like a piece of candy.  Everyone loves a piece of candy, but a full bag will make you sick.

Does the up-charge for 3D theatre tickets mean that we have to give them ‘their money’s worth?’  (Chuck) We are giving them their money’s worth with the story! (Eric)  Outer space in Avatar was shot to look reel, but Hubble 3D ( now at IMAX) had a light-year interaxial distance and it completely engaged the audience.  (Bernard) Outside of Hollywood it is hard to see a 3D movie properly in the theatre.  He would like to see a trailer/intro with the image of a rainbow spanning the screen and the message ‘if you don’t see the full rainbow, including the ends, and you don’t see the full colors of the rainbow, walk out.’ (Eric) It is very important to education the exhibitors.  He went to a theatre where the left/right eyes were reversed.  He spoke to the projectionist, who didn’t consider it to be a problem.

Session 6: After the Capture: What Other Tools Exist?

Moderator(s):

Jim Whittlesey, Sr. Vice President, Technology, Deluxe Digital Media

Speaker(s):

Ray Harrisian, Stereographer, 3ality

Matthew DeJohn, VP/VFX Producer, In-Three Inc.

Peter Postma, FilmLight

Steve Owen, Director of Worldwide Marketing, Quantel

Peter Postma

Baselight is a software color correction product.  It is capable of multiple streams of 4K for color correction.  I’ll talk about what we added for 3D work.

Why would you perform stereo adjustments in a color corrector?  Because you have high performance tools (interactive), a good environment (big screen), the right talent for it, and the right time (at least in part) in the process for color and convergence issues to be addressed.

Stereographers will get eye fatigue if they wear any type of 3D glasses all day.  They can work in side-by-side or simple wipes between the two eyes.  Anaglyph is good for a quick check.  Checkerboard is useful for color adjustments – errors jump out when the content is viewed in checkerboard mode.  Color difference view and interleaved views are also useful.

Stereo tools include a multilayer multitrack timeline, so you can ‘gang color corrections.’  You can also synchronize the color grades, transferring information from one eye to the other.

Baseline is capable of adjusting for keystone, rotation, translation, and scale, and has floating window adjustment tools.

Steve Owen

The challenges of 3D post

What’s the problem?  The data needs to be perfectly synchronized, of the highest quality, comfortable to watch, meet the creative brief, and cost not much more than 2D content.

New issues for Post;

- Where does the image sit in relation to the screen? Creative choice and delivery method / screen size issues.

- Do your edits work in Stereo 3D? What are you asking the viewer’s eyes to do?

What are 5 good questions for any Post house to ask when preparing a quote for a 3D job, especially if your goal is to stay in business and make money.

1 What do the rushes look like?  ‘Fix it in post’ is the wrong attitude for 3D!  Quality control on-set is vital.  Don’t quote a job until you’ve seen the rushes.

2 What does the customer want?  For reference, Sky has posted their requirements for stereoscopic alignment on their website.

3 How much client interaction will there be?  Reliable viewing and play-out is critical to a good client experience.

4 Can your pipeline cope? (Will we make money on the job?)  3D is twice the data to manage, process, move, and store.  Quality matters like never before.  It will stress your network infrastructure, storage, and management systems.  A good 2D pipeline doesn’t guarantee success in 3D.

5 How can your technology help?  Can you do more in one suite?  Do you have real-time tools.  Stereo 3D time-saving tools: stereo color balance, geometry correction, image analysis, and tools to report divergence.

Ray Harrisian

3ality’s stereo image processing box analyzes the left/right image down to 1/100^th of a degree (or whatever the unit is) for accurate alignment.

Where to place things in space may not be obvious when it is shot, but is revealed during editing.  In U2 3D every transition (e.g. many of the cuts) is a visual effect.  They did dynamic depth balancing.  For example, they created the effect in Post of Edge and Bono looking at each other across a cut.

Matthew DeJohn

Dimensionalization as a tool after capture (“Dimensionalization” is a trademarked term of In-Three!) is useful to create and alter content, ensure viewer comfort, and enhance artist control.

Three basic stages for dimensionalization:

- isolation of the elements

- depth generation

- paint process

- (sidebar: transparencies, particles, motion blur, etc. are handled both here and elsewhere)

Doing dimensionalization wrong results in:

- rubber sheet effect – foreground objects wrap around into background objects

- cardboard cutout effect – insufficient roundness

- inaccurate depth layout – conflicting depth cues

- lack of depth continuity

- bad compositing (ex. hair, hard edges that conflict with motion blur, transparencies (foregrounds sticking to background), no paint / auto paint)

Doing dimensionalization right results in:

- good depth, distinct separation, nuanced / detailed, natural fall-off, matched 2D & 3D depth cues, solid depth continuity, and depth that is adjustable to the client’s desire

- compositing is VFX-caliber, hair as good as green screen, stereo-accurate transparency, real image data for occlusions, high quality matters.

When to use Dimensionalization:

- Difficult to capture shots

- Prohibitive environments

- Prohibitive production schedule

- Benefits of traditional 2D shoot

- Flexibility in artistic decisions

- Failed stereo capture

- Alternative stereo capture

- Catalogue titles

Q & A

Regarding catching errors, how much is manual versus software-based detection.  (In-Three) human intervention is a necessary part of the process.

When dimensionalizing, how do you know what is behind the object being dimensionalized. (In-Three) You follow standard visual effects techniques and processes.

Session 5: A Case for Quality in Production and Post-Production

Speaker(s):

Buzz Hays, Executive Stereoscopic 3D Producer, 3D Technology Center, Sony Corporation of America

(Buzz produced the 3D version of G-Force and Monster House)

What constitutes ‘high quality?’

- technical considerations; resolution, artifacts, (mis)alignment (can damage the people working in Post!)

- aesthetic values; the artistry must be very high-quality.  He has sent effects back to be improved.  It can have a lot to do with understanding parallax and stereography.

- effect on the viewers; some people are seeing it for the first time and don’t yet understand what they are looking at.  The audience will become more critical over time.  There is also concern over fatigue and eyestrain.  This is especially important now that it is coming to TV and people will be watching more 3D for longer periods.

Buzz received the completed version of Open Season and was asked to convert it to IMAX.  It had scenes that didn’t work well in 3D.  He used this to make the point that 3D must be considered in the pipeline regardless of plans to make it in 3D or not.

With Beowulf, Zemekis had a lot of experience in 3D, but was now telling a 2 hr. story to an older audience.  How to sustain 3D moments without causing eye fatigue was a key concern.  Phil McNally says that we’ve spent the last 200 years trying to convert the world to 2D.  It has now become its own art form.  We need to discover the fundamental language of 3D.  Motion may tell the story much better than cutting does in 3D.  Perhaps in 3D every shot is a point-of-view shot.

At the Sony 3D Technology Center they’ve started an educational program.  Working with the Local 600 Guild they are focused on the Cinematographers.  They will soon offer the program to Film and TV Directors as well.  They are working with Live Events people to retrain them to instinctively work in 3D.  In addition, they are reaching out to Game Developers to provide them with the education they need to optimize 3D game play experiences.  Later in the year they will be producing an educational program for Editors.

Stereoscopic 3D Terminology and Techniques

- Basic Terms, physiology, good vs bad, examples of 3D content, 3D camera systems, storytelling in 3D, lighting (back to the notion that lighting is used for sculpting), shooting 2D for 3D, production and post-production, practical shooting experience (Sony Pictures sound stage with a 3ality camera where they offer a 1 day class and 2 days of hands-on shooting).

Terms

- interocular distance – distance between the eye centers, about 2.5”, dictates the scale at which we see the world.  Our eyes don’t work like cameras.  We usually shoot at a 1” or less interaxial distance.

- convergence – rotate the cameras inward, but not so much that you produce keystoning on the chip.  It helps push infinity to the right distance.  The keystoning produces vertical misalignment.  Shooting 720p using a 1080p gives you enough information to fix the vertical misalignment in post.

- vergence accommodation – this is a key issue.

- negative parallax / positive parallax – negative is in front of the screen,(right -ye image is to the left of the left-eye image), positive is behind the screen (right eye image is on the right of the left-eye image)

- divergence – eyes point away from each other to fuse the object. At 1920 pixels on a 40’ screen, a 2.5” interocular distance means that more than10 pixels will cause divergence.  Viewing the content improperly on a small monitor will produce massive divergence when the content is projected onto a big screen.

- orthostereoscopy – we now have a chance to create a condition that we couldn’t any other way.  We can create a life-size experience with the audience.  It can simulate sitting in the front row of a theatre because we know something about where people sit when they watch TV.

Techniques that can work differently in 2D and 3D: focal length, framing, blocking action, camera motion (it may be a better way to tell 3D stories), depth of field

Q&A

What one rule would you recommend?  For home viewing, respect the personal space and push the 3D into and behind the screen plain.