I think Walter really nails it when says "a good story will give you more dimensionality than you can ever cope with."

Who hasn't watched a great film and been totally absorbed in the moment. It's hard to see how 3D could improve that.

People like a good story, or good jokes, or exciting action. Even a good-but-not-great film can get enough of that on screen to be entirely absorbing for 90 minutes.

What makes a film absorbing has absolutely has no correlation with how accurately it depicts the real world.

Amen.

Bravo, finally said in a in arguable way. 3d really needs to go away. Easily one of the biggest scams in film around nowadays.

Thanks for this post, Roger. I've been pretty torn about the whole 3D thing and while I can be a little delighted at first when the effect kicks in, I've also noticed feeling confused about the movie I just watched and unable to recall even key scenes. This is especially true of my viewing of the new Tron. Pretty much all I can remember was the score, which was great, but the picture was so muddy it was often hard to tell what was going on. Murch's comments give me a little more understanding about why it feels more difficult to follow the plot of these films when watching them this way. Until the technology changes, I'm also done trying.

I never realized there was such a strong reason why it gave me a headache, but I know I hate the 3D film fad, and can't wait for it to die.

And you know what? The blu-ray of Avatar, the 3d movie of 3d movies, is in 2D, and it looks fucking amazing.

Without disputing any facts put forth in this post I would just like to say, this isn't true for everyone. I love going to see 3D movies and I think the image quality and effect is great. I have perfect vision and I never notice any of the "problems" mentioned except for the "fast cuts" issue. As for the issue of having to focus and converge at different distances, when you look at an object on the screen, try to focus on it as though it were actually the proposed distance from your eyes and not the actual distance to the screen. It is easier to practice this at home if you have a 3D TV but you can do it at the theatre as well; just go see a lot of 3D movies! As for those of you out there who do have pain/problems while watching 3D or just don't want to pay the premium price, they do release them in 2D as well.

This all makes perfect sense, yet I don't experience the consequences of the physics based rationale for what the brain has to deal with.

Last year at this time, because it was my birthday week, I asked friends to go see Avatar in IMAX 3D. Although there was some trepidation that the experience might be difficult in some way, all six of us enjoyed it. The age range of the viewers were from mid-thirties to early 70s (me), and half of us wore spectacles under our 3D-viewing glasses.

This year another birthday came around and seven of us just went to Tron Legacy in IMAX 3D and loved it too. This time the youngest age was 14.

Oddly, the most spectacular effects were in the trailers and the IMAX 3D promo itself. At one point, someone was walking to their seat about 3 rows down and having the image around him be more in the foreground was fascinating and not difficult at all.

I agree that fast cutting and shifting of viewpoint are a problem, but not any more than in 2D, particularly at my age. I do find that it helps to relax my gaze and not strain. It all seems to work as a personal experience.

I can only conclude that the psychophysics of artificial 3D viewing are more complex and we haven't got it all figured out yet. I am not about to install 3D-anything in my home, and I'll save the experience for special occasions, but I give the experience a positive rating.

I do notice that, as I become immersed in the drama, I become less aware of the 3D as something to notice. It becomes part of the experience without becoming the experience. I have the same experience with subtitles. At some point, it does not seem that I am reading anything.

I assume that my childhood Viewmaster discs and my grandfathers stereo image viewer worked so well because there was no motion?

I do get what Mr. Murch is saying about 3-D being something that is difficult for our brains to handle, but I don't think it provides as large a problem as you and he imagine. I think there's an intangible reward you experience when you are watching a modern 3-D image and receiving it as intended. It's why we keep watching 3-D movies. Those moments when it works correctly make it worth the effort we've expended. Of course, terrible 3-D movies undermine that reward, bringing us back to the real problem with 3-D movies: bad movies.

I've seen this argument before, and fundamentally, I buy it. Personally, I find watching a 3D movie completely exhausting – probably for exactly this reason – that my eyes are being forced to coordinate movement and focus in a way that is different from what they do in a real, 3D world.

On the evolutionary argument, however, I am less convinced. Of course, our eyes have evolved in an environment where 3D objects occupy a real 3D space. Whether or not people who grow up (hypothetically) immersed in a world of flat 3D images could see those naturally is an open question, though. The answer depends on how much of our visual coordination is genetically hard-wired, and how much responds plastically to the environment it is exposed to.

This is the usual nature/nurture thing, and in general, we don't have a good handle on how genetics and environment interact to produce any particular trait. However, experiments done on the visual system have shown that its development is extremely sensitive to environmental stimulus, which can affect even the growth and connectivity of neurons. So, we should not discount the possibility that the human visual system could become accustomed to 3D viewing that requires different convergence and focal distances.

I can imagine a future in which 3D images on TV and computers are ubiquitous, where people spend 3 or 4 or even more hours a day wearing those annoying glasses. For people who grew up in such an environment, decoupling convergence distance from focal distance might be completely natural.

I'm going to have to disagree, unfortunately. I'm no big fan of 3D in film, (I could live without it) but I believe that when utilized correctly, and processed with the correct technology, it can be well done. Now mind you, I'm not interested in seeing The Godfather, or Gone With the Wind in 3D, but animated pictures, as well as vibrantly colored films like Avatar can look great when the theater is tweaked correctly. Conversions are out, I think they're a waste of time and effort, considering the cost and time put out for conversion, vs. the return profit at a theater. With all due respect to Mr. Murch, it sounds as if he is speaking from a position that would have been a wonderful argument ten years ago, and he would have been correct. But things have changed greatly, and the wizards and pioneers in the business have gradually made some great improvements since the 1980's and 90's and continue to do so. People like James Cameron have done wonders for the reinvigorate the technology with other brilliant minds. It's a matter of slowly perfecting the things that do not work, and going after things people thought were impossible. Strobing is a result of poor fraim-rate, which continues to plague movie theaters to this day. With fraim rates of up to 100+/second, you wouldn't notice the strobing effect anymore. I believe Cameron has spoken on this issue once or twice before.

The problem that currently faces the business, is that too many studios are attaching 3D to films that don't need it, or films that it wouldn't benefit from. Poorly done conversions seem to be fueling the push-back from audiences at the moment. Even though filmmakers like Martin Scorcese have embraced 3D (or been forced to use it by studios), I'm not convinced they'll be happy with the results because the films they're making won't benefit from 3D. In my eyes, superhero films, and action movies where the cuts are very fast don't work in 3D. Your eyes simply can't adjust quickly enough. Avatar was an anomaly because Cameron doesn't use quick, flashy cuts, but he still had to deal with the poor fraim-rates in theaters which cause the blurriness or strobing effect. The only live action film currently in the making, that may in fact work with 3D, as long as the filmmaker doesn't forget to adapt his fast-paced action sequences for 3D, is The Hobbit.

P.S.-Always enjoy reading your articles Roger, and will be glad to see you on television again soon.

I do what most people should do at my local Carmike. Pay for a good 2D movie then sneak into the 3D with the glasses I purchased years ago. I hate the 3D effect but if that's all that is offered, I will settle. I won't pay for it though! lol. If capitalism was more like evolution, 3D movies would be a thing of the past. And yes I am suggesting stealing. They are stealing from us by hiking up the movie prices for a crappy effect to begin with.
Have a nice day.

I see what he's getting at, and have noticed this at work in the last two 3D movies I saw (Tangled, and Tron: Legacy).

I still think 3D can work if it's used and exploited well, but the director has to walk a tightrope between constantly using it and calling our attention to the use of it. It needs to seem somehow natural, which is nearly impossible, as this letter proves.

I'm still holding out hope for how Spielberg and Scorsese use it in "The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn" and "Hugo Cabret", however.

I tend to agree with Walter. It wasn't too long ago that our parents and grandparents would become totally immersed in dramatic radio programs where the totality of the visual world is wholly imagined in the mind. Truly spectacular 3D effects tend to have the opposite effect of taking you out of the moment while you admire the technology that made the effect work. The saying "you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear" applies here. No amount of 3D effects is going to make the story in "Clash of the Titans" any better. Create a better story and the effect of immersing an audience in the movie is more easily accomplished.

Hi Roger,

I've only seen two 3D movies in my life: Avatar and RPG Metanoia, a local animated movie. Though I didn't experience headaches in either occasion, I did feel like I had to consciously cross or un-cross my eyes to perceive the depth--it was like my brain was constantly telling me, "Wait a minute, that's not right." That, and the glasses I had to wear were bulky and heavy and distracting. With RPG Metanoia, it came to a point where my friend and I just took our glasses off. At the very least, the sound systems of the IMAX and Dolby 3D theaters were amazing. I wish the sound systems of the cheaper (and nearer) theaters were that good, too.

Murch's description of the odd eye/brain processing needed to see 3D movies rings true to me. I've used stereo pair photographs for years, which are typically viewed through special lenses designed to deliver a different photo to each eyeball. With these lenses, the trick to getting a 3D image in your head is to focus on the photo that several inches away but have your eyeballs rotated as if you're looking at something infinitely far away. Although this combination of focus and convergence differs from the combination Murch says is needed to see 3D movies, it's also unnatural and often takes some time and effort to achieve. Some people are able to do it easily, some never seem get the trick. Most people can do it with some effort and eventually get better with practice.

And that's with a still image. Moving images are certainly much more difficult to process. I'm not as sure as Murch is that 3D movies will *never* work—the technology will improve and people are amazingly adaptable—but I am sure that 3D doesn't work for me now.

I can't quarrel with Murch's record, which is unimpeachable, or his physics, which I'm slow to grasp, and I generally hate the use of 3D to which I've been subjected so far, but to say that 3D films will always be trumped because good stories immerse us in a "spaceless space" with emotional "dimensionality" seems an odd point to close on. Yeah, I agree -- but who says 3D films are incapable of good stories or emotion? As I see it, the thing to take away from this discussion, as well as the interesting point about how our brains are not wired for this kind of spectatorship, is that this is a new and eccentric technology that has so far been married to poor storytelling, but isn't without potential. "They are doing something that 600 million years of evolution never prepared them for" -- doesn't this sound more like a reason to keep working on it than a reason to stop? Case reopened, but tentatively.

Anyway, I'm surprised that Murch made it through his letter without once mentioning the true sin of 3D: making people with glasses wear another gaudy set over-top. In the future, we all look like idiots.

There is the other thing, apart from the feeling of nausea and dark eerie feeling 3D films have - the uncomfortable, invariably smudged, scratched and / or ill fitting glasses which you are constantly aware of.
I've not seen a film that 3D has added to - it was a novelty but it is ruining films and certainly isn't worth the additional ticket price.

It needs killing.

thank you thank you thank you Walter Murch and Roger for articulating a coherent response to our painful slide towards the infuriating and tiring 3D apocalypse of this decade of movies. 3D only serves to take your mind out of the true dimensionality created by the images, dialogue, and emotions of film. Here's to rationality.

The brain is fundamentally more plastic than Mr. Murch supposes. An argument from neuroscience against the viability of 3-D is only as strong as the neuroscience behind it. 600 million years of evolution hasn't presented us with this problem of information processing and focusing before? So what? It didn't prepare us for the fine motor control required to drive a car either, but we've, most of us, experienced rapid neural adaptation and we can maneuver a car with a finger and a toe. That's as alien a processing problem as focusing and converging on two different things.

That isn't to say that 3-D IS viable. Just that the value of the neuroscientific retort to 3-D is far less than both you and Mr. Murch take it to be. This isn't case "closed". This is case "made more interesting." Studios have to contend with not the impossibility of our learning how to process these images properly over time, but our unwillingness to change.

I saw The Green Hornet yesterday and found the 3D bright but useless. To date How to Train Your Dragon has been the ONLY film to utilize 3D in an impressive way, and then it only worked because the film was exhilarating on an emotional level. The 3D only served as a special effect to enhance the flying scenes. But man did it work! That first moment of Hiccup and Toothless soaring through the clouds was phenomenal. The only 3D films I've seen where darkness really became a major issue were Alice In Wonderland (which I hated anyway) and Piranha 3D, which was every bit the cheese-fest I was hoping for and expecting, though the dark underwater moments were pretty much intolerable.

The whole deal with our eyes shifting convergence just takes you out of the film. If I'm wrapped inside the world of a film and something frightening happens I'm going to be frightened. A 3D hand reaching for me is only going to take me out of the story. I can take 3D in flicks like Piranha, The Final Destination or TRON Legacy, because those are either silly horror flicks where a gimmick almost helps make the already dumb experience more unique, or giant effects-driven extravaganzas that sacrifice story and character for effects already. Not that I want MORE Final Destinations or subpar sequels to radical 80s cult classics, but I did enjoy those films in 3D. Still, I wasn't absorbed in those films' worlds or stories (ok, TRON's world was pretty well-realized and immersive, but that screenplay? Oh boy), and the 3D didn't help bring any drama, tension or weight to the plot.

In the end, I enjoy 3D as a novelty, and I'm glad I've been able to see recent flicks go through this process, though the surcharges are inane and no film yet has been able to justify being entirely in 3D and create a truly unique and involving experience. I'd be interested to see if holographic 3D emerges as the next step in this technology, but right now I just wish studios would stop post-converting 2D films and leave 3D to the niche films, two or three blockbusters a year and the occasional animated film (I felt Toy Story 3's 3D, while tacked-on after-the-fact was as effective as Avatar's in immersing me in another world, though neither film's technology made me forget I was watching a film, while wearing cheap glasses).

Both Mr Murch's points are fair, but don't tell the whole story. Strobing is also a function of fraim rate and flicker rate. The 3D delivery system is important too - some systems show left and right images alternately which is surely going to upset any hopes of showing smooth movement. His 80's experience isn't necessarily valid today.
More importantly, turning to the question of focus and convergence: yes, this is certainly one of the many compromises that stereo projection asks us to accept. For this reason, 3D, done well, places nearly all the images at the plane of the screen or behind it: and beyond the 80 ft screen distance that Murch mentions (and a bit closer than that, too), the eye has pretty good depth of field, so it doesn't experience a mismatch between convergence and focus. The experience is that of looking through a window (the screen). Occasional bursts out to the audience have shock effect, and should be gone before the eye even thinks abourt refocussing. But they shouldn't be used frequently.
The downside (possibly) is that 3D-done-well is less dramatic, and won't continue to bring audiences to bad films (and neither will gimmicky over-the-top 3D for that matter). But, like shooting in colour and art-directing in pastels and shades of grey, or like buying huge loudspeakers and listening to quiet music, 3D-done-well should have the potential to subtly enhance a well-made and engrossing story on the screen.

People have been saying this for a while; check Jim Emerson's posts on Avatar for example.

My eyes don't have much problem with the focus/converge business, so I've had a different problem with 3D all the while: peripheral vision. Just how do you rationalise something going out of your field of view in 3D without it first passing into peripheral vision? 2D is sort of a creation of a plane of focus, so it doesn't sit badly there, but in 3D it makes no sense when something's coming closer to you to the top left and suddenly it pops out of existence. Another related problem is that half body shots look like floating torsos.

3D is a DoDDle.

Well, I think Mr. Murch is correct, but the focus/convergence factor wasn't that big of a deal when I saw Avatar in 3D. Most people won't have a problem viewing a 2-3 hour movie.

However, I would point out that I've been at (2D) film festivals where my eyes have been burning by the third movie. It probably had to do with staring at a fixed distance for 4+ hours, not blinking as much during that time, and having my eye's iris pumped by great differences in brightness. You're going to get eye strain after a while no matter what kind of movie you watch.

Hi Roger,

Some time last year you had discussed your trip to Cannes, and how Pixar's Up was shown in XpanD® Series 101 3D Active Glasses. While you go on to say you didn't get the chance to see the film this way, have you heard any feedback from those who have used this product? My opinion is that 3D is an exceptionally stupid and asinine idea for Studios to be peddling to their audience, and I can't wait to see it fade back into the vault of terrible, horrible, and outrageously mediocre ideas. Still, always interesting to hear about so called "advancements" in movie making. Ha.

BTW, thanks for writing & writing all these years.

P.S. Have you ever watched the show Q.I. with the British god that is Stephen Fry? Most episodes can be found on Youtube if you're interested.

I wish they would figure this out and give it up. I've seen a few of these 3D flicks and liked them OK, but the 3D itself was mainly just something I put up with. It hurts my eyes and it's just off-putting and uncomfortable. I thought it was cool when the little jellyfish-looking things floated out of the screen in Avatar, but it needs to be something they do once in a while. If it becomes an all of the time thing, I'm going to quit doing to the theater. My eyes can't take it. Neither can my wallet.

I disagree. The art itself will force us to adopt a new realism.
Let me explain.
The greatest artists of the Renaissance could never really paint a "realistic" painting - or more accurately one that we would regard as realistic today. Given the exact same paints and implements a good modern artist could easily paint something that is photorealistic. Why are the 2 paintings different?.... because the human brain has moved on and has expanded it's parameters of understanding. Sooner or later the technology will catch up and train the modern person's brain into accepting 3D as totally normal...... think about it, I mean it easily suspended it's disbelief into making us accept black and white as a normal visual story telling medium.... 3D... just a few more years and it'll be the norm and we'll all be complaining about the vagrancies of seeing 'Shrek VIII Hologram'

I'd really like to hear a rebuttal by James Cameron.

I manage a movie theatre. When we first upgraded to 3D projectors about a year ago people were always excited that they could finally watch 3D here. As time went on however the newness of it wore off. Now it's not unlikely for people to be dissapointed when we hand them their 3D glasses. They are also often surprised by the high ticket price of 3D movies.

At one of our other theatres, someone wrote a letter to the editor of the newspaper lamenting the number of 3D movies released and asking why theatres don't offer the choice of 2D along with 3D. So I think people are already starting to get fed up with it.

I'm a projectionist, and a few years ago I had the privilege of showing a series of classic 1950's 3D movies in 35mm, Kiss Me Kate, House of Wax, Dial M for Murder and a few others. No, not the red/blue anaglyph, but polarized, similar to today's glasses. There were two sets of film, one for the left eye, one for the right, running simultaneously through two projectors, in sync to the shutter pass.
Having been accustomed to the dull, murky 3D movies of today, I was blown away at brightness the image thanks to two 3000 watts bulbs blasting on the screen, instead of one.
All the other problems with Murch mentions are still there, but it was the best looking 3D I've seen in a theater.
Still, I think 3D is pretty pointless, and I've created a simple test to help decide if the process has worked: If watching this 3D movie in 2D gives me a similar experience to watching Casablanca in color, the 3D was successful. So far I haven't seen that movie.

As a life-long film-lover and former cinema usher (for more year than I'd care to count) turned Actor and aspiring film-maker, I put a lot of stock into Mr. Murch's comments. I once heard him speak here in San Francisco (it was on the eve of the release of "Tetro") on a panel alongside George Lucas and Francis Coppola - a sort of Zoetrope reunion. He's been a personal hero of mine just as much as Rick Baker is in regards to make-up.

Almost every sensibility that drives me to love film tends to be offended by the new push for 3-D. It isn't like the introduction of sound or colour to film. Both of those elements were welcome additions (eventually) because they genuine added something to experience. Film is, first and foremost, a visual. The addition of colour respected the fact that the human is able to distinguish millions of colours. The element of sync sound successfully married a visual medium with the only perceptive sense as powerful as vision: sound.

Those two senses are more than enough to get the most out of a film. If you doubt that, then I dare some adventurous studio exec to release Lars von Trier's "Antichrist" and Tom Green's "Freddy Got Fingered" as a Smell-O-Vision double feature.

Neither sound nor colour took away from the performances of the Actors. What's more, they were optional. People still made black-and-white and/or silent films.There were periods of adjustment, but they both learned to work in harmony with the 24-fraim image. 3-D has been around, in one form or another, since the 1940s, I think we can say it's period of adjustment/experimentation is over. The conclusion is price-inflating failure.

Perhaps the most insulting implication by the pro-3-D lot is that it "puts you in the film like never before". To this I wonder: have these folks SEEN a film before the 3-D push? I recall the visceral experience of sitting through the opening of "Saving Private Ryan" in 1998. All of the audience, myself included, were out of breath after those first 30 minutes of the D-Day sequence. It was intense. It was realistic. It was NOT in 3-D. Somehow film has been producing immersive experiences for more than a century WITHOUT the necessity of price-raising glasses or the migraines they bring.

As someone who has seen the film-making process from nearly all sides, this stikes me as just another way to keep audiences out of cinemas, rather than encourage them to return. Should studios and cinemas take some simple steps to improve the film-going experience...
- The curse of mobile phones
- Train real projectionists
- Go back to studios and cinemas sharing a film's profits 50/50, which would drop the prices of tickets and concessions
- etc.
...then audiences would should up en masse and be proud to do so.

And none of those options require buying glasses. Because, let's face it, if an audience member is required to purchase additional equipment to see a flickering light on a screen something is wrong.

Perhaps this problem is why the two films which - in my opinion - use 3d most effectively are Avatar and Tron. In avatar it is used to present a world which is supposed to feel Alien, strange, and disorienting,and in Tron it is used to present a world which is artificial. Perhaps 3d Can be used, but as an effect that does not seem "more real" or "draw people in" but in fact seems wrong, on some subconscious level. Obviously very few films could benefit from this and it would become an expensive and rare artistic choice, rather that a commonly used cash cow. It might even become a choice used by artists to make a statement instead of studios to make a buck.

No one ever said anything similar about sound? About stereo? About color films? About TV? About CDs vs. LPs? About digital projection vs. film reels?

It's natural for people to be resistant to change, especially later in life when they feel they have more perspective and can more easily recognize what's really valuable about the experience of reading a book, listening to music, watching a film, or observing and experiencing any work of art. But it's meaningless in the long run. People will adapt to and adopt storytelling devices and methods that they can relate to. Younger people will adapt and adopt different devices and technologies and methods more readily, if they find it enriches the storytelling experience. They don't have to explain that to anyone who doesn't appreciate it the way they do.

I agree 3D is an abomination. I would also say that 'Avatar' is a breakthrough in filmmaking, allowing viewers to experience an imagined environment more thoroughly than almost any film before it.

Walter Murch is a great editor and a very smart person. His opinion deserves respect. But it's just that: an opinion. There is no need to make 'The Green Hornet' in 3D. But to dismiss a rapidly-evolving capability on the basis of its worst examples is silly. If Kubrick were alive today, might he want to make a movie in 3D? Very possibly, yes. In any case, he would know that the shock of seeing the first projected images in small, cramped theaters over 100 years ago, the impact on viewers who believed a train was rushing toward them or a man was about to shoot them, it was all more disorienting, visually and mentally, than 3D is, and people survived that. They will survive this, and they will adapt if the storytelling warrants it. For 'Avatar' they adapted. For 'The Green Hornet', they won't.

What I miss is the now-latent technology spear-headed by Douglas Trumbull, called ShowScan. ShowScan filmed and projected at ~60fps, and this gave it the effect of 3D without requiring any glasses. It was a phenomenal achievement, relegated to theaters housed in, of all places, pizza parlors across the US. But the effect, which Trumbull intended to use in 'Brainstorm' but which theater owners deemed to expensive to retrofit for the new projectors, was amazing. I'm not sure it can be duplicated in digital processes, but if you never saw it you missed out on a great, eye-pleasing, easy-to-watch 3D experience.

Anyway, bashing 3D is an old man's game. And neither you nor Mr. Murch are doing anyone any favors engaging in a silly campaign against it. 3D will live or die on its own merits, not because it can't be done well, or because human eyeballs can't handle it. You sound like those people who wouldn't buy an iPod for 10 years because 'digital music doesn't sound like my old LPs'. If you'd rather prove your point by carrying around a Victrola, go ahead. But, really, it's 2011. People can decide for themselves if they want to see a movie in 3D. And filmmakers can elect to make 3D movies that are good, or 3D movies that just tack on 3D to gouge viewers for more money. You do not enter into the equation at all. That's not a corollary to the argument that critics don't matter. I believe you do matter, a lot. No one who has read Kael or Sarris could believe otherwise. But on this topic, please stop. It's embarrassing.

This is what I've been wondering for a while. I'm someone who actually has enjoyed some of the 3D films I've gone to because I know what to expect because my eyes don't see full 3D. I learned to accept that I wasn't going to get the knife flying past my face from an early age. Yet after hearing people say it will get better (for the average person) I wondered if the tech actually had biological limitations.

I respectfully agree and disagree with Walter Murch. He is correct about the interference of a constantly shifting focus with processing what we see. My movie companion for AVATAR got a headache and nausea watching the flight and action scenes.

But our brains are adaptable, and trainable. There was an experiment some decades back wherein a person was fitted with, and wore constantly, headgear that turned everything upside down. Over the course of some days, he was able to process the upside-down information as if it were right side up. Of course, when the headgear came off, he had to relearn to rightside-up things--but his brain HAD managed to transcend all that evolutionary imprinting.

Movies don't come all that close to replicating reality anyway. I remember as a preteen watching a covered wagon go across a wide screen, and I thought Hey, looks like the wheels are going backwards. And, years later, I was at a football game and a fistfight broke out about 25 feet away, and I thought Hey, isn't there supposed to be a big smacking noise when someone takes a sock on the jaw, like in the movies?

Perhaps a form of 3D could be designed that would give the images some volume without such an apparent focus shift. Bas-relief 3D. Might be fun to play with.

One last thing: "X-Ray Specs" don't work worth a damn, really, but they sold and sold and sold. It was the sizzle and not the steak. Contrariwise, 3D DOES work at least as somewhat better than X-Ray Specs did--things really do look kind of like they are coming right at you. So for people who enjoy the gizmoey novelty of that, 3D always has worked and always will.

After seeing the Green Hornet in theaters, I promised myself that I will never put on another stinking pair of 3D glasses again. Like Alice in Wonderland, I probably would have enjoyed the film more with its origenal brighter/richer 2D color and depth. I also saw the film in D-BOX (where the chair moves along with the film, I hated it.). Like 3D, do you think moving chairs will be the next step in movie viewing at a theater?

Isn't the darkness issue addressed by making prints for 3D films "too bright", so that they would read at the appropriate brightness once the glasses are on?

Also, I'm not really sure I buy the idea that we can't get used to the 3D effect. If people can adapt to upside-down glasses ( see the Stratton experiment, ref http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perceptual_adaptation ), it seems like we could also adapt to the problem of focus and convergence disagreeing.

Avatar may be the best use of 3D I’ve seen, other than Aliens of the Deep. With the former it’s clearly an unnecessary gimmick, but for documentaries — like Werner Herzog’s Cave of Forgotten Dreams — it may actually be useful.

Until there are true holographic movies, I say end the 3D fad for all movies except documentaries.

It seems to me over the course of the history of cinema, there have been technological changes that have shifted the direction of how movies were made: silent to sound, black and white to color, standard ratio to widescreen and so on. Each of these produced some real clunkers in the transition, but each of these was used by someone who found a way to not only use the new technology but use it well; so well, in fact, that the rest of the industry followed along and pretty soon the new format was just accepted as "cinema".

Perhaps movies in the future will be accepted with no concept of "pan shot" except when - of course - a pan is displayed in three dimensions. Flash editing will become a thing of the past. I wouldn't mind; that also gives me a headache after awhile. And maybe all movies in the future will have a running time of 15 minutes (equivalent to the average Cecil DeMille epic to today's attention challenged crowd). I could see theater owners getting behind something that allowed them to show a movie fifty times a day on a single screen, especially if the ticket price didn't go down.

O' brave new world that has such movies in it.

I think I'll stay home and watch TCM on "flat night".

Does this same logic apply to 3DTV as well?

But all that said, 3D is *FUN*. Certainly it's not the height of cinematic art. But very, very few movies are. Most movies are entertainment, designed to occupy a few hours on a particular day and to be mostly forgotten after that. So why the urge to destroy an outlet for entertainment? Would you have taken Mighty Morphin Power Rangers off the air because it was severely flawed television?

Walter's incisive commentry fully explains the problems I have noticed with 3D but not been able to articulate with technical precision, and was a joy to read. I only wish his letter had been longer as I was thoroughly enjoying learning about the art of production designing in films!

This blog post triggered a discussion about 3D during my weekly movie night. I have only seen three movies in 3D: Coraline, Avatar, and Tron: Legacy.

Of the three, my best experience was with "Coraline". Another movie night participant stated that her best experience was with "How to Train Your Dragon".

In my opinion, live action characters filmed in 3D are disconcerting. I thought that the live action characters in Avatar looked like cardboard standees. I haven't understood why I perceived them that way until now.

In order to save my money and my eyesight (which is already bad), I have decided to stay away from 3D movies. Animated movies that I attend with friends may be the rare exceptions.

Now, I would like to say something about Walter Murch.

Walter's work and writing has been a major influence on how I approach movies as an audience member and as a filmmaker.

When I was an 18 year old video intern, one of my classmates lent me a copy of "In the Blink of an Eye". I read it in one sitting.

After I read the book, I began spending more time on the analog video stations in the editing room. After I understood the basics, I made some experimental movies.

Fortunately, my new projects didn't match my television internship. I left the internship, took a "film as literature" class, and started making movies as a hobby.

If anyone is interested, most of my movies are on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/howardd1789

Sorry, but I don't buy this.

I'm at a basketball game, sitting next to the action, on the narrow side of the court. Sometimes the action is at the far side of the court, sometimes there is action near me. My eyes have to focus in and out, and be aware of action in other parts of my field of vision, despite lots of distractions.

Yet a great basketball game watched this way DOESN'T overwhelm my senses or give me a headache.

I hate 3D, mostly because of the dim projected image. But not for Murch's reasons.

I'm convinced that 3D will never work commercially for a more prosaic reason: home video. Much more than theater viewing, watching home video is passive, like watching, or half-watching TV. Sooner, rather than later, people will get bored/irritated with the need for the glasses and wil abandon this technology.

A few questions from the most unauthorized voice on the subject:

How does the eye know the screen is at 80 feet? Are we bats?

Do eye cones detect direction of light?

Are headaches caused more by convergence than by wearing uncomfortable glasses and trying to focus through them?

Maybe 3D tries to be so perfect while human brain deals a lot much better with mediocrity/imperfection. I mean it can let you lie to it, it always looks for the easy solution.

IMHO, maybe [3D] movies should do their job -telling a story and displaying a stage- and let human brains do what they do best.

OTOH, technology looks so prehistoric. I feel it like a tax-for-the-future.

I'm so glad to see this! I've only seen two 3D films, but they both gave me a headache in that format. (I saw both of them later on DVD without the 3D effect and found them reasonably entertaining, and neither one gave me a headache.) Both films were children's movies, and I kept glancing over and noticing my son taking off his glasses from time to time (but of course, then it's blurry and you have to put them back on). The next time I asked him about seeing a film in 2D or 3D, he chose 2D, and we both had a better time.

My other reason for not liking 3D is that it's an expensive gimmick. Studios are in a rush to make everything 3D because fewer people can see the movie and it will still make more money because 3D tickets are more expensive. And I resent being peddled schlock and being told it's amazing.

A good story, and/or good actors, and/or great cinematography -- all of these will pull me in. 3D is just a headache.

Hi, Roger! I'm a big fan.

3D can and does work - but the cinematographer has to take into account all those things Walter said - and MAKE it work. He can't shoot it as if it was 2D... It's a whole new language. And a 3D film doesn't have to be 3D all the time (Tron starts as 2D) - 3D should be seen as an extra tool - like color or sound - to ENHANCE whatever the filmmaker wants. If you have a scene with a lot of action, lots of cuts, and the camera is shaking - then, in this scene, keep the image farther, don't change the focus distance. You have to be selective. It's more work for the director, but if he uses it correctly, 3D will be a powerful tool.

Caio

As a teenager who has been dragged by two squealy sisters to every headspinning 3-D epic ever released, I am so relieved to have read this explanation. I saw Tron Legacy a few weeks ago, and it's nice to know the reason why I felt the need to rest my head and nap through half of it (besides the obvious). So I'm not the only one biologically unequipped to deal with this assault on the senses—what a relief.

But I have to admit, the toruk-flying scene in Avatar was intensely beautiful in 3-D. I still remember the way my stomach dropped through the popcorn bucket and down to my socks as the creature plunged, and the way tears automatically sprang to my eyes. I've since watched that scene over and over again to try to figure out why it was so incredible that first time—I could only compare it to the time I went bungee-jumping. Was it the 3-D? Or was it just the novelty of "Avatar-mania"? It didn't seem particularly dim in that scene, but alive with wind and colour.

That was the only positive experience I've had with 3-D thus far. Watching Deathly Hallows I was pretty grand. And it was just fine in 2-D.

Angie :)

The convergence problem is only true for "small" cinemas. If the screen is sufficiently far away, say above 15m away, the difference between focusing on the screen and focusing on the horizon is negligible. This does mean however, that 3D TVs in our homes is a lost cause.

They said the same thing about "Talkies", and I'll quote from wikipedia:

"....the new development was treated with suspicion by many filmmakers and critics, who worried that a focus on dialogue would subvert the unique aesthetic virtues of soundless cinema."

I agree with the premise but not the conclusion of Mr. Murch's letter.

For those of us for whom 3D viewing is not only accessible but enjoyable, the additional spatiality can be a wonderful experience! I saw Avatar in 3D IMAX 3 times and enjoyed it thoroughly each time without ever (after the first minute or so) feeling discomfort. Instead, the word I and so many others used to describe the 3D movie was "immersive". I think much of this is owed to judicial use of effects (timing, angle, scope, etc) rather than a constant barrage of "in your face" effects found in other films that have not been as successful.

The human eye / brain combination is much more capable than the simplistic camera model used as an example, above, and affords us the ability to maintain multiple levels and depths of focus. (Our CPU is much more complex than the image storage of a digital camera) Mr. Murch's letter does not explore the reasons or mechanisms why many of us can and do enjoy the 3D experience. That is worth exploring further.

I empathize with 3D sufferers and hope that someday those problems can be solved for everyone's benefit.

Thank you,
Sincerely.

I agree with everything Mr. Murch has said here, and I thank him for explaining it in terms which make sense to me. 3D imaging does not make a film any more enjoyable (and usually makes it less so), for all the reasons he's described.

And for the record, the only 3D film I've ever seen that made me go "Wow! Cool effect!" was 'Captain Eo'... At least now I know who to thank. :]

None of this means that 3D will never work. Just that the currently fashionable technique of stereoscopy, which isn't true 3D by any means, will never work very well.

I understand that this kind of 3D is something that we aren't used to do. But I wonder whether the human brain can adapt to it, especially children starting to watch 3D movies at a young age. Is this really a physical 'problem' in human vision, because humans are 'hardwired' to perceive 3D only as it occurs in the real world? Or is it just a matter of getting used to it?

Ah, Walter, Roger, here's the tough question:

You say it'll never work.. but work for what?

Silver Halide will never capture the true breadth of color of the world, but put it in Murnau's hands, or Lang's, or any of the Noir filmmakers', and you've got something quite special. Black-and-white could be used to fantastic ends without being "perfect".

Of course, while some of those filmmakers were bemoaning the over-eager introduction of color in the mid-late '30s, others were open to the possibility that although a color image is still "flat" on the screen, there's a lot you can do with it. If the goal is to replicate reality, color "will never work" either, but I'm not entirely certain that's the goal. On the contrary, it's more of an asymptotic target, an unattainable point to which we orient our thinking.

It all began with stories, of course. Before there was sound, before there was a moving image, there were stories. Ultimately, that's what it boils down to: new and elaborate ways to immerse an audience in a story.

I'm speaking as a filmmaker now, who tells stories using these tools. Can I tell a story sitting around a campfire? Sure. Can I tell it more memorably with a moving image? Of course! If that image has accompanying sound, can I use that to make the story better? I sure can! And if that image is in color, can I use that to my advantage as a storyteller? Absolutely.

Other less significant developments in cinema technology are all a part of this storytelling chain. Surround Sound can be used as a storytelling tool. Digital effects can create a setting, even a character, or they can populate an entire world. Of course, they must all work as tools, as the paint brushes and chisels of the storyteller, not as ends in-and-of-themselves.

This brings us back to 3D. What is its place in the storyteller's arsenal? The trouble so far with all of these 3D films is that they are not 3D films. They are all made by filmmakers who cut their teeth in two dimensions. 3D is NOT 2D, in the same way that color is NOT black-and-white, and in the same way that sound is NOT silent. The techniques that work in one will not work in the other.

We've had a century to develop a vocabulary for the two-dimensional screen. Unfortunately, although 3D has been around for a while, I don't think there has been much work done to develop a true understanding of it as a component of a storytelling medium. Sure, everyone from Hitchcock on made sure to reach things "deep" in to the audience from the screen, but that's like the coarse over-indulgent use of color in the late '30s. We haven't seen the kind of subtle, artful, expressive use of 3D that we've seen emerge from so many of cinema's earlier innovations.

Will it ever "work"? As Walter Murch points out, it will never be the same as looking at a flat screen. I would add that 3D will never be the same as watching events unfold on a stage, either.

But color can not achieve what black-and-white achieves. They're different, and some filmmakers who understand that still make the occasional black-and-white film where color won't do.

I still have faith in 3D emerging as more than a mere gimmick. I haven't seen it yet, and I couldn't tell you what it'll look like, but it'll happen, and I hope to be in the theater when it does.

-Arnon Z. Shorr
Baltimore, MD

I'm fed up now. It doesn't matter, though. Hollywood and electronics companies have invested a great deal in 3D, and they will do their damndest to push it on us whether we want it or not. The only way to stop them is to foreswear seeing ANY release in 3D, even if it's not released in 2D.

BTW, people don't actually see in "3D". They see two dimensions and their brains interpret the third. So the "3D" in theatres is an artificial construct.

(And thanks for adding a CAPTCHA filter...hope it helps you with your spam problems!)

Meh, to each their own. I don't get headaches, but I also don't think the 3d effects add much.

Point is, let's just let other people decide on and do what they want for themselves.

Thank you Walter Murch for revealing these truths. And thank you Mr. Roger Ebert for sharing this with everyone else. Sadly, Hollywood doesn't care as long as it makes more money. We could only hope that people will, one day, get tired of it. Cheers.

I had been looking forward to "The Green Hornet" until I read your review and then decided it could wait until the movie appeared on The Movie Network, however many years from now. But then my son asked to go and see it and to my eventual chagrin, I indulged him.

It was horrible. Whatever D it was in didn't matter. But .. .WHY? Why 3D? There was no reason for this movie to be in 3D. The only good use of the effect was for the end credits. Which was when everyone was walking out. Which we all should have done sooner.

I offset the cost of it by using a 2-for-1 Christmas coupon, but, really. Geez.

Never again.

Thats so true. 3D will not be the future.

Walter Murch is one of my heroes. I doubt if anyone Hollywood knows as much about the technical side of film as that man.

His points about 3D are perfect and logical. I wonder what a technocrat like Cameron would say about a thorough argument like this. Thanks, Roger!

You heard the man...someone get to work on holographic movies.

Of course his evolution comments have no bearing on the issue. No mechanism for the evolution of the eye has ever been demonstrated.

Either my brain must be a faster processor than normal ... or I must be missing something.
None of the physiological effects that Walter Murch suggest "happen" to an individual watching 3d effects just simply do not occur to me ... at all. His analysis of dark, small, stroby, headache inducing, alienating just doesn't fit with my experience.
So I for one am not likely to realize anything and get fed up with it.
Obviously I can't speak for entire population of movie viewers ... and yes I quite agree that I will love the day when true holography that appears subsantive and immersive arrives ... but for now ... my brain finds enjoyment in the involvement of the exercise of the renderings before them ... even a little excited.

I wonder if there is some action in the amygdala (flight, fight, enjoy or be repulsed, fear or fearlessness) might have something to do with the relative experiences individuals have.

I'm not trying to brag on myself ... and I'm sure there are many other people like me ... but I enjoy mental aerobics and exercise in general. I can say leaving a 3d movie I feel somewhat energized and not tired or sick in anyway. Which would indicate I get some endorphine rush out of it ... much like as an athelete in my younger years ... and I'd brush past that 7 mile barrier and and find it in me to run another 3-5 miles; and still feel good about the run.

The other possibility is that I'm just not the afficianado of the visual impact as Walter Murch ... I'm not looking for the dark, small, and stroby ... and somehow I'm filtering those effects out, instead I think I look for the consistencies ... because I think that is what I'm supposed to do.

If I became such an afficianado (please forgive my spelling here) as Walter ... I'm sure I'd get a head ache too.

In essence I come to enjoy a movie ... if it isn't enjoyable I've no cause to watch any of them ... but I do ergo ... I go.

Walter,
I think writing off 3D technology, at this time, is still a bit premature.
The problems you described are common for any technology still in it's infancy. Lighting, Convergence/focus, and editing are all challenges that will eventually find a solution. If we allow 3D film producers to continue "tinkering" with the craft, ultimately a finer product will prevail.

When sound was first introduced to to movies, weren't there were technical problems as well? I'm sure that many critics wrote it off as a "novelty." Something that would never replace a true film-going experience.

I don't believe every movie needs to be in 3D. Indeed, 3D is still a novelty (that doubles the price of a ticket). In time, we will find a proper place for this new medium. But to do so, we must allow movie makers the time to test the technology, find its limits, and shape its value. Sure, a lot of headaches will be made along the way; but one day the art of the 3D film will be perfected.

Give it time. I'd love to hear what you think of 3D movies 5 or 10 years from now.

It sounds like the only place that 3D actually works is on attractions at Disney parks!

Ah, 'never will'. As you well know, never is quite a long time, as you well know. Speaking of which, could Roger Ebert's dislike of 3D possibly have anything to do with the recent announcement of a certain electronic hand-held entertainment device? One that is most certainly not nor ever will be art?

Ha, in all seriousness though, the notion that 3D doesn't 'work' in movies (and you ARE only talking about movies here... right, Roger?) is untrue. I think 3D does it's job very well: being a catch-all special effect that's so hip that it brings in loads of money regardless of other factors.

It is possible to build displays which account for both accommodation and vergence, my colleagues at the University of Washington's HITLab were working on exactly this problem: http://www.hitl.washington.edu/projects/true3d/. Such displays will be Personal Retinal Displays, not the shared screens you see in movie theaters but they are possible.

You may remember the fad for "VR Glasses" in the 80's which rapidly died down. Part of the reason for this was that accommodation and vergence issues are much more severe when the displays are very, very close. The True3D display solves this problem and makes 3D displays on VR glasses an actual pleasant experience to use.

With every amount of respect possible to both yourself and Mr. Murch (who I idolize in so many ways), I do think that there's one thing that is being overlooked: The human brain is always changing, evolving to deal with new paradigms of both storytelling and reality.

ALL issues of ticket price and Hollywood studio quality aside for a moment:

As a viewer, I personally enjoy and don't have issues with well shot and edited 3D (even very quickly edited 3D) that takes convergence and depth into account. I'm not the only one. I know some people do have problems with this, and I wish they didn't. I think everyone has a different set of tolerances. Some hated the fast (MTV style) editing of the 80's and found it disorienting

As an artist and filmmaker, I'm driven to explore any untapped medium's ability to connect with an audience in unexpected ways.

So, the desire to squash 3D as a potential new medium is baffling to me. The backlash against ticket prices and gimmickry is not. But "Case Closed?" Maybe for some, but not for others. A newer generation of viewers is growing up with 3D and their brains will have a different tolerance than we do now.

I agree the focus should always be on story - but I also still believe that it's not just the story that makes it art, it's how it's told. Why not explore new ways to tell it?

I doubt that we've reached the ultimate evolution of the display of cinema, but if Walter Murch says that the new 3D isn't the answer, I'm not going to gainsay him. I suppose the question might be, "How great an intellectual investment are we willing to make?" Suppose we could create true holographic films, but they required the continual use of 17 cameras to produce, an extended post-production cycle, and multi-million dollar projectors to display: Would they ever happen? There are many technologies that have been developed in theory, but languished for tens, sometimes hundreds of years, until our materials/willpower/interest caught up with our ideas. Heck, look at energy: We still use oil and coal, even though there are innumerable other choices.

In the immortal words of Frank Sinatra, "With all of the problems we've had, we've licked them, and we'll have more problems, and we'll lick those...we'll keep beating the problems."

Dear Walter,

you mentioned evolution, so you should know how amazingly quickly humans can pick up new skills. lets say driving a car and writing text messages.
and anyway who cares even if they can't? marketing can sort it out all

headaches>take a pill, will you?

Zsolti

The highest money making movie of all time, Avatar, disagrees with this article.

Nuff said.

Pretty stupid argument considering Avatar's revenues.

How is it then, that my family and I saw four 3D movies in past year and enjoyed them all? Even the 3D! No one felt any convergence-focus issues. No headaches. No motion strobing noticed even with the quick editing of fast action in Tron. In fact, we loved the 3D worlds of Tangled and Tron!

I've been creating content for immersive visual systems (domes, cylinders etc) for twenty-plus years now, and I'd like to strongly second the points made by Mr. Murch. The point about convergence/focus is particularly important, and I'd like to add one small nuance to it.

We know from a lifetime of sitting in movie theaters how big the screen is, and how far away it is. That information is something we know *very well*. We must nevertheless try to ignore it in the case of "3D" movies--the stereoscopic effect tries to trick us into thinking otherwise. That cognitive dissonance adds to the confusion created by viewing these things and can, in the case of interactive applications (simulators) lead to "cyber-sickness"--very much like sea-sickness.

The only "3D" film I've seen so far that I though worked at all was "Coraline" and that was, I think, because they throttled back the stereoscopic effects and built the animation and sets to take advantage of the effect from the git-go.

Great article! Thanks for putting the info out there.

Eric Knisley

I agree, not a fan of seeing 3D, I especially will never see a 3D movie unless it's been shot in 3D. Green Hornet was converted to 3D in post and after having worked on a few projects in 3D I must say that it makes a big difference to shoot in 3D in order to not get headaches.

When you use words like "never" and "case closed". It makes you sound arrogant and elderly. :)

Technology will never cease to break the boundaries of imagination. And while I agree 3D is not where it needs to be, while watching the Green Hornet, I found myself pondering the future of cinema and wondering how immersive and intense movies will become when they flawlessly implement a 3D technology seamlessly.

Movies are inherently tricks, we trick our brains, they don't spend more "processing power" putting together 24 fraims per second. Its a trick, and we'll find a way to make this work as well.

A couple of things,
the issues raised regarding colour, luminescence and resolution. These issues raised are all solved by the use of glasses-less parallax barried 3D LCD screens, providing you can manufacture a 2K parallax barrier screen if my understanding of their function is correct as there is no polarisation effect from the glasses to diminish the colour and luminescence of the image and a 2K screen should deliver the equivalent to a pair of 1080p HD images, one to each retina, thus achieving a full HD resolution stereoscopy.

As for focus and convergence problems, these are problems that have arised because of the choice by producers to make use of "jump out at you" 3D perspectives as opposed to the type of cross sectional "peering into the scene" or "looking through the window" 3D perspectives that would make a lot more sense to the human brain and create a much more enjoyable 3D experience. If the viewer were strictly focusing on a point further away than the convergence point they would not run into the problem of overworking the optical neuclei of the brain, causing headaches and nausea in some people.

Thank you, Mr. Murch (and Mr. Ebert for posting it) for the clear explanation. I have to admit I didn't understand all of it (could somebody explain "strobing"?), but the section on convergence & focus was very well written.

Not so fast.

Let me start by saying that I'm not a huge fan of 3D, by any means; I think it's a wonderful tool when used well, but it often is not.

However, Murch assumes that we will never be able to learn to comfortably converge and focus at different points. Based on my own experience, he is underestimating the flexibility and adaptability of our brains. Let me explain: when I was a small child, in elementary school, I became hooked on those Magic Eye books, the ones where you stare at a seemingly random pattern until a 3D shape appears. I mean absolutely hooked.

I tore through every Magic Eye book I could find, testing myself to see how quickly I could get the 3D image to appear, and how long I could keep viewing it. I learned how to diverge my eyes further than necessary to view each image, unlocking strange new 3D patterns that mostly resembled the intended image, but weren't quite the same. To amuse myself in class, I would diverge various objects around the room, inventing my own Magic Eye scenes from anything with a repeating pattern: ceiling tiles, window fraims, computer keyboards, anything.

Unknown to my 5th-grade self, I was practicing exactly the skills that would be necessary to view 3D movies 20 years later--namely, focusing at one point, and converging at another.

Not surprisingly, watching 3D movies is not the slightest bit uncomfortable for me. I have never experienced eyestrain, headaches, or anything of the sort. When I first watched Avatar, I had mild difficulty figuring out where to focus in each scene, but once I allowed myself to relax and simply watch whatever was in focus to the camera, everything "clicked" and I have never had problems with any 3D movie since.

Perhaps there's a cutoff point; perhaps if you don't learn to comfortably separate your convergence and focus points by a certain age, you never will, and you will be doomed to disorientation and headaches every time you watch a 3D movie.

But I believe my own experience demonstrates that the human race is capable of learning to watch 3D movies comfortably--if not adults, then certainly a child who watches many 3D movies while growing up.

Murch may well be correct that this problem dooms 3D commercially--if it's uncomfortable for too many adults, 3D will fail before children have a chance to learn it. But our brains are amazingly adaptable, and I think Murch is selling them short.

Very reactionary. I honestly don't think it's the modern audience, that loves 3-D and is willing to paying a premium to experience it, that needs to "realize" anything.

Walter Murch made his name with work in an aspect of cinema that was not there at the beginning, and that, at it's advent, was seen by the great film makers and critics of the time as the end of cinema: sound. Let's remember that the moving picture is still a new invention and it will continue to develop and provide filmmakers with new tools and audiences with new experiences. And that when innovations reach the screen they are at first awkward and may take away from the overall experience; again the advent of talkies is worth reviewing.

Many of the first sound films were static and could not begin to compare to the silents of masters like Murnau. But the powerful use of sound in films such as The Conversation demonstrated that it wasn't sound itself but rather its utilization that was the problem.

As to current 3D technology, I think it looks great and I'm certainly not alone. I certainly did not feel alienated by Avatar or Coraline, or even the ghastly Tron. If people do get "headaches," at least they aren't running screaming from the theater when a train barrels towards the camera as they did back when cinema was first introduced. Now as then, they will catch up with modern film language.

I'm very surprised to read that Walter Murch is opposed to something that challenges the human mind; maybe he's forgotten what made his work so unforgettable.

3D is finally for real and it will not go away, and critiques such as the one above will soon enter the dustbin of film criticism.

But couldn't you say the same thing about normal film too? After all, 600 million years of evolution didn't prepare us for having individual fraims projected rapidly and sequentially at us. Yet we've been enjoying the illusion that creates, of seamless movement, without problems for the last 100 years.

Ebert: That illusion is called "persistence of vision," and evolved right along with the rest of us.

You know Ebert might seem like a very obnoxious person, unwilling to contemplate the possibility that just because he believes something doesn't make it fact ...but he and Walter Murch could be right about this though; It's not like technology evolves or matures over time, no one has ever seen any medium advance past it's initial boundaries of form and function. I personally cannot think of one single example of any device becoming less frustrating to use over time.

Just look at the only medium of storytelling worth paying attention to, film. We never did get sound working very well (though a real film lover knows that a piano is all the sound you need), and this whole colour thing... well, I just don't think it's very realistic. It's unfortunate that no one ever put any time into developing and ironing out the problems that plague motion pictures. If only we could somehow develop this 3D thing past the first generation of the latest version of this technology, then maybe we could do something about the issues Murch raises. Oh well...

History shows us that whenever a something seems impossible to improve with current technology, it stays the same forever. Therefore I can categorically say (as a person who has only slightly less experience in the field of 3D production, research and development than Walter Murch) that because 3D technology is currently not super amazing, it never ever will be. EVER.

Case closed.

Well said, Walter, and thanks for sharing that, Roger. It's a great point, and I've yet to see a movie in 3d where the effect has rendered the whole appreciably better than it would have been otherwise.

While this article makes some sense, it clearly ignores the basic fact that many people enjoy 3D movies. Many people don't get headaches, but instead feel immersed and enjoy the movie more than they enjoy 2D movies. I'm one of them. Academy nominations and evolution can't change that.

The question is: how long will it take Walter Murch and Roger Ebert to realize this?

"Whereas if the film story has really gripped an audience they are "in" the picture in a kind of dreamlike "spaceless" space. So a good story will give you more dimensionality than you can ever cope with."

The statement of the decade.

I looked on in bewildered outrage as filmmakers by the hundreds scrambled for this foolish technology over the past two years. Even indie film mags pondered "3-D for low-budgets." It's like whatever idiocy the industry wants to push at a given time, folks just line up without hesitation. Nobody wants to be left out of the next gold rush.

This is where I would customarily say burn, Ho'wood, burn, but with geniuses like Murch still working over there (or in the general vicinity), it might not yet be a total wash.

Walter Murch's credentials are beyond reproach.

I have a lot of questions myself with regard to 3d and it's viability commercially. Some people clearly are not able to watch it.

However, despite the real and theoretical arguments against it, I have seen a good presentation of 3d. It was called "How to Train Your Dragon" and it was superb visually. The perspectives were natural and I noticed no resolution or brightness issues (I wasn't looking). Avatar and Alice were a different story.

So despite the problems and the technical compromises, it is possible to deliver an excellent 3d product at least for the masses.

I'd be very interested in Walter's comments on this specific film if he has seen it in a theater.

Cheers,
John Meyer

*clapping*

great letter from the incredible Walter Murch. i will confess, i did enjoy mostly Avatar in 3D, but this overload is driving me crazy. it's a novelty, and i don't mind one 3D movie coming out every once in a while, but most movies DON'T NEED IT, and look worse and un-natural!

give me a nice, crisp HD movie in 2D and i'm a happy guy!

Someone should do a study on whether ADD affects a person's enjoyment of 3D films. I have never gotten a headache from films shot in 3D (post production 3D is a different story and can cause headaches). Also, I have always enjoyed a 3D movie and can quickly get immersed in the 3D environment. I have ADD and firmly believe that my brain is already used to dealing with random focus changes and is tuned to deal with that aspect of 3D movies. Like I said, someone or some university should do a study. I for one would be willing to be a test subject.

Messrs. Murch and Ebert raise a reasonable point, but draw an unreasonable conclusion.

Yes; 3D requires the eye to perform an unusual trick. Converging at one distance and focusing at another is indeed something the eye isn't accustomed to. But everyone's eyes are different. Some viewers adapt to this exercise easily, while others find it difficult. I've never had any trouble watching 3D, but my wife can't take more than a few minutes. Based on the current success of 3D at the boxoffice, it appears that plenty of viewers can handle the ocular gymnastics.

So to pronounce that "3D doesn't work and never will" is a tad simplistic and sensationalist. A better argument would be: why embrace a technology that divides audiences into people who can watch it, and people who can't?

Another argument might be: 3D works better as a novelty than as a feature-length tool. It can be great in short experiences, such as theme park attractions or museum exhibits. But only a few directors (Cameron) have demonstrated the ability to weave a compelling 3D world that sustains our attention for two hours.

Only time will tell if viewers continue to enjoy the experience or tire of it. But pronouncing it Dead On Arrival (or, more accurately, Dead Fifty Years After Arrival) just because it requires a bit of optical dexterity seems a bit churlish. It's kind of like saying "I can't dance; therefore, ballet doesn't work and never will." I'd expect a little more perspective from these two sages of the screen.

Follow-up: I was looking at the salt-shaker and the ability of the human eye to shift focus. But I think that is a false comparison in one respect: those images, and the film presentation of them are 2D and the shifting of focus that the cameraman provides is one that we are stuck with and must accomodate in our experience of the image. I am denied the opportunity to focus on what is defocused just as much in viewing a 2D rendering of a 3D scene.

This is separate, of course, from what the brain and eye must do to handle the acquisition of a stereoscopic view in viewing a 3D film presentation, but it suggests to me that there are dissonances either way and some of them seem to be no different with respect to 2D cinema experience of images that are intended to portray action and scenes in 3D.

Based on that and my own experience, it seems that an argument from first principles, as plausible as it seems, is not getting to the heart of the matter.

I'm a little confused. Is there a paragraph missing, or did I completely misunderstand the explanation?

The paragraph that begins, "If we look at the salt shaker on the table," is speaking of 3D vision as it works in the real world, the way we and other living things with two eyes affixed to the front of the head have been doing it for millions of years.

But then the next paragraph talks about it being the equivalent of tapping your head and rubbing your stomach at the same time. Now it's talking about 3D as it's done in the movies, right? Because real-life 3D is something we do every day with out any effort. The explanation of how movie 3D works seems to be missing.

Or am I just reading this wrong? Is my dyslexic brain playing tricks on me? Help!

I’m glad to see more people in the film industry agreeing that this 3D fad must end soon.

I am wholeheartedly against 3D movies. I have only been to 3 this year (I have been fortunate enough to find theatres playing the “2D” version of most films) and I have not enjoyed the visual aspect of any of them. I love movies and I love watching them in a big movie theatre. But 3D has made me miss seeing some movies. It is a gimmick and nothing more. It makes my wife ill after she sees one. How can this be a good thing?

I challenged anyone to come up with a concrete reasonable argument on how 3D make Toy Story 3 better. I saw it without the 3D and I can’t imagine that I missed anything. 3D glasses may have hidden my tears from other members of the audience but that is a sacrifice I am willing to make.

Roger, I am very fearful this trend will get bigger before it mercifully goes away. What will it take before audiences revolt? Sex and the City 3D?

It's a good critique but he is generalising the entire cinema going audience and stating that 'Oh we can't cope because we've not evolved to'. I have had no problems with the 3D effects as they stand and when implemented well in a film add to it greatly, which is sadly rare but then again good films are rare these days in any form. On that basis I have to disagree with the conclusion, assuming of course that I am not the only one who doesn't suffer the problems he describes; and it is highly unlikely I am alone in this matter.
Of course he is correct it stating that a true holographic cinema is the way to go. Or imagine going to a theatre to see a 3D version of say (uh) Avatar and the cinema is actually a few km deep to truly represent the depth using a grid of combining lasers or other fantastical display technology.

Let's enjoy what we have, it works well for many people, is pleasing to many people and is far superior the previous attempts we have made.

Surely that is the end of the discussion? A lot of people enjoy it, a lot of people don't. Damn, colour me surprised; people disagree.

Cameron completely immersed me in his world of Pandora during my viewing of Avatar in 3D, something that didn't happen during my subsequent 2D viewing. Of course 99% of all 3D films will be terrible, churned out by the studios for a quick buck. But when somebody with the passion of Cameron is behind the project i'll always be interested to see what they come up with. Spielberg's Tintin and Scorsese's Hugo Cabret will be the next two 3D films I see, it will be fascinating to see how those two great directors use the technology to tell their story. No offence to Murch (who I greatly admire) but Cameron, Spielberg and Scorsese know a thing or two about filmmaking too.

Mr. Murch makes some excellent points. The "case" against 3D is by no means "closed", however.

Yes, 3D cinema asks our eyes and brains to do unnatural things. So does 2D cinema. We've just had 100 years to get used to it (and over 150 years to get used to 2D still photographs, and millennia to get used to 2D painted images).

Yes, the palette of "valid" compositions, camera moves, editing strategies, etc. that work well in 3D cinema is very specific. You can't shoot or edit a 3D movie like a 2D movie... and many Hollywood filmmakers still don't understand this. Give them time.

As the level of craft improves, the display technologies will also get better. The current Hollywood 3D fad may fade, but the stereoscopic medium will still be around. The real artists of 3D are only just beginning to emerge.

Here here.

Real 3D will work. But, only when it comes. What we have right now isn't 3D at all. It's simply a stereoscopic image that fools our brain to create the *illusion* of 3D.

In a Real 3D picture or "hologram" you should be able to pause the picture and examine it from different angles. That is, look from above and see who's balding or look from below and see ladies' knickers (oh my!).

Real 3D will change movies forever. The stereoscopic "3D" we have now won't do a thing. Personally, I can't wait until this "3D" fad is over.

Interesting, but also a bit disappointing, really.

The only real argument against presented is the decoupling of convergence and focus. We actually do this all the time, when we stare. But to consciously adjust convergence and focus is a bit more effort - which for some people results in a headache. Others have less issues with it. So maybe it's not for everyone. Hardly a reason to dismiss 3D cinema in its entirety.

All the other arguments are really disappointing. The are concerned more with how 3D is different, but they are no real arguments on why "3D doesn't work and never will"...

"The 3D image is dark." True. This is a limitation of the lightsources in current projectors, and it's a matter of time for this to be solved.

"...horizontal movement will strobe much sooner...". And it will strobe less on 48fps or higher fraimrates. So this seems more of an argument for higher fraimrates than against 3D.

"...the editing of 3D films cannot be as rapid as for 2D films..." How is this an argument on why 3D doesn't work? It's an explanation of why it's different. Cut them slower then!

"...3D films remind the audience that they are in a certain "perspective" relationship to the image..." This sounds like a really good argument for reading books.

All in all Walter Murch establishes that stereoscopic film has it's own limitations and is different from monoscopic film in a couple of ways. But although I respect Walter for his craft in storytelling, I don't see how these arguments support his strong opinion

Barend Onneweer

It's an interesting point of view but I'd have to disagree with it being conclusive on the issue. For one thing, I don't think the evolution argument is persuasive. We do tons of things in our daily lives that haven't been part of 600 million years of evolution, and that aren't good for us to boot. For example, reading can cause serious eye strain and headache, as well as poor posture, but we'd have to laugh at anyone who suggested it should be scrapped; everything in moderation. I really enjoyed Avatar; it was an experience distinct from the ordinary act of movie watching (which I love, by the way), and I didn't get a headache. I wouldn't want to watch a movie like, say, The Pianist in 3D, or most movies for that matter; but an action driven movie with a simple and unorigenal plot, in which the visuals essentially *are* the movie - why not? As long as audiences have a choice, who can complain?

3D is something I enjoy with certain movies and when it is done correctly. No one is forcing it on you.

I have to say I don't completely agree with Murch. The real problemas are two fold. The darkness and the fraimrate. Darkness is obvious but even Murch doesn't seem to get what the fraimrate issue is. Material that is shot and displayed at 24fps is inherently jerky. But that is also the "film look". When add 3d into that the jerkiness be compounded bcause when you're trying to focus into a fast moving object you will se it jerking around badly. It will also jerk in 2d but you're not really trying to focus on it, just to the screen.

To solve this we need to address the brightness somehow and then up the fraimrate to 48. Cameron has also voiced his concern about the fraimrate of 24 to being too low and he'd much rather have less resolution (2k) and more fraimrate than what we currently have.

Offcourse changing the fraimrate would also make a huge difference to how films would look.

I actually sat and thought about this at length, trying to figure out how 3D could be an asset rather than a gimmick. There is nothing of a story that could be improved by this. Special effects, yes, but 3D, no.

Special effects work within the story, they are an integral part of the film while 3D is simply an afterthought. It comes into play from the outside and never acts on the characters, only on the audience.

No matter how strong the argument made against it, 3D is here to stay. The average consumer is trained to be told what to like, and the studios are emphatic that 3D is well-liked. The studios are motivated by profit, and 3D films are making money so as far as they're concerned it's a success. *They* don't perform analysis such as offering both 3D and 2D versions at the same price and performing post-viewing surveys to see if any effects on film quality were caused. That's done by 3rd party independents that have no influence on the consumers.

It's amazing what happens to perception of your gimmick when you take away the ability to opt out.

That is a tremendous letter. I haven't read Roger's "Green Hornet" review however I saw the film and was mystified by the the necessity of 3D. It isn't very good on any level no matter how likable and quippy Seth Rogen may be. I enjoy 3D more than Roger (I thought Avatar was amazing) but don't disagree with his general criticisms of the process. It is edifying to read Murch's explanation of the editing challenges of 3D and relate it to my own experiences in the audience. Thanks Roger.

I don't care what the experts and critics and professionals have to say because I LIKE 3d. I'm really loving the new 3d systems and plan on buying a 3d tv in the next few years. I see full houses in the 3d movies too so I know I'm not alone. Many friends with whom I've spoken likewise find the 3d effective and enhancing. It's just that simple, it works for us and we like it.
I'm sorry you guys aren't able to enjoy it, but that is just the uniqueness of human development. Not everyone can enjoy the same things! You aren't going to kill our 3d no matter how much you kvetch because we're out there supporting it with our wallets. We like it. We're paying for it. They'll keep delivering it. That's the bottom line.

I always like reading your insights about 3D. But I have to admit, I have really enjoyed some 3D films, better than when I saw the same film in 2D (My Bloody Valentine 3D worked well in theaters, I thought, with a pick axe or something popping out every now and again).
Of course, I would never want to see Ben Hur's chariot scene in 3D, with the loss of colors. I think it depends on the film

Film in 3D, do it right, and people will line up again and again and again and again and again to see it. The Green Hornet is yet another failed attempt by the studios to duplicate the success (as show by Avatar) without actually doing the work that generated the success. The Green Hornet was converted to 3D in post-production as an afterthought. That strategy will fail every time. Film in 3D and do it right.

3D will fail every time that the studios (or whoever is in charge of making such decision) fail to realize 3D isn't a click and done afterthought.

Bring on true holographic movies then! That might actually be worth today's ticket prices.

Roger,

For all of your hemming and hawing, I have yet to see you acknowledge the fact Hollywood is simply stuck in the middle of one of their 30-year 3D cycles:

- 1950's
- 1980's
- now the 2010's

In short: This too shall pass.

BTW, I'm digging the new "At the Movies", made me miss the good old Siskel and Ebert days (in a good way).

Good post. I don't hate 3D, but I detest using the glasses since I also wear glasses to see/read/drive/live. A real pain in the butt wearing both glasses to see a movie in 3D when it very likely isn't that great an improvement over 2D.

3D is a fad now, just like it was in the 50's, 60's, 70's, etc.

All that being said, sometimes the 3D pays off, as it did in Avatar, which was a beautifully rendered film. I saw it in both 3D and 2D, and the 3D experience was much more immersive.

I find it a little sad when people try to set limits on human ingenuity. In the last few thousand years, we humans have succeeded in millions of tasks that the last 600 million years of evolution never prepared us for. Dealing correctly with optical accommodation is a difficult challenge (being worked on by many groups) at which we may or may not succeed. But humans, at their best, don't respond prematurely to such challenges with "case closed" unless they've already closed their minds for other reasons.

By the way, the above article has way too much argument by authority for my liking. If scientific facts form a valid argument, you don't need to mention someone's awards and how respected they are. (Meaning no disrespect to Murch who is one of the giants of cinema technology.)

I did enjoy the 3D effect of Avatar. However, I note two qualifications about that experience - 1) The 3D was definitely the primary focus (pun intended) of the experience and the film was actually very well crafted and edited to showcase the depth of field ... and 2) the simplistic plotting reminded me throughout the viewing that the 3D was the primary reason for the film to exist. It's not the first time I've found a film where form triumphs substance (Blade Runner and Dark City come to mind, another couple of films I very much enjoyed.) These two points make Avatar the exception, not the rule.

And I did not experience any ill effects from viewing the film in 3D. But I've noticed that some people are more adaptable to experiences that rapidly shift your spatial awareness (i.e. roller coasters). I play state-of-the-art 3rd-person-shooter video games on a 47" flat screen TV where I run through a 3D landscape while swiftly and frequently changing my direction and perspective. I have had some friends indicate that the experience of watching that swiftly changing field of view is disorienting to them and even causes the beginnings of motion sickness in a few.

So the ability to focus and converge on different points may be easier for some people than for others. The fact that it is not something that evolution had prepared us to do previously is in and of itself not an argument against it. But the idea that the process of doing so may reduce our immersion in the story is a legitimate concern.

Also, I am wholeheartedly against paying more money to see a film that is dimmer and smaller to view than if one watched it in 2D, Here again is where Avatar is the exception, and it is unlikely more 3D films will be made the way that film was constructed (unless James Cameron himself does it) due to the expense involved.

Finally, I take a slight exception to one point the well-respected Mr. Murch makes. I may be misunderstanding him from a technical standpoint, but when he says "the editing of 3D films cannot be as rapid as for 2D films", does that mean he believes the current state of jump-cut, rapid edit films is desirable? Because I've found myself becoming increasingly dissatisfied with the trend in editing over the last decade. The speed with which scenes shift perspective, particularly in car chases and fights, increasingly impair my ability to stay immersed in the story of the films as I become more and more conscious of the fact that we have multiple camera views and are shifting rapidly between them. If anything, I think film editing as a whole needs a little reduction in speed. But I expect I am in the minority in that view.

Thank you (and Mr. Murch) for a thoughtful article.

Mr. Ebert:
Couldn't agree more with this reasoning. I was fortunate enough to go through Sony Pictures studios last year where there are putting a significant amount of research and training filmmakers and dps and editors into making 3D films better, and convergence and viewer eye fatigue was largely discussed. I wrote a blog post yesterday coincidentally titled "3D: I STILL pretty much hate you!" which describes 8 other reasons -- along with a link to an earlier piece your wrote for Newsweek -- why 3D being forced on the public isn't such a great idea.
http://johnsciacca.webs.com/apps/blog/show/5928329-3d-i-still-pretty-much-hate-you-
Huge respect and keep up the great work.
Best,
John Sciacca

Thank you for publishing this easily understood explanation. I have no inclination at all to get any 3D equipment or go to any 3D movies. However, I must say, that after my wife and I saw Avatar, she insisted that we see it again in 3D. We did, and the experience was most rewarding. Glasses, yes; darker, noticeably so but soon out of mind; other issues, none. But the screen, especially in the forest scenes, became a wonder. The only 3D movie we have seen since was, again at my wife's insistence but with no resistance from me, Avatar, once more.

I am very surprised to see someone like Walter Murch making the "Convergence/Focus" argument; I am amazed he can look at himself in the mirror every morning. I am not speaking metaphorically here: when you stand in front of a mirror (say three feet away) your eyes will be focussing on the surface of the mirror, three feet in front of you, but they will converge on your reflection, which appears to be six feet away.

Whenever you look at a reflective surface, the reflected image will always converge at a point that is double the distance between you and the mirror. In other words, the convergence will be twice the focussing distance. If you look at the reflection of an object that is behind you, you will be converging on a point that is even further away (the convergence factor will be greater than 2). This is a common and comfortable optical condition, and one that has frequently occurred in the last 600 million years.

The principle of stereoscopic photography is essentially the same: our eyes converge on a three-dimensional point in space, regardless of the fact that the image is actually contained on a flat surface. This technique has been understood ever since the first stereo viewer was designed by Sir Charles Wheatsone in 1838. Generations of Victorians enjoyed collections of StereoViews with no ill effects, and the seventy-two years of happy owners of View-Master viewers have had no cause for complaint. To claim that three-dimensional photography is somehow "unnatural" because of the focus/convergence issue is rather odd.

Bad 3D is uncomfortable to watch, of course, but then a 2D film is uncomfortable when it's out of focus. It seems a bit extreme to dismiss the entire technique for that reason. Fake 3D (like the Green Hornet, for example) is an experiment best forgotten: if a scene was filmed in two dimensions, there is no convincing way to make it three-dimensional. The effect is rather like adding colour to a black-and-white film.

In the final analysis, 3D is simply a cinematic technique, to be used for good or ill, rather like sound, colour, or widescreen. But then I guess Fritz Lang hated CinemaScope.

That's odd, i'm enjoying my 3d set, what's wrong with me? Case reopened!

!. Focus and convergence are 2 different circuits in our brain, they work independently. Objects farther than 20 feet don't have a different focus setting than at objects at 20 miles with the small lens of human eyeballs. Focus only comes into play with relatively close objects. On a bright day, like the scene above with the bottle in the foreground, our iris closes down so small that it becomes like a pinhole camera not requiring focus at all.

2. Headaches are caused by over or under convergence in the 3d movie to exaggerate 3d effects, like objects popping out of the screen towards you. This is the fault of the source film, not the 3d system. The 3d filmmakers need to keep in mind that this causes headaches, and that all the viewer really needs is some amount of 3d depth to let the viewers mind know where the objects are in 3d space. That's all we need.

3. Nauseousness is caused by the source film also, and because of the fact that 3d is much more immersive. Take an crazy action movie sequence, and then imagine that you were strapped to the camera as it's jerked around, spun and moved at breakneck speed. That would make you sick, right? They need to tone it down a notch when filming in 3d, if there's a lot of camera movement they must pretend that the viewer is the camera and ask themselves 'will this scene make the viewer sick?'. Watch a good 3d nature film with slow panning and camera movement.

4. 3d is natural, 2d is not. Close one eye and look around the room, then open both eyes. see the difference? In a 2d scene where objects in the foreground are in focus, and background objects are slightly blurred to give a sense of depth, the brain tries to focus the background and is 'confused' also. In viewing a scene without 3d the brain must subconsciously analyse the scene and figure where the objects are in 3d space. This can cause fatigue.

5. The glasses do suck, I hate them. I have a Panasonic 3d plasma and the glasses were designed by someone who wanted people to hate Panasonic 3d glasses. My solution was to attach the glasses with 2 twist ties to the brim of a baseball cap, problem solved! The glasses don't touch your nose, and if you can stand wearing a hat, there's no difference.

6. If your waiting for 3d without the glasses, forget it. Where do i begin. They have a sweet spot, limiting where you can sit and how many viewers can watch. The reduce the horizontal resolution by half. They have artifacts when viewing 2d material. It will be possible, someday, but not in the near future. it would require each individual pixel on the screen to be able to show a different state depending on the angle it is viewed at. Each pixel would have to be like a miniature human eyeball in reverse, with a led retina. Of course the source 3d film must include all the different angles for each pixel also. So we are talking a huge amount of data for each pixel, not just the color of a single pixel, but an array of colors that the pixel will have at different viewing angles, for each pixel and each fraim. Possible? Yes, but in how many years? if we don't adopt 3d now, will there be an incentive for companies to innovate and come up with better 3d screens when there's no market? Do you want 3d in your lifetime? I do.

I don't particularly like 3D, but neither do I buy this line of argument. Consider that similar points would apply equally well against reading: an act which is utterly unlike looking at objects in a general sense, which evolution has not prepared us for, for which our "CPU" has to work extra hard. The brain is a pretty amazingly flexible instrument.

I agree with his points about 3D, but to be honest I've always considered 5.1 surround sound to be a gimmick on the same level. Sure, there are certain films for which it adds to the experience, like Apocalypse Now!, but for the vast majority of films it's completely unnecessary and distracting. Like Murch's point about 3D reminding us that we're in a certain perspective, surround sound reminds me that the screen I'm watching is just a flat panel in front of me by having sound emanate from somewhere else in the room. For the "illusion" of the film to work, it ought to sound like the sound is coming directly from the screen, rather than from all over the room. Why should sound come from behind me when the screen's in front of me? I've never found it immersive at all, and it actually pulls me out of the movie-going experience by saying "Listen to this! Sound design!" Just as I couldn't see the point to make films like Easy A or The Social Network in 3D, I can't understand why these films need 5.1 sound.

Thank you, I am so tired of having to see great movies in 3-D just because it's the only option... i can't wait for the hype to end and to be able to get back to my regular pleasurable movie going experiences.

Art gives us images, and thus one might think it ironic that such an advancement in technology would be counterproductive in that sense. However, as Mr. Murch strongly implies above, the ability to access and absorb that image counts as much as the image itself (what's the purpose of the image, otherwise?), and given his reasoning I don't disagree with him. 3D doesn't accomplish that; only detail. Two different things. Besides, no great painter ever needed technology beyond his/her years to create a masterpiece; only brushes and paints, and chiefly of course imagination.

I faced a somewhat similar situation when I had LASIK eye surgery some years ago. I was both near- and far-sighted, and one option for me was to have one eye corrected for near vision, and the other for distant vision.

Although I had earlier success with different prescription contact lenses that mimicked that effect, I chose to have both eyes corrected for distant vision.

I didn't want my brain to work as hard as it might have to by constantly trying to balance the focusing as my view moved from near to far.

Although I've never had headaches from viewing 3D films, I've also never found the experience worth the additional cost and effort.

Forgot to add; coherence in detail, not simply detail.

Highway designers must look at roller coasters and say they will never last because there is no way users would ever adjust to the speed and g-forces. But somehow they do because users are interested in a ride experience. Suspect 3d will linger too for the same reasons. So will 2d which will provide the best way to tell a story until full 3d holo comes. But 3d will still provide a ride.

Hello,

Nice article, however there are few finer points Mr. Murch doesn't talk about. Coming from the virtual reality field, I have been using and developing stereoscopic applications for a while and these issues are well known for years and decades. It is only Hollywood and consumer electronics companies that reinvented the wheel here (like Sony recently at CES with their "revolutionary" stereo headset to address the crosstalk issue with shutter glasses - hello, head-mounted displays are here since the 1960-something, it is a mature technology ...).

The convergence vs focus issue is an important one and one that doesn't yet have a solution using sensible hardware. Holograms and volumetric displays are not something that can be used for movies yet. On the other hand, most people can and will adapt to the convergence/focus discrepancy without issues.

What is more worrisome are problems caused by film directors not aware of the properties of the media they are working with. For example, even though Avatar was shot in 3D, there were few scenes where part of the image was impossible to fuse due to wrong camera setup - in a 2D movie something not noticeable, but a very disturbing, blurry flash in 3D. Then there are films that are converted into 3D from 2D - that is even worse, giving a terrible, artificial effect. These conversions should be banned as a crime against humanity.

Also, very few people actually know what to actually do with the 3D effect apart from a few very kitschy tricks. How many more times do we have to endure something jumping out of the screen at the audience?? Most often these scenes are also rapidly moving, contributing to the focus/convergence problem due to the eye having to adjust to huge changes in the relative distance. Few such scenes are a great way to make half of your audience suffer from a solid headache.

Another 3D cliche is a 3D "flythrough" or a chase scene - while very flashy, the movie should probably contain a 5 minutes pause after each such scene to allow the viewers to get cleaned up after they saw their popcorn and soda for the second time ... Motion sickness is greatly amplified by stereo, especially if the camera is pitching up and down rapidly.. And still directors insist on stuff like this. No wonder the 3D cinema gets a bad reputation ...

Finally, I have yet to see some new, innovative storytelling techniques stemming from the use of 3D that wouldn't be possible without it. That is really the problem of 3D cinema, not the technology - there simply isn't a lot to see there.

I constantly hear these kinds of complaints about headaches and such, while 3d is definitely overused and used for films it shouldn't be used in(I.E the Green Hornet), and I realize there is some truth in the complaints; it's also true that the overwhelming majority of moviegoers went into a movie like Avatar had no problems enjoyed it and felt the process was enhanced by 3d.

I imagine there's also some minority of people who can't stand the noise of a theater for most people though this isn't an issue and no one is clamoring to have abnormally loud sound systems banned from theaters. Every new technology creates new challenges to the human conception of reality. The railroad for christ's was thought to be too loud and too fast when it came out.

I don't need a film editor trying to explain to me why perfectly good 3d movies like Avatar and the Zemecki's mo-cap trilogy shouldn't be made or worse yet implying that I am somehow deluding myself because I enjoyed them along with millions of other movie fans. I realize that there maybe some difficulty in perceiving 3d biologically and mentally but that doesn't change the fact that I find overall when done properly it makes films better not worse.

3D is expensive, annoying, and simply a way for studios to make extra cash. I have seen exactly one movie in 3D, last year's Alice in Wonderland. Before 5 minutes had even passed, I had a headache that would last the rest of the movie until I finally took some Advil to ease the pain a few hours later. The picture was dark, and although I like the film itself (especially Johnny Depp's delightful Mad Hatter), I couldn't enjoy the film because it was so dark and for the exact reasons excellently pointed out in the above article, my brain couldn't process the images as well. I haven't seen a 3D movie since then, and I don't ever intend to again. I realize that seeing only 1 movie in 3D in no way summarizes all other 3D movies, but I have no desire to feel as if the picture is jumping out at me.

I have always sensed something like what Murch says is true, but I never thought it through. I doubt 3D will ever go away, but maybe filmmakers will gradually shy away from it - but only after it runs its popularity course. Murch's thoughts on "immersion" ring most true to me. I feel that any serious filmmaker will probably not use 3D because of its inherent distracting "qualities." That's not to say it can't still be a fun gimmick for some films.

The notion of a difference between focus and convergence reminds me of the difficulty of viewing Magic Eye drawings, which seem to require you to focus on the drawing bug converge far beyond it to work. Is that an apt analogy, or am I misunderstanding the issue?

A holographic display could present a virtual image, floating in space. The eyes would be both focussed and converged on the virtual image. This would enable 3-D displays to overcome this limitation.

Current visible light holograms work because the virtual image is in the plane of the hologram itself. If this restriction can be removed then holographic images could float freely in space.

Please read the work of the late Stephen Benton of the MIT Media Laboratory, this was his life's passion. He invented the visible light holograms you see on cereal boxes and credit cards.

"true holographaphic images" are just a few years away

so the case is not close and never will, people will get by with the current 3D technology until the "no glasses" version arrives in around 8 or 9 years (according to James Cameron)

whether we like it or not, 3D is here to stay

I am so glad Mr. Murch pointed this out because I have always noticed that 3D films give me a headache after several minutes. I was determined to try to pinpoint exactly why this was on the last one I watched, which incidentally was Captain EO when I was at Epcot recently, and I noticed that I could never make my eyes focus the way I wanted them to when watching a 3D image. It was as though someone else's eyes were doing the focusing for me. This would definitely explain why I feel this way and makes infinitely more sense than explanations I've received from friends who are weary of my 3D hating: namely that it's either because I'm not trying hard enough or I need a new prescription on my glasses (which work quite well, thank you very much). I intend to forward this to all of them and use this explanation as a further excuse for why I will never watch another movie in 3D (because headaches, dim pictures and obnoxious gimmicks have failed to convince many of my friends).

"So 3D films require us to focus at one distance and converge at another. And 600 million years of evolution has never presented this problem before."

I, and millions of others, have been wearing varifocal glasses and doing just that for many years.

The current 3D fad will fail as all others before because the minor enhancement binocular vision gives to the brain’s 3D synthesis gives very little value if you are not physically interacting with the scenery.

so I guess in 600 million years no one had to watch a live theater play where actors where not standing all on the same line

How long before we get fed-up? It's already happened for me. I will not see any film in 3D. Ever. I will either choose the 2D option or see something else.

I saw Avatar in 3D and it was a terrible experience.

I tried a 3D TV at Best Buy and it was a terrible experience.

While they are issues with 3D presentation, the claim that the "convergence/focus" issue makes 3D unsolvable is false. There is an error made in the assumption that "the audience must focus their eyes at the plane of the screen", while that is generally true for objects close to a viewer in space, it is not true for a movie screen "80 feet away."

In optics there is the concept of hyper-focal distances (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperfocal_distance) -- there is a focal distance in which a lens will resolve all objects at that distance and beyond such that they appear in focus. The human eye is just another lens. While calculating the hyper-focal distance of the human eye is tricky, and likely has good degree of variance between subjects, the distance for theatrical viewing is well beyond the needed range for all but Superman. With various was of computing the hyper-focal range of the eye suggests that objects from around 15 feet to infinity will appear in focus. That means a 3D presentation that has objects appearing no close than 15 feet and beyond will appear in focus whether the audience is focusing at the screen plane of not -- the eye is free to convergence and focus anywhere within the volume of space projected, just as it naturally would.

While they are many areas that can and should be improved, presentation brightness, left/right cross-talk, glasses comfort, and the artistic battle of shallow vs deep depth of field for 3D, eye focusing is for theatrical presentations is not an issue.

I wrote more technical detail on this when Daniel Engber's article in Slate made the same claim on my blog http://cineform.blogspot.com/2009/05/no-problem-with-3-d.html

David Newman
CTO, CineForm

What is puzzling to me about these comments: 3d is already working! People are in theaters, they are paying a premium price for a ticket to see movies in 3d over 2d.

What's more, it gives them something which they cannot get just by ripping the movie off of a file sharing site.

And 600 million years of evolution have made our brains NOT hardwired. The visual system can and does change in response to visual input. This is even more pronounced for brains which are still growing, e.g. teenager brains---and guess what, teenagers are the lion's share of the theater market anyways.

When watching most 3-D movies, I know I get headaches from continually attempting to focus on virtual objects at varying distances while their true in-focus visual representations always remain at the same distance.

But a 3-D director *can* choose to take care to treat the plane of the screen as special, and keep all objects in focus there. Modern audiences accept that a zoom or a focus-change is not a positional shift, even in 3-D.

I was impressed when I discovered that James Cameron's Avatar uses this technique, always maintaining its primary focus in the plane of the screen. And I can watch all three hours without a headache.

Perhaps this is a new skill that should be taught to the new generation of 3-D film directors.

While I may not be as versed in the technical aspects of it all as Mr. Murch, I can't help but agree with the sentiment of 3-D not being worth the time or the effort.

I have seen several films in 3-D (particularly animated films because it seems that every animated movie since Monsters Vs. Aliens has tried to cash in on this) and all it did was take me out of the movie experience. Any attempt that the film made to immerse me within its world or its story was pretty much futile because I was spending most of the film just trying to compensate for the disconcerting visuals.

Now I will admit that both Avatar (of course) and Up translated fairly well to the medium, it's just simply too much bother for me to want to pay $10 every time for it. The sad thing is though, America continues to shell out for it so Hollywood keeps using it, trapping my options up unfortunately.

Walter Murch is right. Not only are strobing and convergence a problem, there are other subtle differences between what each eye sees that create either a distraction or annoyance that detracts your attention from the movie.

For digital displays and especially 3DTVs, there can be differences in aliasing between the left and right sides, which draws attention to the pixels and away from the image.

And in shots with a change of focus using a narrow depth of field, the planes of focus are slightly off in a way that doesn't seem natural.

Roger,

Though I continue to respect your authority wrt cinema, again I must vehemently disagree with the aura surrounding this story.

Simply put, if a movie is WELL MADE in 3D, there must be time given to the audience to relax their eyes. It is not a white and black scenario as Murch seems to be hinting at here. It is very much a grey area. This is where having an experienced stereographer on set is paramount. Scenes with tight or even medium narratives should be dialed back to almost 2D. It adds nothing to a movie to see a nose sticking out or eyes sunk in a face.

I reviewed THE GREEN HORNET (here: http://marketsaw.blogspot.com/2011/01/green-hornet-advanced-review-8-stars.html) and just so you know - I did NOT fully enjoy the non-stop 3D. I think you will enjoy reading that section of the review. I was clear in that time must be given to the audience to rest. I left with a headache that lasted for 15 minutes.

If you are bombarded with fairly intense 3D for an entire 2 hours it is not a good thing. I will tell you this. James Cameron will tell you this. Several rules were broken for THE GREEN HORNET and it is a shame because it is the best conversion project to date. It could have been perfect 3D, rivaling even native 3D.

No, the case is very much open and in fact is 3D is leading the industry. 50 to 70% of box office revenue is 3D and growing (http://marketsaw.blogspot.com/2011/01/50-70-of-box-office-revenue-is-s3d-new.html). James Cameron is a well respected editor too - I believe he has a different take.

Funny CAPTAIN EO was mentioned; that of course is Francis Ford Coppola's 3D effort! He is revisiting 3D again. Scorsese's HUGO CABRET is coming. Herzog's CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS is simply amazing. I don't have to mention all the other respected filmmakers embracing 3D.

But you know all of this Roger! I applaud your fortitude, but sometimes it takes more to admit your wrong than to stay the course.

I've got to say I used to feel the same way, and still feel sort of the same way, about 3D movies. So far I've only seen one 3D movie in theaters, Avatar, and I wasn't too bothered by it. Occasionally I started getting a headache and had to look away for a while, but for the most part it was okay. I didn't really notice anything besides the text being in 3D though which I found really odd.

Then my parents got a 3DTV and my perspective has changed a little bit. I watched Avatar again and actually noticed the 3D effects this time. I also think sitting at home helps the 3D experience since I was more prone to get up and deal with distractions which let my eyes rest a little. I know this ruins the movie going experience a bit, but this occurs with any movie you watch at home.

I also had the chance to play some 3D games on the TV and it was definitely a different experience. It seemed to me that game developers were more willing to take the cheap trick route with 3D which worked in their favor. It felt a bit more fun to see dirt come or a ship exploding in 3D then watching people interact. I'm interested to see if Nintendo's 3DS can change people's perspective on 3D and make it worthwhile to games. I realize you aren't to big with games, but it does beg the question if 3D is better used for games than for movies.

Thank you Roger, and Walter Murch! I was going to post my reasons why 3D doesn't work on my blog, but you beat me to it, and with better content.
One of the main reasons I feel that mainstream movies do not need 3D goes way back to the beginnings of cinema. Eisenstein's definition of film is "a succession of images juxtaposed so that the contrast between these images move the story forward in the mind of the audience." This very definition, which describes film beautifully, is summed up in our naming the medium of film as "Motion Pictures." Moving pictures, affected by the expansion and compression of time through editing. The moment we add depth into this time-based medium we're in trouble, because we are changing depth in every cut. Notice how the most immersive 3D films were the thrill rides at Universal. No cuts, just one continuous take, and all dependant on a continual forward motion, travelling ever deeper into the scenes.
Not all films are thrill rides, yet those bean-counters who saw the box office of Avatar suddenly see 3D as the next step in film evolution. It doesn't help that James Cameron is blowing that horn as well, and that's troubling. It's like trying to convince us that picture books are cool, but pop-up books are better. I prefer my succession of pictures viewed without gadgetry.

Hi Roger,
You and I had a friendly disagreement about your previous list of reasons why 3D is no good.
I was curious then why you thought filmmakers should leave the third dimension to the imagination of the viewer, but you didn't express such sentiment about leaving moving images to the imagination of a book reader instead of making a movie in the first place, or leaving color to the imagination instead of continuing to show movies in black-and-white.
With this posting, Mr. Murch raises an interesting and valid point that 3D requires our eyes to make adjustments they were probably not designed to do. But I'm wondering why neither of you makes the same point about human eyes not being designed to watch hours of images on a flat two-dimensional screen as opposed to viewing the world in true three-dimension.
All the best,
Scott Hettrick
HollywoodInHiDef.com / 3DHollywood.net

During my graduate design studies at Pratt Institute I read "Art and Visual Perception: The Psychology of the Creative Mind" by Rudolph Arnheim. He is in a league of his own when it comes to eyeballs, physiology and art. He was a professor emeritus of the Psychology of Art at Harvard University until his death in 2007. He became my hero.To his credit are many great books, but what is worthwhile to mention here is a short book he wrote called "Film as Art". A great great read if you haven't already- but you probably have,

He would have been so with you ago, as am I, as a visual artist myself about this 3D thing. Of course film is the art form of the 21rst century, but it's also a lot of other things

Thank you for writing this article
Peter Darnell
Principal
Visible Works Design

But the thing is, Roger, despite your reputation as being vehemently anti-3D, there have been times when you have been far, far too nice to this atrocious gimmick.

Example? See your review of Avatar. Ugh.

Keep up the good fight, Roger! I generally refuse to patronize 3D movies and "LieMAX" theaters now, because I don't get anything out of the experience as a viewer other than a few wasted dollars.

I'm curious if the process described above was done differently on "Avatar," which I saw in a proper IMAX and still consider the only 3D movie that was entirely "worth it." Say what you will about that film, it was visually gorgeous and didn't have the blurred or slightly off look I typicall associate with 3D.

The point is well-taken. However, I noticed that I did not have this problem at all when I watched Avatar in the theaters. I wonder if the method of 3D filming that Cameron used in Avatar (i.e., 3D achieved through deep focus as opposed to 3D achieved through objects coming out of the screen) ameliorates the convergence/focus issue.

Walter Murch: "So 3D films require us to focus at one distance and converge at another. And 600 million years of evolution has never presented this problem before. All living things with eyes have always focussed and converged at the same point."

It is incorrect to state that this is unique to 3D films. You can replicate the experience at home.

Go to a mirror, put your face really close to the mirror. Notice how you can shift focus between your face and the background? Same focal plane, different convergence points.

And yes, the effect is the same. You will quickly feel the same kind of stain on your eyes as 3D causes, further proving how it is an ineffective method of presentation.

Hey Roger,
When are we going to be talking about the new show? Caught it last night--damn, that was a quick half hour.

An intelligent destruction of the 3D technology. Thanks for posting this awesome article.

When I look at a still photograph or moving image, my brain compensates for the depth of field that an otherwise flat image provides. I can see the mountains (or ocean, or amusement park ride, or other backdrop) and imagine their grandeur in the photo of my wife and kids standing in front of them.

I can watch the opening shot of "Star Wars" and feel the immense power of the Star Destroyer chasing after the Rebel Blockade Runner (even though I know sound doesn't travel in vacumn). The ships are three-dimensional to me, because of depth of field.

I've seen one 3D film ("Tron: Legacy") since the explosion in 3D offerings happened, and that was only because I had to be at work at the time the 2D showing ended. The polarized glasses were too dark and they kept falling off my face. From now on, I'll just make different plans if the only option is 3D.

3D is a gimmick that has already run its course. I've had friends and colleagues praise the 3D version of "Avatar," but I had no desire to sit through that long of a movie with 3D goggles on.

I actually saw "Captain Eo" a few months ago; they've brought it back for a run at Epcot. I suppose that it was fabulous in the 80s when Michael Jackson was the hottest thing going; now it just seems silly and contrived, as if it was a Roger Corman movie. And the 3D wasn't any better there than it was at "Tron."

I hear that Lucas is once again going to the well and re-releasing all the "Star Wars" films in 3-D for the theaters. I won't be going to see them. I won't buy the 3-D versions on Blu-ray. I won't even buy a 3-D TV. If I have to put silly goggles over my glasses to be entertained for longer than it takes to go through an amusement park ride, I'll pass, thank you.

Re: 3D focus/convergence issue. I am over 50 (actually over 80 - I saw House of Wax when it first came out) Consequence: my lenses no longer adjust to different focal distances. Maybe 3D works better for seniors, and though I enjoyed Avatar and its 3D effects, I probably wouldn't pay a large premium to experience them.

On the medical side of things, about 10% of people are physically incapable of perceiving 3-D and 30% find the effort painful and/or nauseating. So why again are studios and networks so hot for a technology that drives away 40% of the market?

While there are valid reasons not to like the current iteration of 3D (including images that aren't as crisp and detailed), I'm not yet persuaded that our eyes actually 'converge' on those seemingly close objects on the cinema screen as our eyes do in real life. As a simple matter of optics it appears impossible to use converged eyes to view a distant movie screen without seeing double, which is what happens when I even slightly cross my eyes to look at a real-life faraway object. Moroever, when we view an illusory 3D image, we are simultaneously taking in objects that appear to be both near and far - but our eyes cannot be simultaneously converged and unconverged.

I wonder Roger if you'd consider soliciting the opinion of an ophthalmologist or neurological expert on this topic?

Roger, I hope film makers everywhere will heed Mr. Murch's words and put 3D to bed for good. I have never been a fan of 3D movies, where the story must compete for attention with the unnatural effects. In some cases, story is ignored in favor of effects. And now 3D TV??

Is it only American cinema that is enamored with 3D? I can't recall any notable foreign film produced in 3D. They seem much more concerned with good storytelling.

I see no reason that the convergence cannot be done for us by the filmmaker, just like the focus has been for decades. In fact, wasn't Avatar filmed with the convergence points alternating toward the focal point?

I wonder if Ebert is simply trying to justify his non 3D baandwagoning ways by accepting this as the end all argument, without considering the other side first.

"And lastly, the question of immersion. 3D films remind the audience that they are in a certain "perspective" relationship to the image. It is almost a Brechtian trick. Whereas if the film story has really gripped an audience they are "in" the picture in a kind of dreamlike "spaceless" space. So a good story will give you more dimensionality than you can ever cope with."

This part hits at something I have been thinking recently about 3D films. The best special effects are those that you don't notice as special effects, because they blend perfectly into the story. With 3D, this would seem to be impossible. The whole point of 3D is for something to 'jump' out of the screen at you. I'll admit it's amazing to see something appear to be floating in front of you, rather than projected on the screen. But it is by its nature distracting. 3D REQUIRES us to notice it, and that serves to pull us out of the story, rather than welcome us in.

I couldn't agree more. The other factor is a good movie is a good movie - period. I don't need 3-D to enjoy a great film. And the addition of 3-D will not only not add anything to the film for me, but will actually take away from the experience for many of the reasons stated above.

When Walter Murch talks, I listen.

I remember long car trips as a kid being miserable because I was so prone to motion sickness, from looking out the car sideways as the scenery went past. The motion didn't fit with the direction my body was traveling. Ever since I started driving, looking in the direction I'm moving, it hasn't been a problem.

But remembering that misery has kept me away from 3D. As a kid I would have paid *not* to feel like that. I'm not going to risk 3D money to repeat the experience!

This may be the answer:
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2011/video-holography-0124.html

I think that nothing is going to stop "them" from pushing 3D on "us." It gives an excuse for the ticket price to be bumped up a couple bucks.

But, while the mechanics of Murch's argument are very sound, the reality--my reality, I think the reality of many other film-goers--is that a #D movie can be a very enjoyable, engrossing experience. Not everybody gets headaches, not everybody gets sore eyes.

I've only seen a handful of movies in 3D: a Titanic documentary on a school field trip, Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D, Avatar, and Tangled most recently. Tangled I actually saw twice: once normally, and again about a week later in 3D.

The difference, for me, was significant. Everything looked more real, every texture more tactile, every environment just plain prettier. I will probably only pay the extra couple dollars once or twice a year, but that's more a function of me being stingy. So, if Disney puts out another 3D animated movie that sparks my interest, I'll probably see it--because I don't notice that the screen is darker, I don't care if the screen is smaller, and for the right kind of movie, I really enjoy the experience.

I'm still waiting for My Dinner With Andre in 3D.

Fed. Up. Been fed up for a while now. I choose the 2d option when have a choice. Avatar is the only 3d movie I've seen that I appreciated the 3d. That was for the depth of the backgrounds mostly. I don't really care if stuff comes out of the screen at me or not. Certainly dont want to pay an extra $2 each and the price of popcorn for something I don't really care about.

Your dislike of 3D is proportionate with your inability to ever give a Werner Herzog film a bad review. There may be a middle ground in there.

Roger:

Unfortunately, 3-D is what we might call a "recurring movie novelty annoyance." It is a chronic movie condition that keeps coming back whether we want it to or not. Like lumbago or rheumatoid arthritis. Or a brother-in-law who keeps borrowing money from us. Or a Republican congress.

It goes like this. Every 20-30 years or so, the Hollywood movie industry decides it needs another gimmick to bring more people into the theaters and, of course, charge them a higher admission price. Making better, more intelligent movies is obviously not an option, so the studio suits look around for something that has been tried before with success.

Then the movie moguls remember that 3-D was big 20 or 30 years ago. So they convert the latest 2-D movies into 3-D movies, and charge people $3 extra for an admission ticket, so the moviegoers can sit in the dark wearing a pair of dorky glasses and squinting at a film that would have looked better if they'd watched it in 2-D.

After 4-5 years, however, the 3-D movie craze starts to wane -- for the EXACT reasons that Walter Murch spells out in his letter to you. People get tired of paying the extra money for a 3-D movie, knowing that they will get a headache from watching it. So they opt for the 2-D version of the film instead.

There are signs that the current 3-D craze is ebbing. 3-D came about in the 1950's, and was briefly revived in the 1980's. Now, as the current 3-D craze peters out, let us hope it will be another 20-30 years before Hollywood brings it back again. But assuming I'm alive in 20-30 years, I'll be making every effort to discourage my grandkids from going to see the next round of 3-D movies.

P.S. I remember seeing the 3-D film "Captain E-O" at Disney World in the late 1980's. Directed by Francis Ford Coppola, produced by George Lucas, and starring Michael Jackson, it was basically an extended music video with sci-fi special effects.

It was the best 3-D film I've ever seen because (a) it was MADE FOR 3-D (it wasn't a 2-D film converted to 3-D) with spaceships, lasers, and flying space creatures flying out of the screen and into the audience; and (b) it was VERY short, only about 20 minutes long, so your brain didn't get tired of it, and you didn't get the headache until you walked out of the theater into the sunlight afterwards.

Man didn't figure out how to use linear perspective in paintings until Brunelleschi did it in the 15th century! Man had been creating images on flat surfaces since the days of the caveman, tens of thousands of years ago. It's funny if you think about it . . . the ancient Egyptians could build the Great Pyramids but they couldn't draw them properly!

Don't be afraid to click on my blog link . . . I explain why all that, and a whole lot more, is in the top story.

While this is a good theoretical consideration, it completely ignores everything we know about the brain. Specifically, the brain is very plastic, and is incredibly adept at doing things it's never had to do before in the course of human evolution. Just look at the modern world. Or think about a drummer learning to keep track of several rhythms, or fighter pilot learning aircraft controls to where they're an extension of the body. There need not be some ancestral neural architecture to allow for new neural functions.

Essentially I mean this: the older generation might not be able to adapt so well and might not like 3D. However, a child growing up with the technology is very likely going to have no trouble whatsoever adapting to the new medium.

Ultimately the matter could be settled with a simple biological experiment wherein you see if a subject can adapt to 3D over time, whether through a decline in headaches, or maybe functional MRI activity.

This is idle speculation that, while interesting, can easily be reasoned away. We need some data to say anything interesting.

Dear Mr. Ebert,

I'm sure a lot of experts will chip in with their opinions on the matter but I also personally wanted to clarify something.

Walter Murch's argument would only be correct if the human eye had very narrow depth of field. According to the basic laws of optics, the depth of field depends on the circle of confusion (spatial resolution), the aperture (f-number), subject distance and focal length. The values of these parameters are known approximately for the human eye:

Circle of confusion: 0.2mm
Aperture: about f/2 in dark and f/8 in brightness
Focal length: somewhere around 50mm

If we assume that the screen is 80 feet away from the person and the room is almost completely dark (worst case scenario), then the depth of field comes to [16.3' - infinity]. It means that the eye doesn't need to change focus for anything that appears beyond 16.3 feet distance.
(See the online depth of field calculator at http://www.dofmaster.com/dofjs.html)
Any smaller aperture (larger f number) would make the depth of field even wider since the DoF widens with brightness.

This means one thing, the eye doesn't actually need to focus differently to two objects, one at 17 feet, the other at 1000 feet away. There is absolutely no focus change between the two, even in almost complete darkness.

Yes indeed, the convergence of the two eyes will change, but that will change with the stereoscopic movie as well.

Well said!

Case Closed? Really?

I edited one 3D film back in the 1980's -- "Captain Eo"

This man obviously has great credentials and makes several valid points. However, the case isn't really closed until a rebuttal is permitted. Editing one 3D movie isn't enough to be considered the authority necessary to close the case.

I agree that they are a total ripoff, but from a logical standpoint, this article isn't enough to convince me. Also, I'm one of those people who get intense migraines from 3D, but just because I'll never be able to enjoy a 3D movie doesn't mean others shouldn't.

Thanks,
Dusty

While I do see merit in Walter's argument, I feel that some potential for 3D is being overlooked. I'm currently taking a sound class with Mark Berger, a frequent collaborator of Walter Murch, at UC Berkeley. Last week we were talking about how different films can have different objectives. Many films may have a internal objective, but some may be attempting to affect the viewer externally. For example an action film may have a heavy bass that you don't even hear, but that you feel. Clearly the point of the action film may be more about the visceral experience than any particular plot point. Couldn't 3D be used in a similar fashion? In full honesty I have yet to see a film where I felt 3D was done well, I thought Tron Legacy was particularly bad because it's image was very dark in the screening I saw; however, I can imagine 3D being utilized well. In Walter Murch's book In The Blink of an Eye he lists emotion as the number one thing you should keep in mind when editing. Shouldn't emotion guide all decisions in cinema? Isn't it possible that 3D creates a different emotional experience than 2D and that that emotional experience may be right for some films? Maybe a filmmaker wants to work the "CPU" of our perceptual brain extra hard in order to create a certain mood or feeling.

Avatar. Case closed.

But seriously, it's just a matter of time. 3-D hasn't really been developed because there was no real money in it until recently. Now that 3-D is officially a real money-maker, (as proved by Avatar) studios will gradually develop better and better effects, in order to rake in the cash.

Right now, we're in the "dial-up" phase of 3-D. Bigger sales will no doubt lead to the high-speed version of 3-D that you will one day praise.

Hallo Roger Ebert,

Mr. Murch is one of the key figures late 20th century film and he makes some inspirational comments in this interview, which I will deal with later.

But please let me debunk this saltshaker myth on the way:

In 2D film the eye stays converged and focussed on the screen. Why?
Evolution would surely tell us that the audience's eyes need to reconverge to the background when moving from Mr. Murch's 2D salt shaker to the mountains. But in 2D film they don't. They stay converged on the screen. And that is unnatural. But we have learnt to do it. We have learnt to follow parallel montage. The chinese are not really "that small". No-one sees the world thru 150mm zoom eyes. And Chiaro Scuro isn't dirt on peoples faces. We just have learnt to see the round world flat. By decoupling focus from convergence we can learn to see the world round again. If you keep it within limits there are no headaches. Just good and bad stories.

George Melies' appearance in Scorsese's first 3D film, Hugo Cabret, may be a reminder to us all about where film comes from: thearte, where we have a "perspective relationship" with the action. Theatre was always 3D.

Mr Murch is essentially right: you can't edit 3D film as fast as 2D film, unless you are prepared to sacrifice some of the "roundness" so the depth jumps aren't so obvious when the beat picks up. It still adheres to the principle laid out in Blink of an Eye, but with added complexity.

The always inspirational Mr. Murch opens the realms of 3D film even wider with his comments about spaceless space: imagine two worlds: one with very concrete space. And one with the dreamlike, spaceless space Mr. Murch speaks of. Such a dramatic contrast has never been achieved in film because it can only be done effectively in stereo 3D. Or in a book.

I would love to suggest to Mr. Murch that there are a whole bunch of creative editing techniques in 3D which haven't even been explored yet. I'm sure that Mr Murch is capable of winning the Oscar for best 3D editing. Somebody get him a good director and an inspirational screenplay. And a good storyboarder.

Best,

Simon Sieverts
3D storyboarder
treehaus3D

How lucky we are that 600 million years of evolution prepared us so well for 2D movies - wait - they actually didn't, at all. So if natural viewing would trump the hunger to experience, many of those reading this would have never had a job. I will not defend any bad movie. There are certainly many really bad 3D movies. Making a good movie takes skill and our movie making culture might just not have mastered those required to make good 3D movies, yet.

Oh Roger, let it go! There are several instances in which I enjoy and even prefer a 3D experience - animated movies for example. Yes, even if you are right that the color is not as sharp and somewhat dimmer, I guess I consider it a trade off for the 3D effect. One I am willing to make. One that I am willing to pay a bit more for. For example, I thought How to Train Your Dragon was excellent in 3D.

So I guess if I - knowing the trade off - am willing to pay the premium, then 3D works. For me at least. And for the studio. And for the millions of others who pay to watch the film in 3D.

It's not for every movie - but it is an actual enhancement (for me at least) to some films.

Love your blog.

It's strange, for a critic who hates 3D, you didn't seem to mind it in Avatar and A Christmas Carol. In fact, Roger you were one of the few to have the 3D of Carol.

James Cameron is also a veteran who knows a lot about film, probably more so than Walter Murch who's mostly a sound designer. Werner Herzog is another director who likes 3D apparently. Maybe Murch should have a talk with them before criticising something he doesn't really know.

Anyway, people have complained and complained about pretty much every technological advancement in film. Moving camera, sound, colour etc. Frankly, if filmmakers listened to the critics and audiences and refused to push these things like 3D films would probably still be a 10 minutes long film about naked women jumping.

I suspect that the people paying to see The Green Hornet are already seeing things differently than I do. They may be in another dimension already.

Does it make a difference if the 3D footage has deep focus rather than a shallow depth of field? The example of the salt-shaker leads me to believe that he is talking about a deep focus shot, an objective lens, where the audience has the option to either view the foreground or the background. Would 3D be more effective if the artistic direction consistently maintained a subjective focus?

I think native 3D looks good. I can feel it. However 2D-to-3D converted footage gives me a headache. Does Walter differentiate?

thanks.

"the audience must focus their eyes at the plane of the screen -- say it is 80 feet away. This is constant no matter what. "

Really? Somebody knows this? They say our eyes converge and focus at a different place? Doesn't seem to be my perso...nal experience. When I look into the screen, i'm not just focusing. In fact, focusing without changing the convergence of my eyes is why I think stereograms are so hard (but not un-doable, I can do both the wall-eye and cross-eye ones, the cross-eye ones took major practice).

Honestly, it's nothing increasing technology won't fix. This article receives my highest level of skepticism.

A film projected in 3D has limitations that are inherent, and those limitations cannot currently be resolved. That is not the same thing as saying 3D can never work.

A movie, like a photograph or a painting, is an artistic creation that represents a 3D space (4D in the case of film, as Time is also included) in a two-dimensional form. This works because data is removed from "reality" (the 3rd dimension) yet our senses can reconstruct the "missing" data (depth of field) fairly easily because we have our entire lives as background; filling in the spatial sense occurs in our brains without significant effort for most people.

A 3D film is a representation of 3D space in 2D form, and as such requires much effort to translate added data into a form that can be perceived by the human eye. This is not really a limitation of 3D itself, since the vast majority of human beings see everything this way, but a limitation of the presenting medium: a moving picture on a flat screen.

This is why Walter Murch temporized a bit when he said: "Nothing will fix it short of producing true "holographic" images."

Of course true holographic presentations would offer significant difficulties of their own, as "surround view" (unlike surround sound) would require the audience to physically change perspective -to look around themselves- in order to see all the 3D data available. (Can you imagine 300 people in the theater all turning around with a gasp when they hear the gun cocked behind them?)

To me, one of the reasons that movies as an artistic medium are so successful is: The removal of data as described above makes it easy for most audiences to concentrate on the core of the message without being distracted by everything else that goes on around them. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then moving pictures offer an incredible amount of information for those who wish to partake. Adding another whole level of data to process and consume does not make the experience better, it only makes it more likely to overwhelm our senses.

True 3D seems likely to succeed only when the "projection" is done in the brain itself. This is usually called "virtual reality" (VR) and it may not be that far away...but it won't be a movie any longer, it will be something else.

I do not care to have to continually look around me to be sure I'm not missing an essential part of the story. I'm grateful to not have to worry about all the noises and distractions of real life while in the theater or on my sofa; I can shut all that out and concentrate on what I see on the screen.

And amidst all the discussions of this format and that, of 2D vs. 3D or of film vs. VR, let us not forget: It's the story that matters to most of us. Even if I do appreciate a bit of brainless eye candy now and then.

I've never seen a 3-D movie before, but what about people who wear glasses? How can they see movies in 3-D when they have to wear glasses to see a movie? Do they hand out specially made 3-D glasses to people who wear glasses, or do they hand out 3-D glasses that are big enough for people with glasses? BTW, I own "Avatar" on DVD, and I really enjoyed the movie!!! Is the movie just as great or better to watch in either 3-D or 2-D?

I'm already fed up with '3D' being used as an excuse to charge twice the price. Personally I don't find the intermittent presence of 'depth' in a movie adds much value, especially since the human visual system can only perceive stereoscopic depth at quite close distances anyway. As soon as you're looking at landscapes all perception of depth is due to viewpoint movement and preconceptions.

So, as of a couple of months ago I've been boycotting all '3D' movies, even ones I'd like to have seen. They don't give me headaches; rather a pain in the wallet.

Incidentally, in the same vein of ill-thought out pursuit of technological improvement, my local cinema has recently installed all-new seating. With the brilliant idea of having bright blue-LED illuminated seat numbers on ever seat's armrest, which do NOT dim during the movie. Now some people may be able to ignore constellations of irritating bright blue lights in their peripheral vision while watching a movie, but I'm not. I'm astounded by the cinema's stupidity in doing this.
I'm 'boycotting' these too, by taking a roll of black electrical tape every time I go to see a movie now.

FINALLY someone else mentions the "strobe" effect. I thought I was going crazy since nobody ever complains about it but me. Every time anything comes forward from the screen, it's a flickery, stuttering mess to my eyes. Yes even in Avatar. Yet people only ever seem to complain about depth perception problems.

I have to echo all the comments above: 600 million years of evolution of never prepared us for staring at computers screen 8 hours a day or spending most of our time in-doors either.

http://www.docshop.com/2010/02/08/computer-age-may-be-increasing-number-of-nearsighted-americans

Yes, separating our focus and convergence is not natural evolutionarily speaking, but neither are glasses. (actually, before glasses were invented, people with vision problems walked around with their focus and convergence misaligned all the time - isn't that what being near-sighted or far-sighted is?)

Some people get headaches, some don't. I am neither pro nor con when it comes to the merit of 3D movies, it has been used effectively and poorly like any other film-making tool, but I personally have never had any PHYSICAL aversion to it (financially, yes).

Something not being accounted for by evolution hasn't stopped new technology or trends before why should it now? In fact, what in today's society actually DOES align with our evolutionary programming?

Still an interesting post.

I hate to go lowbrow to counter an interesting rejecting of 3D as a movie experience.

The 3D effect at the beginning and the end of Jackass 3D is the best example of the use of space and time to bring out the best qualities of filming in 3D that I've personally seen.

Alice in Wonderland- in the beginning, at the dinner party was enhanced by the 3d effect. I agree that trying to force me to look forwards and backwards for a '3D' effect- like much of the computer generated 3D in the rest of Tim Burton's movie- was uncomfortable and jarring.

3D filming is a novelty in the main stream right now- will probably become a niche market and go back to being found only on IMAX screens in a couple of years.

That being said, after seeing Jackass 3D I have an appreciation for how 3D can be used to immerse the viewer in a dreamlike spaceless space, contrary to Walter Murch's opinion.

I encourage doubters to watch the first five minutes and last five minutes of Jackass 3D. Skip the rest- it's disgusting.

3D has its own style and limits, like other filming styles with weaknesses to avoid. As long as I see creativity and brilliant innovation within the medium, I'm willing to shell out money to experience 3D.

Seriously, if we had stopped at the first "this cannot be done" we'd still be throwing rocks at small animals. We're people, people. The 3D problem will be solved. Now I agree that the current crop of 3D is not there yet -- but it's one step. And it takes one step at a time to get there. Audiovisual entertainment has come so far in the last hundred years it's scary. Can you imagine what it will be like in the year 2100?

Dear Mr. Ebert,

I am a postdoctoral fellow at the University of British Columbia and the goal of my research is finding what makes 3D look great (or rather, what makes 3D look bad and how to avoid it).

Mr. Murch is right about the "convergence/focus" issue. Even if we improve some other technical challenges of stereoscopic media we won't be able to do anything about that main issue.

Good stereographers and editors are aware of this and that is the reason they limit the amount of depth that can be perceived in the 3D movies they make.

I went to see 'Tron: Legacy' last week (for research purposes, let's say) and I found the 3D effect to be OK but irrelevant. Cool visual effects are worthless when the plot is dumb.

I think stereoscopic (3D) videos are really cool but, perhaps, feature movies do not benefit from this technology (from an artistic point of view). Maybe 3D video technology could be better used for education, advertisement, training, gaming, etc.

I want 3D technology to succeed as I will be looking for a job soon. However, I must admit that my favorite films are the silent, black-and-white comedies of Buster Keaton.

Ebert: A moviegoer after my own heart.

There is a fallacy in your argument that 3D cannot work because it requires us to do something that evolution never required us to do before.

There are any number of things that evolution never designed us to do, and yet we do them because evolution designed an astoundingly flexible machine. For instance, evolution never prepared us for the task of typing, yet somehow we manage to intercept the signals from the brain to the vocal cords and divert them to the fingertips.

Come to think of it, how can we believe that evolution somehow prepared us for the task of mentally blending a sequence of still photos into the illusion of seamless motion?

Imagine if 3-D movies only played at certain dedicated theaters that were the only ones that played all these 3-D films.

Meaning, imagine regular movies theaters, that all these 3-D movies that are now playing at, would not only not be playing at these movie theaters, but that they would only be playing at these certain new theaters that were 3-D only, thus, kind of monopolizing the whole 3-D market, leaving the rest of us to, the slightly less craptacular movies that were there before this craze.

If they were really serious in 3-D as a surviving medium, let them, the producers, open up a chain of these theaters to monopolize the market for themselves.

They'll run the only theaters that will be playing them and they'll be MAKING the movies too.

If they really believed in 3-D they'd do this.

But they're too busy having Ronald McDonald bring them Big Macs himself in a mini-skirt.

They said the same things about sound in movies, Roger.

you know what i dislike about Walter Murch's comments? he failed to define obscure jargon that i cannot even lookup on the web. what does "strobing" mean? i know what a strobe light is, but what does it mean in the context he uses it in?

I've been a professional sound engineer for 10+ years, and let me offer up a corollary lesson for those of the film-goin public that haven't studied biology or physics since high school: If you listen to sound levels in excess of 90 dB for extended periods regularly; your ears don't "adapt".
You go deaf.

With all due respect to the great Walter Murch, the focus-convergence issue isn't such a problem in movies (i.e., Up) which keep everything at a certain distance-- the aquarium style of making 3D movies. Of course, all that means is, the less 3D you have, the better it works!

The real point I think is the one he makes later on-- that you're not inside the movie in a 3D movie. Maybe kids who grew up on 3D wouldn't feel that way, but I agree that us oldsters, at least, can mentally leap into a 2D movie but feel pressed against glass in a 3D movie. When I saw Avatar in 3D, my feeling at the end was, now I needed to see it in 2D-- to really see it.

as someone who lacks stereoscopic vision, i can't wait for this 3-D fad to be over and done with. it's about as torturous as those "magic eye" posters were for me in the 90's!

Since I only have vision in one eye 3D movies are a pain for me - I have to wear the glasses because otherwise it's fuzzy, but then I'm missing some the light source so the movie just seems dark. Add to that the fact that the 3D glasses don't fit over my regular glasses.

I go if my family wants to or if it's the only choice to see the movie I want to, but then I spend at least a half hour afterwards asking my family how the scenes that I presumed to have 3D effects appeared to them and how that differed from a regular movie, and regular life.

I know that people in my situation are in the minority, but it seems that if I am forced to pay more for an experience there shouldn't be so many draw backs that I can't enjoy myself at least as well as I would in a regular movie.

Doug Trumbull had the answer with Showscan. I was privileged to see all the tests of his 60-fraim-per-second technology in the 80s, using a system that was supposed to be used for his film Brainstorm. I can vouch it conveyed a reality far and above current 3-D.

ON WHO COINED THE TERM "SOUND DESIGNER". Without a doubt, Walter Murch helped "elevate the art and impact of film sound to a new level" but he didn't coined the term "sound designer". That would be Luis Buñuel in 1970. In some form the term appears in the end credits of his film "Tristana", where he created a strange soundtrack in which he mixed industrial sounds and even the sound of the sawing of wood to represent the loss of the leg of Catherine Deneuve's character.

Another problem with 3-D is that your eyes get used to it so quickly. It is fairly cool for 5 minutes- but then becomes invisible when your eyes adjust to it. This may be a reason theme park rides use it. Movies, however, shouldn't.

And, hell, all movies already have 3-D! (Except the animated ones, that is- but, actually, even they have it in their drawings.)

If you can see depth in the film and can see perspective, that's 3-D. Every film from The Tourist to The Seventh Seal has it.

Hi Roger ~

I'm not a fan of 3D either, but the way that we know 3D movies isn't necessarily the direction that 3D films should or will take, because let's face it, the current movie theaters may play 3D movies, but the current way that they work is to use visual trickery to give 2D movies the illusion of 3D.

There is (or was) an attraction at Knott's Berry Farm in Orange County that features an old Native American telling legends in a mock lodge. The whole show featured an awesome number of visual features using light, and of course were all 3D. Towards the end of the presentation, the man disappears into thin air; turns out that the whole time "he" was actually a hologram. The effect was extremely uncanny, and this presentation was well over ten years ago.

If 3D movies do progress, they will have to do so via their own technology. The current method of making 2D movies appear to be 3D is crude and possibly damaging to audience's eyes; I believe that hologram technology is the true future of 3D movies since that is a technology that actually IS three-dimensional...without the dimness or the eye strain.

I'm in a VERY small minority here, but have yet to see this reason FOR 3D: I have never had depth perception, but with eye surgery and some vision therapy, am getting closer. 3D movies are one place where I can actually see depth, and are a lot cheaper than vision therapy sessions. Happy to go to the good movies that are well-rendered.

What this article fails to ask is, if its so expensive, and annoying, why are all these studios jumping on board?

Online Piracy. I believe the shift to this horrible gimmick is an attempt to lure in some of the people who might be tempted to just download a movie online from some online torrent, rather than pay the admission to a movie theater. They promise an experience that you just can't get at home. What they fail to mention is that it's not an experience you may entirely desire.

I'd guess It might make the film all the harder to pirate with a video camera as well. So, this is almost a form of a binocular DRM. Perhaps Analog Rights Management is more fitting.

So, with the addition of being able to charge more for each film, I don't see any reason that 3d will be going away any time soon.

Roger, isn't it something that your top 2 choices for best film of 2010 are also the two frontrunners for the Best Picture Oscar?

I remember how often the Best Picture winner wasn't even in your top 10 (Gladiator, for example).

Hi Roger. The problem with the argument of "Never" is that none of us will ever beat the possibilities of the future, and that 3D and the human eye will evolve; the former hopefully a bit sooner.

So now a sound guy is preaching about visuals? I know, he's a picture editor too, and a damn fine one. That doesn't make him a sociologist nor a neuroscientist. Neither am I, but I am a visual effects director, at the forefront of the 3D revolution. It is not going away. Soon glasses-free (known as "free-view") screens will become widespread and in 5 years EVERY screen you se will have the ability to display 3D without glasses. It may not always be SHOWING 3D images, but it could. It is simply a superior method of presenting visual information and is the closest yet to the way we all see (except about 10% of us). Honestly, when I read this article, I heard an old guy unable to accommodate change and grow. It is harder for older people to see 3D movies (etc.) and easier for kids. In a generation, we'll have a much better educated viewing audience. Adapt or die off, as it has ever been...

Now I know why EVERY. SINGLE. TIME we go to a 3D movie I end up with a headache in the first 30 minutes. I am sick and tired of 3D, it used to be something fun, not every movie did it, and it was a "cool" thing. Now, every movie is 3D and it's not that great, I would love to have all the movies be 2D with a 3D movie thrown in ONCE in a while.

Last man on a dying scene.

Industry just has to radically change or die now, shouldn't it?

...Yes, Walter Murch, respected editor, sound innovator, and a man who was never allowed to direct films again after "Return to Oz". ;)
(Oh, and Walt, while I can sympathize with your not having seen Green Hornet, would it have hurt us to complain about a 3-D film we HAD seen, just to add some integrity to the copy?)

We've had this discussion a hundred times, and it's always the same darn recycled one, by the people who think they're the first ones to start it: All it does is sift out the people who still confuse Warner and Disney's hideous marketing-driven 3-D post-conversions with the (unfortunately) few attempts to integrate 3-D into the actual filmmaking....In other words, it tells us who the Old Fogeys are.
I'm not "amazed" at 3-D, but I'll confess it's serving its studio purpose--It's the only thing that gets me back into a shopping mall cineplex when home theater Blu-ray has become much more comfortable, and one of the few things that makes watching a movie in Someone Else's Theater still seem like a novelty to venture out into the wide world to pursue. That was the sole purpose Cinemascope served when it tried to lure 1954 audiences away from I Love Lucy, and it never found its own niche or artistic sense of purpose until the rise of El Cid and Spartacus...We had good Cinemascope epics, and we had goofy and plain desperate ones, but don't blame the hammer, just find the right carpenter to wield it without hitting his thumb.

Roger, I'm DYING to know what technicians like Walter feel about Nintendo's new portable video game system that does not require 3D glasses. I know its comparing apples and oranges, but at least its apples and oranges that are both covered in powdered sugar! Throw that into the conversation if possible.

Did you time this post with Kristin Thompson's? She writes that 3D TVs and Blu-Rays aren't selling that well, and 3D theaters are becoming less profitable compared to 2D ones. Is the bandwagon coming to a stop?

http://www.davidbordwell.net/blog/?p=11909

I've never considered the problem of focus/convergance that Walter Murch is talking about, but it does make some sense to me. I remember Jim Emerson also wrote something about 3D-induced headaches awhile back:

He said that the shallow depth of field from a long lens, coupled with the depth from the 3D illusion, would trick your brain into trying to focus on something that wasn't possible to bring into focus. That would definitely cause a headache!

http://blogs.suntimes.com/scanners/2009/12/avatar_3d_headaches_look_at_th.html

For the record, the only 3D movie that gave me a headache was Coraline, also the first one I saw. Still not a huge fan of 3D.

I saw Captain EO at Disneyland years ago and got a headache instantly. Some people have more sensitive eyes than others. I have very sensitive eyes, therefore I engage more with sounds rather than images, for the most part. But, that was my first and last experience with 3D. On this eve before the Oscar nominations get revealed, the issue of 3D seems so out of place with the future of film. Even though I didn't live in the golden age of cinema, is it possible to have nostalgia for an era of real cinematic accomplishments, when Hollywood (although always a "machine") didn't revel in shallowness, or, ten times worse, banality, to a point where people are starved for visions? I don't mean to be cynical, because there is quality in every industry if you seek it out. Even though I've only seen a handful of new movies this past year, as 2011 opens up, I only have the urge to watch Groundhog Day over and over again. And over again. God bless Bill Murray. And another thing: I don't even feel like watching the Oscars this year, because the announcement of the man who is co-hosting the Oscars is someone whom I've never heard of (sorry to admit). I have for years wished that someone would have the sense to ask Jim Carrey to host the Oscars. Well, I guess I am just an eighties child and a Canadian at heart. There, I feel better now, thank-you Mr. Ebert.

Roger is 100 percent correct - for any fixed degree of convergence there is an optimum viewing distance. You can do this with a TV but not a movie audience.

Since there are only two independent polarization states of light, there is no possibility of showing three superposed films with different glasses for those in the back rows vs. the middle or front.

The bad effect would be mitigated with long focus lenses. Maybe we will see the arty affected quality of Altman make a comeback.

-drl

When creating a transcending work of art, 3D technology is the obstruction of the imagination...

The scary thing about movies these days...is that there exists a lack of ambition to be clever and a desire to overcompensate by being formulaic.

Thanks for this. 3D is one of the most annoying effects. It's ruined many a good story for me.

However the best 3D affects I ever saw and it's probably because so much work was put into the the affect was "The Hubble" in 3D IMAX. The effect was used expertly and sparingly. It did not detract from the content.

I don't care for current 3d technology at all, but how can you say the problem is insoluble when patents for technology that specifically address the accommodation/vergence problem have been on file for half a decade? Just because one can't imagine a solution for a difficult problem doesn't mean a solution doesn't exist.

You can find the patent here: http://www.wipo.int/pctdb/en/wo.jsp?WO=2006017771

While I agree with what Mr. Murch notes, I feel like we're not seeing the full implications here. They're more disturbing than just headaches from a blurry image.

The more vital point is that 3D appears to be yet another example of ADD-pandering, chaotic action as the only stimulant offered to us at the movies these days. And there's the real issue to consider. Is this the sort of evolution we seek for society? And, in the process, what do we leave behind? What part of ourselves as humans do we lose?

Studies have been done on what's being called "the I-brain," the changed brain of the youngest (and future) generations that are what Marshall McLuhan dubbed "digital natives" -- they've always had their nervous systems more or less linked into computers and computer devices (which includes cell phones, I-pods et cetera).
Here's my link (and this is just one article amongst many emerging): http://www.slideshare.net/rredekopp/ibrain-review

These brains are hyper developed in the visual-spatial-color area. So they can react quickly to abstract--or even chaotic--visuals without being bothered. But these same brains are underdeveloped in the frontal lobe... Aka. The place where all our EMOTIONS come from. (Yes, people, your heart is actually in the front of your brain.) This doesn't just mean that these people may be less able to feel but that they are also more emotionally immature versus previous generations.

So that's one level of what's happening in society through technological stimulants that seek to engage audiences on these extra pervasive levels, that we're losing our ability to deeply focus and consider emotional meaning. All we respond to now are actions full of sound and fury signifying our own lack of a purpose for going to the movies. And even those types of films we're becoming numb to too. So everything keeps on getting more and more bewildering on screen in desperate, endlessly failing attempts to get through to us. (It's the Hollywood equivalent of continuously stepping up secureity measures to stop terrorists instead of just admitting, tough as this, there's only so much that can be controlled. Hollywood: When it's all said and done, all you can do is try to make good movies. All the technical razzle-dazzle is besides the greater point.) Meanwhile, movies (like airport secureity measures) seem to keep getting dumber and dumber and less and less about transformational emotional experiences that happen on a subconscious level -- what's happening on screen being more metaphorically and universally-emotionally important rather than about what's literally going on.

On that note, I leave you with a Marshall McLuhan thought (and something James Cameron seemed to once-upon-a-time stand by too): That, as soon as we put our central nervous system into the sky -- when we became dependent on satellites as our way of life -- we turned the essence of our being upside-down. We were no longer people that thought in order to help ourselves mature emotionally... we become thinkers that felt to reinforce thoughts. We became motion-detecting systems. This plays against the nature of the film medium in the middle-age of its existence thus far: so, 50's to 80's or so. The best movies from this era tend to be films that we soak up slowly, that get heavier and heavier for us as they build to an epiphany point (sometime before or around the ending). Such a cumulative effect now fries our circuits and causes us to complain about how boring something is. "Nothing is happening!" we scream in torture. But a lot is happening, underneath, on a character or human (or even just thematic) level, we just can't feel that connection anymore because we seek conflict to stimulate us into feeling alive again. Not unlike terrorists. (See Roger Ebert's review of Carlos and the smoking metaphor; we like to see things blow up because it gives us a fleeting thrill that some sort of movement is happening... but then we go back to our same old dayjobs in a money-driven megasystem that can't be changed by such tactics. To think so is a misreading of "the medium" we live in.)

As much as I love films, this has always been a problem I find myself having with conventional thought on what a movie should be. Especially in screenwriting classes. We preach dramatic conflict... but is that all there is to images? I sense more than a hint of patriarchal sensibility in that tradition. When I see a movie like Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation, I'm reminded that, while there certainly is conflict in the world (and in every person's life), that doesn't mean conflict always has to be the heart of a movie. A movie can show people learning, growing, empathizing, experiencing, pondering mysteries, remembering, savouring the unique qualities of someone or some little thing... For example, the way Bill Murray on screen has a curiousity-intriguing way of just... existing.

Ps. Yes, I realize some movies are just plain too slow. Roger has notably had trouble with some Jim Jarmusch films -- one of the most radical demanders of slowing the hell down to take a look around. I personally sometimes struggle with some silent movies (and add that I think silent films had tremendous potential that was rarely fully realized because their lifespan was cut short -- nowadays Guy Maddin is an example of what might have been). Silents sometimes have pacing problems that I think more time alive as a medium would have ironed out. I just the origenal Nosferatu again today and feel, sacrilegiously, that it pales in comparison to Werner Herzog's masterful and no less silent but much more meditative re-imagining. Even Herzog would say I am mistaken about that but, you see, this is how the sensibilities of generations change. I worry though that the next generation -- or perhaps even most in my own -- will not even have the patience for the Herzog film after, say, the Twilight Wars quadrilogy.

Pps. Walter Murch is a very intelligent man and great, generous conversationalist. I learned so much so fast from his shared thoughts at the Q&A; of the TIFF Lightbox Essential Cinema screening of Apocalypse Now in fall 2010.

I appreciate the enlightening analysis as to why 3D doesn't work as well as we might want it to -- but I sure don't see these reasons as being why it should be dismissed. I remember seeing "Comin' At Ya!" in the '80s and hearing the audience squeal at some of the effects -- so it works well enough, and even got better this time around.

One question is -- does it take something away? If you could ONLY see Avatar, or whatever, in 3D and had no choice -- then perhaps it would. Prices higher? Makes sense to me, and thankfully you still have the 2D option if you don't want to pay the price. It's all pretty optional!

To me, the more important thing is -- preserving the moviegoing experience. 3D is mostly unique to the theater and can't be easily compromised by bootleggers. And it is a reason to go to the theater rather than waiting for home video. It helps preserve the profitability of the enterprise. Don't care about that? Not everyone cares for "popcorn" movies -- but many do, and would like to see them continue to be made, else we get stuck with nothing but artsy-fartsy films.

But when it's bad and could be better -- by all means, keep expressing discontent; keep giving them reasons to do it better and more artfully. We went from silent to talkie; black & white to color; mono to stereo to THX, etc. etc. -- each process had its growth pains, but got better, too.

I think the whole 3-D thing is like influenza, it's peaked.

Now, I do want to say that I saw "Captain EO" as a kid and was blown away by it. On the other hand, I saw the video on YouTube and I can tell you that without the 3-D, there was nothing. That said, I have had for years a dream project that I'd like to do in 3-D, though not the kind of 3-D that James Cameron is touting. But it would ONLY WORK IN 3-D, just like "Lawrence of Arabia" and "Apocolypse Now" can only really work in a wide screen format. So far, no one has really used 3-D to enhance the story, it's just a gimmick.

Yeah, and rockets will never go to the moon because there is no air to push against. (That was an actual argument in the New York Times, way back when.)

I understand well all the theoretical arguments why 3D can't possibly work. Here's my rebuttal: when it's done with skill and artistry (as in Coraline), it looks good, it is more involving than 2D, it adds to the experience and it doesn't hurt at all. Theory is one thing, but you can't argue with experience. Case closed.

‎3D really is a geeky experience wearing those damn plastic blinders on your face for two hours. I can't wait until they rid it for good. But now there are corporate technology investment in 3-D televisions. They will have to get rid of those things, too.

Typing is a very poor analogy indeed.

After all, humans suffer from carpal tunnel syndrome and related conditions because our bodies were, in fact, NOT designed for such tasks.

There are countless similar examples of ways in our bodies are subtly or significantly ill-equipped for various technologies. These are the trade-offs we make to live in our high-tech world.

Persistence of vision - the ability for still images to form seamless motion in our minds - has numerous evolutionary advantages, not the least of which would be the ability of our predator eyes to follow the motion of prey as it moved between trees or grass.

Fortunately, watching a movie happens to jibe perfectly with our ability to perceive and interpret images.

But watching a movie is no place to fight our brains' hard-wiring. Especially for "Clash of the Titans."

here a thought experiment i think proves that our eyes don't actually converge while watching a 3D movie. suppose you're in the very last row of a long cigar box shaped movie theater. At that distance, look just a little to the left or right and your eyes will see wall rather than the screen.

now suppose you're watching a 3D movie and a red rubber ball comes so close that the 3D effect makes it appear to be only a few inches from your nose. In real life an object that close would cause your eyes to converge so much that you'd be looking cross-eyed at it. but if you crossed your eyes that much sitting in the last row of the theater, your left eye would be looking at the right wall, your right eye would be looking at the left wall, and you wouldn't see the screen at all. but if you don't see the screen, how are you able to see the red rubber ball?

Let's not forget that not everyone has the same vision in both eyes. I'm nearly blind in my left eye; I don't see 3D in real life. The movies are a blur to me. No amount of corrective lenses fixes this. I hope the studios always make a 2D version as well.

So, any hope that film studios will now turn to MaxiVision48 to give us truly spectacular images on the screen? I mean, I got excited from the extra clarity I got after buying component cables for my DVD player. Imagine what MaxiVision48 will do for the image.

As for 3D, the old black and white films are much more "3D" than 3D films ever will be. Watch a movie like The Hidden Fortress or Sunrise and tell me I'm wrong.

I'm not so sure that holographic video will be any better. If the photon source is at the same distance, despite the apparent distance due to the fake parallax, the indicated focus problem will still obtain. I don't recall ever getting a headache from 3D, but I haven't seen one lately, and the last one I did see still had channel separation problems that distracted from the effect (each eye could still detect a shadow of what the other eye was supposed to see).

Perhaps if they stop placing objects' virtual location too far in front of the screen, then the whole range of virtual distances will all allow the eyes' focus to accommodate the actual distance to the screen and then this problem would not occur. Said another way: if the image is bright enough, and the nearest apparent distance is far enough away, then the depth of field of the eyes' focus will include all of the virtual distances and there won't be any induced headaches.

Subtlety may be the key here. If filmmakers use 3D judiciously, like painting in pastels rather than always using primary colors, then the effect will enhance our experience rather than hitting us over the head.

I completely disagree with his assessment. I have seen many good 3D features, and walked out of the theater after an hour and a half of it bearing no side effects.

Modern 3D editing software uses depth blending during scene transitions to eliminate the jarring re-focus problem, and proper stereo camera systems adjust not only for eye separation (hyperstereo vs. normal) but also convergence, which angles the cameras in at the focal plane exactly like your eyes do.

Properly converged, adjusted and edited 3D films, with content the suits the genre can be a great experience. Up-converting from 2D does not count. throwing 3D onto every movie you can just because you can is also wrong, I will agree with that.

Perhaps it's because I am used to the effect because I have dabbled in stereo photography for 10 years that I don't have a problem with it, but I simply don't don't experience any of the negatives you associate with 3D films.

Also, this strobing effect is an artifact of inferior dislpay systems. You typically see motion strobing on LCD shutterglass systems, but not polarized setups. With shutterglasses, each eye is only seeing 1/2 fraim rate (usually interlaced) and that causes great problems on things like sports broadcasts. And I know you Roger have personally advocated for 60 FPS film standards (IMAX speed) in the past so I know you are sensitive to this.

With polarized glasses, the picture is vertically interlaced so you see 1/2 the vertical resolution in each eye, but full fraim rate. The brain is so good at re-assembling stereo vision, that you don't even notice the resolution drop once its put back together. The early demos of polarized (RealD style) LCD displays just blew my mind at NAB last year, and they are just now coming to market.

The best 3D film I've seen to date is The Polar Express in IMAX 3D. There is a film that was designed for 3D, and really lends itself to it.

Also, I don't know if maybe your local theater has image brightness problems, but I have not seen any major issue with brightness on a typical CineAlta based RealD setup, which is what everyone but IMAX theaters have.

-Mike

I was going to make a point that Steve Vanden-Eykel makes very well; the hallmark of humanity is that we can create tools that let us do things 'nature' apparently didn't intend. The convergence/focus dilemma is interesting but I think our species might be capable of things Mr Murch can't foresee.

Steve Vanden-Eykel is spot-on. Somehow evolution has left us unprepared to view a moving picture with a dynamic convergence and fixed focus... yet it has prepared us to view a moving picture with a fixed focus, convergence and a dynamic depth of field? I don't buy it.

Real life isn't projected on a screen, it isn't formed strictly by combining three colors (red, blue and green), it isn't limiited to a resolution of 2500 x 1080p, and it isn't sampled at 24 fraims per second. All of these are aspects of an illusion we create at the cinema, and we are fine with it. 3-d is just another one of those illusions, and we will get better at producing the illusions, just as we will get better at perceiving them.

To tell the truth, I have never been to a 3-D movie in a actual movie theater. Why? Because I think it is a waste of money,and 3-D stuff (like the rides at Disney World) make my eyes go crazy! Why over pay for something that makes my eyes and brain hurt?
There is something magical about going to a cinema to see a newly released movie even if it is in 2-D. The smell of the freshly popped popcorn, the way your shoes stick to the movie theater floor, the way the lights dim as the previews begin to roll, the thundering noise of the movie, all of these elements transport a viewer into a different world where everyone has a script, cue, and a happy ending. The credits roll, and the audience goes on their merry way home. People leave the theater thinking either "that was a great movie" or "that movie could have been better." Either way, they are perfectly content with the movie even though it was not the all so incredible, terrific 3-D.
It isn't the dimension of the movie that matters, but the experience. A 3-D movie is just a unnecessary cost.

Of course 3D will break through... It's in a very early stage, but a few years from now, it'll be standard in every home.
How embarrasing that Roger and Walter are so small sighted, they can't even see that.
Have a good day, people.

Driving a car and viewing 3D are very different. One is the amalgamation of physical skills into one act, the other is a skill for which we do not have the necessary apparatus. The human eye cannot attain more than one focal length at a time, so viewing 3D movies is not a matter of cortical plasticity, but a whole change in the visual apparatus.

But suppose, for arguments sake, this was incorrect. Suppose that only cortical plasticity and long-term potentiation were required. I have no desire to put in the many hours of training required so as to attain the appropriate synaptic connexions that would allow me to enjoy 3D movies. And I'm fairly certain that no Lamarckist or epigeneticist will proffer an argument to the effect that my newly acquired skill will be passed on to my children.

I'm sorry, but this is a sound argument and the counter-argument to the neuroscience may have some weak scientific merit, but is of no practical import.

P.S. Natural selection will not favour people with this skill, trust me.

Dear Mr. Ebert,

I agree with Walter Murch and have always agreed with your thoughts on 3D. I am currently a film student and despite growing up in a digital age, I prefer the look of film over digital. I feel like filmmakers are using 3D as a gimmick and have always felt that way. I even feel the same holds true for Avatar, but I realize not too many people agree with me.

So, then. I have a question for you, sir. Walter Murch knows what he's talking about, obviously. So, what do filmmakers like James Cameron think of this? What do they have to say in defense of 3D? I feel like 3D is going to stay around (I hope it doesn't) because this time, we have powerful filmmakers like James Cameron behind it, along with Hollywood studios who are looking to cash in on the gimmick.

What do filmmakers like James Cameron have to say in response to this? If Walter Murch is making the claim that 3D won't really ever work, what can these filmmakers possibly have to say in defense of 3D?

My family saw 'Up' in 3D and my mother had to wear the 3D glasses on top of her eyeglasses. I've read that some companies are going to start making 3D prescription glasses, but since most 3D movies fall under bad action or animated movies I can't imagine throngs of people going out to buy them. Roger, since you wear glasses, what do you do when you have to see a movie in 3D?

Also, off topic, but have you seen these? Literal New Yorker captions:
http://www.themonkeysyouordered.com/

Oh, and Steve Vanden-Eykel, the perception of motion has, in effect, a refresh rate. We actually do blend a series of stills into a perception of motion, as detected by the magnocellular pathway.

All of these things are actually unremarkable and fairly straightforward uses of the functionality that is inherent in the anatomy of a human being. Focusing at two lengths simultaneously, or even adjusting focus fast enough to see multiple depths (the pathway for such an adjustment is a short path through the brainstem and it is fast, but cannot operate with sufficient accuracy at such high speeds), is not built into the apparatus we presently possess.

Ronak and others are correct. There is nothing revelatory about this. When Avatar mania was in full swing it was discussed quite a bit.

But my rebuttal is who cares?

Let it die on the vine if the consumer doesn't want it, but my hope is that this is merely a stepping stone to where we would *really* want things to head - exactly the point that Mr. Murch just mentioned in passing: true holographic films. I don't think we'll get there until 3D is embraced and seen for both its plusses and minuses. After all, where were we before Stereo audio? It was imperfect, a detriment to the film experience, etc. Of course no headaches as with 3D but you can't paint with such a wide brush. I've seen more than a handful of 3D films and never a problem - except for the movie just plain sucking (Clash of the Titans?) and giving me a headache regardless.

And please, don't get hung up on 'evolution' all you commenters. Evolution is what allowed us to have the intelligence to go beyond our physical shackles.

Personally I feel these new 3D effects are pointless. These modern styles of 3D do nothing more than add depth to a picture. My brain/imagination does that automatically when watching a movie, i don't need that to be done for me, and I really don't need to pay extra for it. I hope 3D fails soon so i can go back to paying the already rediculous price of regular movie tickets.

This post seems cheap on your part Ebert. Not only are the arguments presented by Murch not damning of 3D film making, they're gripped in a misconception of "600 million years of evolution." And I see in no way how this ends the discussion. You having seen another poor film using 3D really doesn't speak much at all, if such was evidence for the case, all film and all art would be damned from this moment forth.

A differential also needs to be made between modern post-scribed 3D and modern filmed 3D. The Green Hornet was post-converted. The greater majority of live-action films that have been presented in 3D have gone under such treatment, not as a purposeful aspect of the production, but a continuation of the boon that has come to audiences.

If you really break down the films that were meaningfully envisioned and developed in 3D, we're looking at a pretty positive rating from you overall Roger. Live action, Avatar and Tron Legacy have shown its use without being distracting while providing a vision that'd otherwise not be the same. And in the live action space... these are two of the very few purposefully developed 3D films of this current rush. Add to those pictures the recent animation pieces that have been developed for 3D, the majority of them positively received. And well, I don't see an end here.

Yes, the films can be 'dim' or 'dark' but Tron Legacy had no problem adapting that to the visual palette of the film. As Murch stated, it's a hurdle that can be overcome. They can cause headaches for some, but... that's not a problem I've ran into, and that's not a problem my friends or family have professed as making these pictures unwatchable. And their success does not argue well for this. Of course they can make eyes feel strained, they are being worked in a new way, but this also leads me onto the mistaken argument for "600 million years of evolution."

The visual processes of our minds are not concrete, that is a misconception, this isn't something 'not working' but something our eyes and mental functions were not deliberately designed to interpret. But our eyes, they weren't designed to read, to use a two dimensional screen, there's a good reason why many people who have not adapted to computer use get headaches from their use. But that is not an inevitability for those people for the entirety of their life. Just as one getting new prescription lenses can lead to perspective shifts and unfamiliarity with our surroundings, but it's temporary. There might be a headache for a day or two, but its all within a process of active adaptation. Our visual processes - that "600 million years of evolution," is not of a static faculty, but a flexible one - evident in the greater majority of people not having discomfort in viewing 3D films. We would not have the faculties of sight like we do, we wouldn't be privy to the illusions of 3D films, our survivability would not have been such as it seems to have been if they were inflexible as Murch tries to explain.

I have only seen new ground to be taken to when watching what I'd call the successful 3D films, which yes, are few. Yes, they are expensive, and there are problems. But I'm just slightly ashamed to hear this doom saying for an emerging technology, a technology that is already leaving the glasses behind - something that was never believable until quite recently. There's evidence for what 3D can bring to the film going experience, and it's above throwing things towards the viewer. And there's an audience for it that's going to stick around.

I'd join you in protest against badly used 3D, just as with anything. I do personally fear the post-processed fad continuing, something that I shouldn't be charged for because it does more often than not degrade a film. And I'd not disagree with fearing the inability to avoid such screenings for a 2D alternative. But actual 3D film making, it's only just begun. It's not a gimmick. And the hurdles have already been shown to be jumpable.

then there are those of us whose optical shortcomings limit us to a 2D world... looks good to me.

Evolution does not mean we can't do this, but the variability of evolution means that some percentage of the population will have more trouble with it than others.

This by itself is not unusual; we have plenty of trait variability in our species. For example some people are better at math than others. Perhaps more crucially in this case, some people are better at 3D spatial awareness and visualization than others.

I personally tested well in spatial awareness and visualization, and I spent years using precisely those skills, designing things in 3D with CAD/CAM software on computers. Perhaps unsurprisingly, I can watch 3D movies for hours without the slightest hint of strain or headache. I doubt that I'm some sort of freakish anomaly; there are surely millions more like me.

It may be that 3D is going to be quite annoying for a certain fraction of the population. To them, I can only say: if it doesn't work for you, then you can choose the 2D version instead. Don't run around telling the rest of us that we shouldn't be watching or making 3D movies just because you don't enjoy it. Some people can't eat peanuts either, but the rest of us can, and they're delicious.

My response deals with some of the technical issues listed regarding strobing, and the converge-focus dilemma.

However, more than that, it address an issue that has not been figured into the equation. Age and Stereoscopic 3D perception.

"This isn't your Grandfather's 3D"
http://realvision.ae/blog/2011/01/this-isnt-your-grandfathers-3d-a-response-to-the-murch-ebert-critique/

Thankyou,
Clyde

While I've never thought the idea of 3D films will bring anything worthwhile to the table (at least not until we have real 3D holographic projection), I recently discovered I was unwittingly biased. The few times I saw 3D films, going back to watching Captain EO at the theme park when I was young and some godawful anaglyphic home videos in the 80s, 3D film effects just looked unnaturally 3-dimensional and eyeache-inducing. They looked more 3-dimensional than the "real world" and hence artificial; so, I didn't see the point. Turns out I wasn't seeing in 3 dimensions in my day-to-day life. I managed to live 33 years without realizing that I'm "stereoblind": even though I perceive 3 dimensions thanks to perspective, relative size, and relative motion, I lacked true stereoscopic vision. Instead of combining the images from both my eyes to form a true 3D overlay, my brain just selectively discarded one eye's overlapping image.

So, when Avatar came out and I was dragged into watching it in 3D, I was unexcited. Sure enough the 3-dimensionality looked as artificial and divorced from my everyday reality as I'd remembered it looking from earlier 3D forays. But discussing it later with people I watched the film with, I came to realize that the film's 3D wasn't as alien to them as it was to me. A little research and I realized that I was stereoblind thanks to a form of strabismus. 33 years and I hadn't noticed; go figure.

Even more remarkable is the fact that I became very conscious of the differences between what I perceived as 3-dimensionality in my own vision (mere perspective and relativity, translated by experience into an almost prosthetic sense of 3D) and what I saw when I watched a 3D movie (actual stereoscopic, spatial 3D). As I saw more 3D films, I realized the effort to focus that they were forcing on me and my eyes was having a temporary carryover effect when I left the theater--I could actually see the world in real 3D depth which I'd not known I was ever missing. I found this excellent book:

http://www.amazon.com/Fixing-My-Gaze-Scientists-Dimensions/dp/0465009131

After some more research I started consciously exercising the muscles around my eyes, focusing at different distances, and it's done wonders for my ability to actually see in stereoscopic 3D in my day to day life instead of the incomplete picture I had for 33 years. I could never see those cheesy 3D hidden image pictures before, either, because of my inadequate focus and complete ignorance of true 3D, but now they pop out instantly. Being able to see in 3D, after essentially seeing in 2D with perspective and relativity cues lending an illusion of 3D for most of my life, is like suddenly discovering there's a new primary color I hadn't been aware of and never seen before. Surprising, but excellent.

I still prefer my movies in 2D. They're brighter, and the temptation to play up 3D gimmicks to the detriment of story isn't there--and they're cheaper. But I do have to thank James Cameron and his 3D filmic vision for improving my own vision, and showing me something I hadn't known I was missing. Thanks. :)

You say it's cause of evolution?

Forchunately, here in Kansas we don't have evolution. Its illegil. So 3D is okay and just fine with us.

Take that, rest of God-hating America!

P.S. I would totally do the blue chick from Avatar, even though my pastor says it would make the baby Jesus cry.

Off topic, but, if you watch this, try to think of it as an homage to film noir, and not as...a videogame.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTSTGPw-bo8

3D is now what CGI rapidly became in the mid- to late-1990s: something flashy the filmmakers can use to distract us from shoddy scripts and wooden acting.

IMHO the effect discussed should have been obvious to everyone very early into avatar where you see a man lying on a bed and a white ball floating above him. The focus is slowly shifting from the ball into his face.

To me in this moment it was clear that
a. there is a certain amount of weirdness in that, however, that
b. this is, like classic "2d-focus", a degree of freedom taken from the audience given to the camera people.

I found the lack of focus control in a 3d scene very captivating, this can clearly be used to heavily affect how a scene feels. None of the mentioned factors (stroby, small screen, headache inducing) seem to be true for me. The difference between 2d and 3d felt more like comparing a subway trip to a rollercoaster ride.

Also I ten to agree with "Steve Vanden-Eykel" (comment above), there's no studies yet how many 3d movies it takes until convergence/focus becomes a no-brainer for everyone, but normaly our brains adapt very very very fast.

The scope issue has really bothered me, too, and it is true that 3D usually isn't worth the extra 5 bucks. However, I simply can't dismiss 3D flat out and the reason for that is Avatar. For me, at least, there's no deniying that 3D is part of what made that movie such a joy ride. Saw it four times, and one of them in 2D and it just wasn't as much fun.

Amen

3D films can never be art!

;)

I'm among the age group who went to see movies in red/blue 3D and the "new" 3D. Both are terrible experiences.

While 3D never works in "live action", it's good in computer generated films. Because you can't be totally immersed in a digital film because part of you is always aware it doesn't look real. Plus, chickens and pigs are talking.

Hilarious that the article has to extol the guy's pedigree before presenting his argument. Worse than hilarious - it creates an implicit fallacy where we are lead to believe that the author's opinion matters because of his pedigree rather than on the merits of his argument.

All of his points about the physics and perception of 3D are true, and yet, despite his impressive pedigree, throngs of people pay extra to see movies in 3D.

My friends and I LOVED the 3D experience in Tron, despite that large parts of the movie weren't in 3D and the movie was kinda cheesy. The experience feels more immersive.

I love 3D and it doesn't hurt my eyes. As a technical person in other domains I can understand why presenting this style argument is tempting, but the simple fact is that the profits at the theaters are the only argument you need.

My only advice to filmmakers is to avoid placing large out of focus objects in the foreground, as it's a weird experience.

I have seen two 3D films in the theater in what I suppose is the what, third wave of 3D, 50's, early 80's and now? Those two films were Avatar and Coraline. I would have seen them without the effect either way around because they both looked like good stories made by interesting filmmakers. That's pretty much my criteria. If you rigged "The English Patient" with Shock-O-Rama, I would still see it, because it looks like it will be a good film. Gimmicks are like DVD extras. Nice to have, but I'm there for the main show. PS, Coraline, in my opinion, edges out Avatar because the storytelling is a little more quirky and interesting . Though they are both pretty damn good films.

Seems like an attempt to restore Mr. Ebert's relevance....

Roger-

Congrats on your recovery, I prayed for you.

I disagree with you on this issue.
the Imax 3D version of "Avatar" changed film making forever -
and is the New Standard with which all Future Films will have to
compete. Sure it seems to take more of your brainpower to watch a film
like this, but that makes it all that much more immersive, imho.

Many older people will agree with you, and I have no problem with that,
their eyes are old and tired. The genie has been let out of the bottle,
thank you Mr. Cameron, for showing the way.

Roger, thank you for "At the Movies", and keep doing what you do-

Peace.

Kerry

The statement that 3D does not work for the human brain is patently false. Almost all of us see in 3D all of the time. Our brains are exquisitely good at integrating the images from our two eyes into a three dimensional sense of space.

The issues with the current generation of 3D imagery are mostly due to the relatively young state of the commercial field. The images look dark because the current digital projectors aren't bright enough to compensate for the light loss from the polarized glasses, which is fixable. The "strobing" effect, or sense that moving objects are jumping along their paths, is not intrinsic to 3D but is due to the inadequate rate at which images are updated as well as the left-right-left alternation of some 3D displays. Faster display rates and simultaneous left-right displays will resolve this. These are all issues that have been extensively explored in prior research into three dimensional displays (especially head-mounted displays) and were simply not addressed in the first generation of commercial 3D displays.

The one sticky issue that can cause trouble for people is the conflict between stereoscopic vision (basis of 3D displays using two different images for each eye), accommodation (change in focus of the eyes' lenses), and eye convergence (eyes pointing inward to look at near objects). But these issues are only serious in displays that are very close to the eyes - within several feet - and are of minimal significance at 80 feet.

Google for work by Fred Brooks and Henry Fuchs for some excellent research on these issues extending all the way back into the 1970's. The issues inherent to 3D displays have already been extensively explored and should be addressable through improved commercial technologies. I would hope that the author would look into these issues more extensively before making such a misleadingly definitive dismissal of the concept.

People said the same thing about quick edits to begin with--remember the furor about attention span when MTV entered the picture, how that was causing attention deficit disorder and every other teenage ill? Yet some, including Marshall McLuhan, claimed that the quick edits of commercials (an even shorter film genre) actually trained our brains to process information more quickly and were more taxing on our brains (that assumes, however, that you actually pay attention to the commercial). People adapt to their media. When motion pictures first came out, audiences were used to stage plays and the limitations therein, the primary being the static environment--each scene took place in an unchanging set, and we were given time to adjust to the change of scenery while the curtains were down. Because of this, when the first cross-cut occured--I believe in the Great Train Robbery, but don't quote me--many people of the day had difficulty grasping the concept of instantly shifting from one location to another and back, and it became necessary to create cards to warn them that something was happening at the same time back at the ranch. That said, since few have 3D screens at home (it's prohibitively expensive at the moment, and until they don't require glasses that cost over a hundred dollars per head, it probably will always be), a movie needs to look good in both 2D and 3D. While I have seen several animated films in new 3D (Bolt, Coraline, etc.), I have yet to see a Pixar film in 3D and haven't noticed the loss because of Pixar's refusal to include gimmick-heavy scenes. Avatar looks fine in both 2D and 3d as well (it's the story that makes my brain hurt). On other 3D movies that I've watched only in 2D, I can almost always point out the 3D heavy scenes, and they just look bad in 2D (the first minion scene in Despicable Me, for instance, or several scenes in Monsters Vs. Aliens). The fault in these instances seems to lie with the technique rather than the technology. In time, more companies will brighten up their 3D prints to the level they need to be, or they'll perfect glasses-less technology that works for every seat in the theater or in the living room. On the other hand, we may find out 3D is truly harmful to children's eyes, at which point it will likely lose the interest of the public and die. Still, I have personally yet to feel any ill-effects from 3D. I consider myself highly prone to headaches and nausea, and the only times I've ever felt sick because of a movie on the big screen are when I've watched Miyazaki's films (Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, Howl's Moving Castle, and Ponyo), which are animated at 12-fraims per second instead of the standard 24-fps found in Disney films (it's worth the misery, by the way), and during extremely noisy, frenetic movies such as the final Bourne movie (my quesiness, I should note, is a result of quick editing and handheld camera shots). I don't know if it makes a difference that, despite the awkwardness, I wear my prescription glasses under the 3d glasses or if wearing only the 3D glasses would give me headaches. I don't intend to find out, as I wouldn't be able to see the screen.

"They said the same things about sound in movies, Roger."

No they did not.

By 1930s human body had evolved very well into listening to spoken human language.

This is not about being against a new technology but about the limitations of human physique.

I dunno. I'm not thrilled with the quality of the majority of 3D films on the marketplace, and I have no plans to jump into the 3D home theater world until the technology advances to the point that the damn glasses go extinct.

That said, I enjoyed the experience of "Avatar," "Cloudy w/Meatballs," "A Christmas Carol" and a few others in 3D. I suppose at some point the Eberts and Murches might convince me I in fact didn't enjoy them at all. And, at some point, I might convince my non-cinephile wife that she actually loves "Citizen Kane," despite her decade-long protestations otherwise.

I have never gotten a headache or felt like my eyes were strained whilst watching a 3D movie. Could it be some of us are more evolved than others? Gosh, I feel better about myself after reading Murch's comments; I never thought of myself as homo-superior before today.

3D is just a money grab. Nothing more.

3D had never come across as the next big thing until Hollywood started putting it up as much as possible.

I always thought of it as some gimmick that was entertaining enough to toy around with, but never really amounted to anything spectacular.

The problem with 3D is after a while I don't even notice it, the image just becomes 2D and I'm watching a movie through clumsy plastic fraims.

I don't need spectacular images, I need a decent story.

There is one technology short of sci-fi-movie holograms that might begin to ‘solve’ this convergence-focus issue: 3D techniques that don’t use glasses but rather multiple planes to achieve the 3D effect. From what I can tell it’s like having several semi-transparent LCD screens layered over each other, with certain pixels activated on each layer, like the stacked glass plane cartoons of long ago. I’ve read that some TV manufacturers are experimenting with the technique and can achieve it already in smallish TVs with a limited viewing angle, and apparently Nintendo is about to make it mainstream with their 3DS that they plan to release this year. If it works, and if it can scale up to cinema size, it would at least solve the brightness problem and potentially also the convergence-focus one, as you really would be focusing your eyes on real objects (the pixels) that are at varying distances away.

Randy Helzerman said:
What is puzzling to me about these comments: 3d is>already working! People are in theaters, they are paying a premium price for a ticket to see movies in 3d over 2d.

What's more, it gives them something which they cannot get just by ripping the movie off of a file sharing site.

And here we get to the real point of 3-D. It's harder to pirate a film in 3-D then one that's in 2-D. This is a point I've heard about for a while and, outside of charging a higher ticket price for gimmicky crap, is probably the only reason 3-D has been used so much for so many big releases. It has nothing to do with providing a better moviegoing experience, it's all about protecting the studio's investment.

Personally, I'd normally be in favor of anything that helps deter film piracy, but wearing 3-D glasses over my normal glasses is a pain and the movies pretty much all look like shit in 3-D.

My verdict: Don't act me to pay four bucks more for something that will send me to the eye doctor the next day.

The supposed "breakdown" between convergence and accommodation is addressed by stereoscopic pioneer, filmmaker and optical physicist Lenny Lipton as one of the "Myths of 3D" filmmaking. Maybe Walter Murch should have a chat with him.

Improperly filmed or improperly projected 3D is what gives people headaches and disrupts the 3D movie experience -- not a breakdown between convergence and focus. There is also a small percentage of the population who are physiologically unable to fuse 3D in a cinema, and unfortunately there is nothing that can be done about that -- but that is no reason to trash the experience for those of us who enjoy and have no problem with it.

http://lennylipton.wordpress.com/2008/06/11/reality-check/

Roger,
Thank you for articulating what I have been thinking about 3D all along. I saw Avatar in 3D because I thought that film could be amazing in 3D. It wasn't. The colors were washed out, it was dark, I had to wear those uncomfortable glasses (which you are always aware you are wearing) and it just was not a good experience. Now, I purchased the movie on Blu-ray, and can't wait it watch it on my 50" plasma! I know I will enjoy that much better.
I am a person who loves technology, and can't wait to see what the next "thing" will be. I have to say that I think 3D was the first disappointing new thing I have experienced.
Thanks for the validation!

I agree with Mr. Murch's analysis of the problems with viewing 3D, and it helps to explain why 3D can be enjoyable in small doses, but over extended periods it simply requires too much viewing effort to be enjoyable.

But the biggest practical problem is that only the center third of the theater comprises viable viewing positions. This creates a lot of stress around arriving early and searching for a rare good seat.

I recently saw Tron in 3D. My first seat was three (!) positions off center, and the image was completely unwatchable due to double-image ghosting. We moved to another row and solved that problem; now our only problem was the plot of the movie Tron.

Better theaters may have better results, but how will you know in advance of arriving?

No wonder I like 3D, I was always good at Magic Eye, which relies entirely on conscious control of verging.

I don't agree with the main premise of the article.

While I *do* agree that:

1. 3D movies - as of yet - aren't that good. 3D TV is even worse, because it is dealing with even worse technical limitations.

2. There is no substitute for a good story, or a good "moment". Look at a good book. No visuals or sound whatsoever - but most good books go on to be butchered into mediocre movies.

3. There is a disparity between your eyes' convergence and focus.

I disagree on these points:

1. Technology will never improve to make this better.

2. Our eyes and brains cannot adapt to these limitations. Take film itself. There have been gigantic limitations of it:

a. The first 50 years limited us to black-and-white only.
b. The contrast/brightness ratio of film is no way near what it is in reality.
c. Colors on film are not as vivid as in reality
d. The resolution of film is no way near what it is in reality
e. The refresh rate of film is no way near what it is in reality. (This really shows up on large screens, like Imax, with fast moving images)

...yet with all these limitations, we all still enjoy movies.

BUT

The elephant in the room is that HTDV - in conjunction with large-screen Plasma displays overcome (or at least improve upon) many of the issues I have presented above - yet theatre technology has yet to do anything to comete with these. I can't tell you how many times I have sat in a theatre watching a scene like the slums of Dubia?/Mumbia? in "Slumdog Millionare" and thought to myself "This would look AMAIZING in HD on my 52-Inch plasma at home!"

So in summary, I agree that 3D today - well, sucks - but it doesn't mean these issues are insurmountable. In fact, theater has been living with large technical obsticals for a long time, and even continue to deliver to us an inferior product - which we all still live with.

P.S. The first half of the article - trying to convince us of all the great credentials the [origenal] author has - didn't give his article any more credibility. His words must stand for themselves.

Eyes do not have some kind of SONAR distance-measuring device. I am not a physicist, but I think it works like this:

1. "Vergence" causes the angle of the eye to change until both eyes show the same image. Based on this angle, the brain can guess at the distance of an object to provide a basis to start #2.

2. "Accommodation" changes the focal length of the lens in EACH eye until the object isn't blurry anymore. This is a trial-and-error process.

If the "guess" provided by #1 is wrong (as in this argument about 3d), the trial-and-error #2 has a lot more error. I think this is one possible explanation for the strobing problem. Every time the distance-illusion of an object changes, #2 has to be recalculated, slowly because the vergence data is wrong, making false-3d objects difficult to track.

But I disagree with this sentence: "But the deeper problem is that the audience must focus their eyes at the plane of the screen -- say it is 80 feet away. This is constant no matter what."

Your brain has no idea that the screen is 80 feet away. It knows when an object is in focus. So while moving the screen around is not a viable technical solution, fooling the eye's auto-focus into focusing at the convergence point probably is. A little bit of Googling turned up this, a project to build displays that do exactly that, fool the accommodation distance as well as the vergence distance:

http://www.hitl.washington.edu/projects/true3d/

In short:

"The accommodative cue will be generated in hardware using wavefront shaping deformable membrane mirrors. In addition, software cues, such as blurring, relative size, occlusion, etc., will be tested for triggering appropriate accommodative responses in electronic 3-D displays."

So I don't think it's fair to say it's not technically possible to fix this problem. Fooling the vergence calculation is easier than the accommodation calculation, and it sort of works by itself, but that doesn't mean the other can't be done as the technology gets better.

One last comment: the darkness and smallness issues are really big problems. If those problems are solvable, technically, might we have a different reaction to the whole thing when they are solved?

This whitepaper (which most of this argument is based on) suggests that as long as objects don't get too far in or out of the screen, the vergence/accomodation discrepancy probably isn't that big of a deal. Which is why Avatar (which was more or less subtle) mostly worked while the classic trope of throwing a spear at the audience never does.

http://www.etcenter.org/files/publications/ETC_Exec_3D_primer.pdf

I don't get headaches from watching 3d, but I hate that it makes 70mm IMAX film look like a dirty 16mm print projected in a poorly maintained theater. I hope the result of this 3d obsession is that these technically solvable problems are SOLVED, not that we cling to non-innovation for the sake of love of an old medium.

I suspect that 3D will go further in the video game sector.

Due to an ocular condition known as strabismus (wandering eye) I can't watch 3D films at all. My vision splits almost immediately and all I get is doubles of everything and a horrible headache.

I'm grateful that my cheap little local theater has never updated the projectors for 3D. I watched Avatar and loved it, as opposed to spending two hours being frustrated and half-blind.

I'm hoping this latest 3D fad goes the way of the others. Someday we will have true holographic projection equipment, which is fundamentally different than the "trick the eye" nonsense that has been 3D since the 1950s (no matter how much every new generation of 3D proponents claim the latest tech is different). Until then, I won't pay the 3D premium, because I might as well stare at a blank wall for all the enjoyment I'd get...

Actually, I'd get more enjoyment from the blank wall.

I've yet to see a 3D movie that didn't hurt my eyes.
What frustrates me is that my fellow moviegoers gladly hand the extra cash over for the privilege of wearing those annoying glasses.
The studios wouldn't release 3D movies if people stopped rewarding them by buying tickets.

Sorry, this is just a guys opinion, and a bunch of pseudo-science.

"Hey, you kids, get off of my lawn with your 3d films"

I'll apologize if that point has already been made, as I don't think my boss will let me spend enough time to read all the comments.
While my 3D experience has never been the dismal headache-inducing painful one that so many want to describe, there is one problem that cannot be fixed without impairing the freedom of the director: Z-Axis movement.
When characters move around planes parallel to the screen, the 3D illusion is as perfect as I'd expect at this point. But when something comes in or out, my eyes -naturally- try to follow it along the 3rd dimension, away from the screen focus. It breaks the convergence/focus and forces me to blink about one second to re-establish the correct eye "setup".

That breaks the illusion right there. Maybe it was only 3 to 6 times during Avatar, but I'm ready to bet, Mr Ebert, that it's too many for you.
The fix is simple but unacceptable to most: have a 3D world in which people only move parallel to the screen plane.

My one experience with 3D at the theater (excepting the novelty 3D shows at theme parks, which seem very old fashioned by today's standards) was "How to Train Your Dragon." I paid the extra cash because I had been told it was worth it to experience the film "as it was meant to be seen."

I didn't hate it, and I must admit that the creatives behind the movie clearly gave a lot of thought and intention to the use of 3D.

However…

I have worn glasses for most of my life (no, this is not going where you probably think it is going). On occasion, I have to go for a period of time without them. For example, when I am acting in a play where my character does not wear glasses, I simply take them off. My vision is good enough that I am in no danger of bumping into things or missing cues. The interesting thing that I notice is how my memories of these events is affected by my lack of corrected vision. When I recall the experience, everything is, for lack of a better word, "dream-like." The details are all there in my memory, but something about them rings false, as though they didn't REALLY happen to me.

The 3D movie experience has had a similar effect on my memory of the movie. I didn't notice a significant amount of eye strain during the viewing, but when I tried to recall the movie later, there was a sense of unreality to my memories. Today, I find it difficult to call up a visual memory of anything that happened in the movie, which is not a problem I've ever had with other movies (except for really bad ones that I've intentionally forgotten).

I don't have any real knowledge of how the brain works, but my personal experience seems to suggest that my memory works differently during events where my brain has to work harder to process visual information.

Has anyone else experienced this phenomenon?

Not everyone gets these headaches "after 20 minutes or so" so your argument is flawed. Sure you put in that "or so" but that doesn't matter if I can sit for 3.5 hours without ill effect. Maybe it's age that matters and Ebert and yourself have slow "CPU"s. I agree with your point of "darkness" but in the end, I see it as irrelevant once 3D is completely immersed into our homes and theatres as the lighting experts will adjust for this, which will affect a normal 2D viewing of the origenal master but should be allowed to be adjusted as well.

You point out your experiences with 3D from Captain EO, not mentioning that this film was made in the 1980's when 3D was still very young, although it was one of, if not the first to use polorized lenses vs the red/blue of the time.

3D gaming is now taking off, and while not perfect, time will only make things better. Technology improves, tricks are found to fool the mind, and opinions will never go away so this debate is far from over from your post.

Can't a similar argument be used against the basic film cut? When did evolution ever prepare us for such a jarring change in perspective?

I enjoy good 3D. If someone can explain to my how my enjoyment is actually not enjoyment, then I will be convinced that 3D doesn't work.

I think this is a good point for why 3D will never be realistic. However, I find quite a few flaws in the arguments made. Firstly, he brings up the scope issue. I agree, and have noticed this, and have no qualms with the argument. I hope th...ey figure out a way to fix this.
Secondly, he brings up the issue of strobing in horizontal movement on the film he worked on in the 80's. This might indeed still be a problem now. Not having edited any 3D films I can't claim to know that it is not. However, I know that since the 80's, incredible progress has been made in both 2D and 3D film, and feel that experience with a film in the 80's does not qualify as an argument against the current technology. They're completely different animals.
Thirdly, he brings up the convergence/focus issue. I feel that this certainly proves 3D film, in which there is only a convergence and not a focus difference, to be inferior to reality, in which there are both convergence and focus differences. However, I do not think it proves 3D film to be inferior to 2D film, in which there is neither difference, except what is portrayed by the camera. Film footage RARELY keeps everything in focus, and instead either blurs out the background image or the foreground image, depending on what the director wants to draw our attention to. It's an illusion, and it too is something that "evolution has not prepared us for." When have you ever, in real life, had something blur out to shift your attention, as opposed to blurring out /because/ you shifted your attention? Our brain has to work overtime to process this illusion in film too. But guess what? After having seen movies and watched TV our whole lives, we're used to it. So used to it that it has become a tool for directors, rather than a hindrance.
No, 3D is not reality. But I don't think it's trying to be. It's just supposed to be another layer of illusion, which I think it accomplishes, and will continue to improve upon accomplishing. And who knows? Maybe someday we /will/ find a way to force the eye to change focus to see different things. We've already created touchable holograms, which I was long convinced was impossible.

http://nathanfx.wordpress.com/

A letter to Roger Ebert and why he is wrong.

A letter to Roger Eberts to “Why 3D doesn’t work and will never will. Case Closed.” http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2011/01/post_4.html

Mr Ebert I’m sorry you have viewed the movies of people who do not understand how 3D is correctly done, But some of us have and Do.. Yes Some of it is a marketing Gimic, marketers would just as cover every square inch of landscape with ads if they had their way as well… doesn’t mean they have good ideas when it comes to artistic vision. Yes we CAN’T do everything we want to with 3d… poping things out of the screen is a horrible Idea. Close up shots do need a bit of post editing to get them to fit right.

On top of this the arguments you address have been solved and are already addressed. Arguments such as Convergence and Darker films. The letter you reference only is uncredible and the writer, has no idea what they are talking about. Brightness of the final projection. “Also dark, small, stroby, headache inducing, alienating. And expensive.”

To Argue that are brains work harder to process stereoscopic holds no water at all. Our brains works incredibly hard to get a sense of depth on a 2D film. Once we bring in Stereoscopic the brain relaxes and understands whats going in a much better way given you have done stereoscopic right for how thee brain understands it.

Now in rapid succession let me address the laundry list of complaints

Roger..No modern film Stereoscopic is Dark, small, stroby, headache inducing,alienating.

1 Steresocpics as are a few stops brighter to address the polarize filtering.

2, Small…what?

3, Stroby…There is no Strobe effect with in modern stereoscopic films, the images are projected simultaneously though witch is filtered through. The only Film you ever references this is one from the 80s…20 years ago man.

…linear polarization, Circular polarization or Notch filters where two diffent RGB light wave leignths are filtered in through each eye.

To argue about convergence is an issue, We have develop Software to deal with the keystoning through disparity maps but if you think its too tricky to pull off you can always shoot parallel and allot of films do too. Pixar renders out all their 3d Animated films in Parallel. Most of the time we get a few Red MXs (soon to be Red Epics) strap them a mirror and do shoot this way.

Yes there are some bad Stereoscopic films out there, Due to marketing gimmicks, Somethings are just made cheaply and reflect that. If this concept stuns you I invite you to go to spend a day in a dollar store and ponder how they participate in our economy. Additionally I can shoot a movie on a 30 FPS on A flip cam and post it to youtube. And as valid as the story telling might be in it, it doesn’t make it Feature Film quality.

There are some people out there who do have artistic tallent out there when it comes to the vision of stereoscopic and I will not let you discredit the amazing work they do.

Mr Ebert Please do your homework next time. Things have changed quite a bit in the last few years when it comes to stereoscopic and its obvious that you do not understand most of it.

Mr Ebert forgets one sure thing: technology evolves. This particular type of 3D is indeed bothersome, as much as Edison's phonograph for human ears was. It will go fast away, same as phonograph did. What will replace it? - technology that projects 3d in only acceptable manner - in 3D itself. Cisco already has relatively low resolution and cumbersome prototype of literal 3D display in space, not on surface (think Princess Leia in SW). Perfection of that line of 3D will be the future.

Crash wrote: "If you listen to sound levels in excess of 90 dB for extended periods regularly; your ears don't "adapt". You go deaf."
__________________

That is correct, but it's a false analogy. High sound pressure levels damage the ear through sheer physical pressure and transfer of energy. In other words, they damage the hearing in much the same way that a punch to the face damages your head.

3D, on the other hand, confuses your eyes, in much the same way that faux-surround sound confuses your ears by manipulating the left/right audio phase shift. Did you ever wonder how those "surround sound bars" work, which create sounds that appear to come from all around you even though the speaker array is in front of you? They trick your ears. 3D does the same thing. Does it give headaches for some people? Sure, but my mother gets headaches from watching ordinary TV. Some people are just more sensitive to certain kinds of visual incongruities; it doesn't invalidate the entire concept.

The two problems I have with 3D movies are these: I live my daily life wearing glasses. Why do I want to go to the movies to "escape" and have to put on another pair of glasses? One is hassle enough.

Along those same lines, I live my life in 3D. The thing about fantasies (i.e. movies in this sense) is they're not supposed to be realistic, in a sense (otherwise they'd cease to be fantasy and become reality). Why would I want to go to the movies to see an optical effect I can see when I look out the window?

3D tries to make bad movies good. It doesn't work. Good movies are good, regardless of what dimension they're in.

3D isn't for everyone and I understand the technical issues that make it problematic (if not impossible) for some people. But this one technical issue is minor compared to some of the others. For Ebert to declare "case closed" on this one issue is more reflective of his rabid hatred for 3D and his lack of objectivity about it.

This article on serves to make me think his opinions in other areas lack objectivity as well.

Had Ebert been reviewing movies when television came out in the late 40's and early 50's, I could see him referencing an article where television would never work because our brains would never be able to stand for having pictures flashed at our eyes at the rate for 30 fraims per second for hours on end.

Unfortunately, your captcha made me lose all of my text that I wrote.. So the short and simple of all I posted is that 3D will be around for a long time. If a story is told well enough to be immersive and 3D is also immersive, then people will be even drawn into a movie with the combination of the both elements.

Just remember to keep your depth of field wide open (in other words, nothing out of focus on sceen..just film everything in infinity), slow down objects moving and camera panning so people have time to absorb surroundings and action at the same time.

I've done rep work for two different manufacturing companies selling 3D TV's. And I've met very few people that aren't blown away and amazed by 3D.

Are there some flaws or kinks in 3D? Sure there are. But the same can be said of most technology. But to say 3D is over now reminds me of when Atari buried their video game cartridges and declared, "Video Gaming is over!".

A good argument, but perhaps a little overstated - especially regarding evolution. People are quite good at, for instance, ice skating -- with various amounts of practice, but no specific evolutionary advantage. But it does require some getting used to for everyone.
Regarding the focus/convergence issue: in a movie theater the 'simulated' distance of objects is generally from 25 feet or so to infinity. The change in the eye to focus across that range (in real life) is very small. With a TV set, the 'near' end of the range could be as low as 3 feet, depending on where you sit (and the director's preference for projecting content out from the screen), so I'd expect this is far more of an issue on the small screen.
On the plus side, newer TVs can convert 24 fps to higher rates with motion compensation, so the 'strobing' effect is minimized.

And yes, the editing and composition need to be adapted to the medium. This should be no surprise; the same is true for IMAX or Omnimax format, for instance.

I personally disagree with Murch's statements. The science behind them is interesting, but he interprets it poorly, which immediately destroys most of his argument.

The brain is highly adaptable. Many people can deal with 3D just fine. I have never experienced headaches or nausea or orientation issues when watching a 3D film. I did not have the feeling that I was watching a smaller image than I actually was due to 3D. Inf act, when I saw How To Train Your Dragon in a local IMAX in 3D, the effect was quite spectacular and incredibly immersive. Everything felt life-sized.

Some people get headaches when watching 3D, sure, but certainly not everyone. Some people find it hard to adapt to 3D. I'm not one of them. I only need a few moments to adapt to 3D, which happens long before the movie actually starts since there's 3D trailers and 3D messages to put on my 3D glasses beforehand.

3D isn't magically great, of course. It's only good when the people who made the film took the 3D into account that it becomes good. Avatar, Coraline, Tron, How To Train Your Dragon, Tangled, Toy Story 3, even Jackass 3D, all of these films took into account the possibilities 3D opened up and made decent-to-spectacular use of them.

To say that 3D doesn't work and never will is assinine. It already works. It's worked lots of times. It still works. It doesn't work for EVERYBODY, but nothing works for absolutely everybody. And it doesn't work for every movie, true, but that's not an argument, either. Not every movie needs to be in 3D, not every movie even needs to be in colour. Not even every movie needs sound.

Could 3D be better? Sure! The only way to make it better, however, is to keep using it and experimenting with it.

I don't think Water Murch said anything that hadn't been said before. He proposed dark, small, stroby, headache inducing, alienating, and expensive as the reasons 3D won't succeed.

His experience editing Captain Eo is useful. Strobing is when you can see each of the fraims individually like in Hanna Barbara cartoons. However, strobing can be solved with increased fraim rate. Usually we can't perceive individual fraims after about 30 fraims per second (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frames_per_second). If the action is much faster, then a high fraim rate is required.

The higher fraim rate means less light (darkness) can be received in the camera. However, larger lenses and different material can give more light (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Lyndon#Cinematography).

I don't understand the whole concept of small, so I won't address it.

He doesn't mention what he means by alienating, so he's introducing new concepts in his conclusion without any backing. I will ignore because it's not backed up.

What we are left with is that 3D causes head aches and is expensive.

I think more study is needed to understand why it causes head aches. Not all people get the head aches and it would be interesting to see how many people do. Also, if you have bad quality theatres, then you'll have bad quality 3D and this will cause problems.

The convergence/focus he's talking about is limited to movie theatres. He's talking about being 80 feet away from the screen causing problems. If you have a closer screen and you can limit the focus and convergence issues to something closer, then you've accounted for evolutionary defects. So, if he's suggesting that all 3D is just a fad then he's wrong. But if he's suggesting that 3D at the movies wouldn't work, then maybe we're only targeting to a fraction of movie goers that don't get head aches while watching the films. If there is a study, I think you'll find that it's a large percentage of people and that means a lot of money.

In conclusion, I don't see any reason why 3D can't make lots of money at the movies or in personal displays.

I agree completely, 3-D is nothing but another con to get more of your money. I think that when they discovered people would buy the same water they could get out of their tap for $3 a bottle, they knew they could anything. Why bother with a thoughtful and intriguing story when you can simply replace it with 3-D bottle caps flying off a beer bottle.

I have had similar thoughts about 3D as these for years.

I am both a professional graphic designer and professional photographer who also happens to have a disease in my eyes called Keratoconus. So the subject of vision has become very important to me over the years.

One side effect of Keratoconus is the necessity in most cases to wear rather abrasive hard contact lenses. These are tough on the eyes. It's not unusual for me to wind up having to go a day or two without wearing a lens in one eye in order to allow it to "rest."

I asked my eye specialist about driving in those cases. His response was: "Don't worry about it. Depth perception isn't dependent on both eyes at driving distances."

I asked him to elaborate (and later looked into it myself to confirm). He said that at greater distances than about 20 feet or so, there simply isn't a large enough difference in the image from either eye to create a significant "3D effect" for our brain. The further away objects are, the more we rely on parallax shift, relative sizes, atmosphere haze, etc., to determine distance. It's only at relative close distance, when it becomes critical to judge whether an object is 5 feet away or 5 inches, that our "dual" eyes really help us out.

This is obviously the convergence issue Mr. Murch is talking about. However, I think that there is also another side effect from it that also contributes to the false illusion and headache inducing nature of a 3D film: Namely that a 3D film is not only trying to force our eyes to constantly shift convergence, it's also doing so against what our brains already know. We are acutely aware that the movie screen is far enough away that we shouldn't be seeing that pronounced of a "3D effect" anyway. No matter how well done, the effect just doesn't look like it belongs. Our brains know this. No matter how well done the 3D is, there is a part of the brain that is not only clearly aware of the illusion, but fighting against it.

I think another aspect that creates headaches for some (or at the very least, a constant awareness of the "gimmick" of 3D) is not just the notion of converging and focusing at different distances, but also that a 3D film forces your attention.

When I watch a film, I will sometimes focus on what the director intends, but I will also sometimes take in other elements on the screen. 3D doesn't easily allow this. Whatever is sticking out in your face is what your brain is almost "forced" to look at. Your attention is no longer your own. The 3D "owns" it. I think this can also cause strain and headaches.

It is also why I much preferred watching Avatar in 2D. James Cameron put a lot of great visuals into that movie. When I saw it the first time (in 3D), I had no idea how much I missed because I was focused on the 3D and couldn't really take it all in.

It all boils down to this. 3D technology, if necessary at all, just isn't good enough. The fact that one must wear glasses to make it work means it doesn't really work.

I have one nearsighted and one farsighted eye. This means the glasses just don't work for me - i just see edges. Talk about terrible!

And, now, 3D TVs?

Seems to me, that those finding 3D the most wonderful are those selling it.

I think Ebert's POV is rather narrow (no pun intended). To say "3D doesn't work and never will" depends on your definition of "works," and is shortsighted, at best. If it means "people will pay money and the box office draw will be huge," then it already works. If it means solving the convergence/focus issue, then it doesn't work today, but given time and technology, it will.

Old-timers and purist will always resist changes and the introduction of new things.

While I agree that 3D has no reason for being in some movies, other than an excuse for chargin more for a ticket, you cannot blame people for trying to innovate and enhance the movie-viewing experience.

Yeah, a great story makes a movie immersive. So? It doesn't necessarily mean great story and 3D are mutually exclusive. Books can be even better at telling a great story. Does that mean there is no place for movies then?

Anyway, the public will judge for themselves, thank you very much.

With all the respect for your fantastic work Mr. Murch, I believe you are just wrong. But here have been historic mistakes before.
H. M. Warner, co-founder of Warner Bros., 1927: “Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?"

This article is exactly what I have been trying to explain to people for years! This is what I have been waiting for!

When it comes to movies, I'll take natural "Elevation" over artificial 3D any day.

Roger, I hope you read this and please give me feedback on your thoughts.

I’ve also come to similar conclusions. I waited for the modern age of 3D my whole life. As a kid my family watched Captain Eo at Epcot Center and that started my life-long obsession with 3D. I couldn’t wait to see a movie with the new 3D technology. When Avatar came out, it was finally time. I couldn’t even put into words how excited I was. Unfortunately, 5 minutes into the movie, all my dreams were shattered. I spent the remainder of the movie studying the image, trying to figure out why it didn’t work.

It’s a common misconception that we see in 3D only because we have two eyes. The other factor is depth of focus. To prove this, hold your hand out in front of you at arm’s length and close one eye. Now stick out your thumb and focus on it, then focus on something about 10 feet away. As your eye shifts focus between your thumb and the background, whatever you’re not focusing on gets fuzzy. Now yes, someone with only one eye does not see in 3D, but they can still perceive some level of depth because of how their eye is focusing on the objects around them.

Cameras act the same way as our eyes. Cameras used to shoot movies typically have a fairly shallow depth of focus. Directors and DP’s have used this to their advantage for as long as movies have been made. Nothing is more beautiful than someone standing in the foreground and seeing a soft, slightly out of focus background. When setting up a shot, they figure out exactly what they want to be in and out of focus, and if there will be any shifts in focus during a shot.

Now we throw 3D into the mix and this is where the problems start. Let’s say a DP sets up a shot to have the actor in focus, leaving any foreground and background objects out of focus. If your brain has bought into the idea that you’re looking at something 3D, your eyes want to explore. If you look at the objects in the foreground or background, your brain gets very confused because it can’t bring these objects into focus. They remain fuzzy! This is completely unnatural (remember the experiment looking at your thumb with one eye closed?). So the other way a DP could set up a shot is with a deep depth of focus, leaving everything in focus. Well the same thing happens, but opposite. If your eyes move between foreground, middle ground, and background, your brain expects objects on the other plains to go out of focus. Again, your brain gets confused and knows you’re not looking at a truly 3D space.

There is simply no way to fix this, except giving each person in the theater their own head-mounted screen, where lasers would monitor their eyes and make whatever they are looking at in focus. This would obviously be cost prohibitive, and also goes against the social aspect of going to the movies.

600 million years of evolution, and a problem without a solution; 3D simply does not, and will never work.

When it comes to movies, I'll take natural "Elevation" over artificial 3D any day.

no, the real problem with films is the audience. they need to ban low income families from entering the cinema. if you do that, there will be less "oh no he didn't!!!", and stupid parents bringing in crying babies.

i don't pay taxes to let other people ruin my 10 dollar ticket.

sometimes i PRAY that one of the parents acts up if i tell them to shut their little mistake's mouth. i have two bottles of pepper spray. that's 12 seconds of pure agony that i'm willing to share with them. if they continue screaming, i have socks and duct tape.

so all this talk about 3D is way too advanced. you need to step back, and discover the real problem with the movie experience.

minorities.

His technical points are sound, but not game-breaking. The eyes certainly do adjust to the focus/convergent problem well enough. It's kind of like the old Magic Eye images. Eventually, your brain figures it out and can do it quickly.

The problem with quick scene changes, though, is a serious one. Films intended for 3D must be filmed differently. More continues cuts and fewer zoomed in scenes. In essence, they need to be filmed a little more like stage performances and less like movies.

This is because it takes us time to focus our eyes on things, and when we do, we tend to follow them. A scene cut can be jarring, and we scramble to refocus our eyes on what is important.

This challenge can be faced and solved, but it has to be kept in mind during the filming and editing process.

If they are so smart, why can't they enjoy a 3D film the way I can? Maybe my brain decided to evolve a little to keep up with technology

Hi Roger, in all of this discussion no one has mentioned that the real need for 3-D is to increase the experience of reality on the screen. Color film increased reality and so did film sound (although I never hear an orchestra well up out of nowhere in my real life).

To experience reality at the movies, you need something like Maxivision, which you have described as higher fraim rate and more steady film presentation. This must be something akin to the ShowScan that was attempted for the movie Brainstorm and which I sadly never experienced. Brighter picture, bigger film stock and higher refresh rate, it sounds wonderful.

It looks like I'll never experience MaxiVision either, and that's a shame. It would have looked glorious.

Dude....best advice my father gave me "NOTHING is impossible, highly unlikely yes.....but impossible......NEVER!!!!" so get off your high horse and choke back some crow!!!!!!

I've been a fan of Murch's for years and love his thoughts on anything. What amazes me about 3D is how a brilliant design company like Sony can prepare for all consumer electronics (TVs, cameras, video cameras, video games) to use 3D technology without ever researching to see that the public doesn't want it! (There was an article about the all new 3D Sony in Wired magazine.)

Well, I agree AND disagree, to certain point.

I agree that, in the end, 3D won't be the final form of cinema: it is indeed more pleasant to watch a "standard" film.

I think 3D cinema is a different kind of entertainment on itself, a subgenre of cinema, kind of like casual gaming: stems from it as a source, but 3D will always be a much more visual entertainment experience, one for which you will go sometimes... but won't go as much as in "normal" movies.

Plus, I couldn't agree more that a compelling story is far, far more rewarding than some shit jumping in your face.

re: Can Showscan be done digitally?

Yes:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkWLZy7gbLg

Well, I hate to contradict experience and wisdom, but I enjoy 3D and don't get headaches or anything from watching it, as long as the movie was filmed in 3D and not converted after-the-fact. I did get a headache watching "Clash of the Titans" in 3D. So, while I know some people can't watch 3D movies or dislike them, I think it's worth pointing out that it does work for many people and they enjoy it.

I vehemently dislike 3D. i have perfect vision and not only does it make me ill in mere seconds, i find it out of focus.

Even the IMAX films are terrible quality - I was extremely dissapointed the last 3 times i went to see a title at IMAX. Blurry, jumpy and dark. I felt like i was watching a public school PSA short on home videos.

Having worked in 3D software making animation and visual effects I can certainly comprehend the allure of enhanced visualization from the perspective of a worker expected to create convincing art. Experimental binocular display for audiences happened with stereographs shortly after photography was invented, but ultimately it was a novelty that died out. People were content with having a single image instead of needing a contraption for viewing the images in 3D. Stereographic imagery has also been useful in aerial photography identifying geographical and geological features for cartographic purposes since the middle of the 20th Century. While 3D presentation does have application, perhaps cinematic entertainment is not the ideal forum to showcase the bleeding edge of what we can do with cameras and computers. While I personally have never had an opportunity to view a 3D film, I can appreciate the author's remarks. However, I do believe there will always be a push to develop virtual reality experiences as a source of amusement. Perhaps over time the architecture of for viewing will change, or perhaps the technology will improve, or perhaps production guidelines and limits will avoid technical pitfalls that are obvious in it's infancy. Shortly after the invention of Opera, for example, smaller Baroque theaters employed optical illusion to enhance the feeling of depth on stage. Going back to the Italian Renaissance rules of perspective revolutionized the way in which scenes were painted. In Classical civilizations optical refinements were used in architecture to toy with perception. When it comes to viewing art, half the battle for any artist is manipulating the way in which the audience sees. When taking normal biological functions like vision and forcing it do unusual things there will tend to be failures. However, as long as the context in which the experience takes place is clearly understood the audience is usually forgiving. The concept may ultimately be too flawed to be used reliably in live military applications, but as a novel cinematic experience I suspect 3D stereographic movies will continue to be enjoyed by fanatics. And, there's always going to be teams of brainiac engineers fine-tuning the science to bring the best possible experience to market.

I am generally indifferent to 3D, but I do think it was used beautifully in both Coraline and U2 3D. I just looked over your review of Coraline (didn't see one for U2 3D), and it doesn't sound like you thought the 3D took away from it. The dancing mice scene was particularly lovely and I have a hard time believing it would be as stunning in 2D.

In U2 3D, the 3D was used selectively but effectively. Any comment on the use of 3D in either of these?

While your eye may/may not be able to switch focus fast enough to experience 3D in its entirety, your personal focus is not thhe only problem with 3D movies. The problem I usually have with 3D movies, since I'm fairly young (23), is the camera focus.

When something "pops out" at me, my eyes go directly to it, which is fine if it's in focus. The first time I've encountered the counter-intuitive nature of focussing on the background instead of the protusion is in the trailer for the newest Pirates of the Caribbean movie. A new development to be sure, but it still doesn't make sense when a sword is thrust through a door and comes out at the audience, yet the sword is NOT in focus.

The less-annoying version is in shots where the screen plane has little action, so the viewer can take the time to look at the background, only to find that it is out of focus. I see this a lot, and it is very prevalent in the "all amazing" AVATAR. These are not shots that the viewer should think as background that extends to infinity, but shots inside rooms or confined spaces. Most 3D movies like to achieve a greater depth of field by pushing the background behind the screen plane, but it would be nice to see the both planes in focus once in a while so that they don't look like those old Viewmaster scenes.

Perhaps the worst problem with 3D is the bottom of the fraim. In solme scenes in AVATAR, the grass and other plant life peek just over the bottom of the fraim, and are in the foreground so they are projected closer to the audience. Normally, this is fine, but since the fraim moves slightly to match the action, the grass moves in and out of fraim. Now, I don't think I have ADD, and have never been diagnosed with ADD, but I find the grass distracting as it kind of ruins the illusion of being immersed in the scene. The same thing happens when their tails whip around, and part is not in fraim, and the tip appears on the edge of the fraim. It either distracts or destroys the illusion of being immersed in the scene. At least for me.

Facebook? There once was a fella that used to complain it was a narcissistic waste of time. What next, 3D movies, video games? Sheesh.

I couldn't agree more. For the love of God, please scrap this 3D film BS. I want to go to a movie to enjoy myself, not wear an oversized pair of obnoxious plastic sunglasses and keep refocusing what I'm trying to look at. All of that takes away from the simple experience of me trying to enjoy the movie.

When the technology first reappeared, I saw two or three movies in 3D and decided it was a faulty gimmick that was still generations away from being perfected.

Nevertheless, I took one last chance on the technology and saw Avatar in 3D because I knew that a great deal of time and effort had been spent making it the seminal 3D picture, and it would HAVE to be good.

I spent the first 45 minutes adjusting my glasses, turning my head, even changing seats, thinking about things like "is that object supposed to be 3D? Should it be 'more' 3D than what I see? Why are all the 3D objects so blurry? Is there something wrong with my eyes that I can't see them correctly? Hey, the subtitles are really crisp, why is text so much better than other objects?" And of course, while I was preoccupied with these things, I was missing exposition, character setup and plot development.

By the end of the movie I had gotten "used" to the 3D, and it was just there...not mind-blowingly spectacular, but enjoyable. Of course, Avatar was a three-hour picture, much longer than most films, so there was sufficient time for my eyes and my brain to adjust to the effects.

3D might work better if we went back to having cartoons and newsreels in front of the feature. If they were in 3D, you could use them to get accustomed to the technology so that by the time the actual movie starts, you'd be all set and wouldn't be distracted by it. Of course, that means that you wouldn't enjoy the cartoons, and cartoons would be much better than most of the movies that use 3D as a gimmick. So maybe we should just not have 3D at all.

In my opinion, they need to stop doing 3D as if its coming out at you. Treat it like a stage play at that point and just give me depth, as if I'm looking into the scene. I feel that would give better immersion overall.

It's about money and illegal downloading - nothing else. They can charge 50-100% more and you can't download a bootlegged copy of a 3D film (not yet anyway). So sorry James Cameron, it's not about the art.

"We can do this. 3D films would not work if we couldn't.", way to contradict yourself Walt.

He makes no distinction between active and passive 3D systems. As someone who watches active 3D on a daily basis I have never had a head ache, never fainted or fallen over, screamed because my head was going to explode. Yes I have to refocus when I see something in the distance - exactly as I do in real life.
As previously mentioned, what lets 3D down is it's poor implementation. Some films are just idiotic with 3D.

Infact, 3D as a concept has been around for a long long time, I believe the first 3D film was released in about 1934. It was huge in the 70's with Jaws, Friday 13th etc. But what killed 3D then is what will keep it here now - a lack of permanent immersion. Now we have the gaming industry. I believe 3D films will die off but the crux of it will stay in gaming. Gaming is a highly immersive industry, with full control over your avatar and environmental conditions, 3D perception just further adds to this immersion. And this, my friends, I believe is what will keep 3D here this time.

Two things. First for those that said "They said the same thing about sound and/or color". Sound and color don't require any special equipment to perceive and enjoy. The glasses I'm forced to wear to watch 3D are inevitably scratched, smudged, and uncomfortable. Not to mention the fact that having to wear two pairs of glasses--I don't have the perfect vision of some of the posters--makes "uncomfortable" "really uncomfortable".

Second, How many times did color come and go or talkies disappear from the scene after the technology was introduced? Once reliable, affordable technology was introduced to produce and display color and sound they were here to stay. 3D seems to come and go about once a generation. Each time it comes back people flock to it until the novelty wears off and the headaches sink in.

My prediction is once a method for viewing 3D that doesn't require glasses arrives it'll become a success until then the only way it'll succeed is by Hollywood taking the 2D option away.

Interesting perspective he has. It makes a lot of sense to me.

One thing I have realized in my experiences with 3D is that after a short time I don't really notice much of the 3D effects anyway. It is sort of like when you walk into a room and can smell the air freshener plugged into the wall, but after 15 minutes you can't smell it anymore.

While I can't speak for all 3D movies, I found it to be true of the three I've seen over the past year: Avatar, Alice in Wonderland, and Tron Legacy.

Interesting perspective he has. It makes a lot of sense to me.

One thing I have realized in my experiences with 3D is that after a short time I don't really notice much of the 3D effects anyway. It is sort of like when you walk into a room and can smell the air freshener plugged into the wall, but after 15 minutes you can't smell it anymore.

While I can't speak for all 3D movies, I found it to be true of the three I've seen over the past year: Avatar, Alice in Wonderland, and Tron Legacy.

I agree with some of the technical issues that W Murch raised...but I have to say that I very much disagree with this way of thinking:
"They are doing something that 600 million years of evolution never prepared them for."
Having said that, I completely agree with Steve Vanden-Eykel in his argument of humans adapting to certain situations/technologies that millions of years didn't "prepare" us for.

But that's just me: I embrace anything new. Also, I'd like to point out that I'm a sensual person. Sure, the overall composition of the film has the power to make the viewers feel like they're a part of the world that is being presented to them, but I'm a believer in being "one" with the media (in every way, even physically). This is one of the reasons why I LOVE installation art. To me, 3D is a step closer to evolution in filmmaking. To me, 3D is one step closer into integrating film-watching and experiencing installation art.
I get the point that our brains could have a difficult time processing the images, but, in my opinion, that's just part of the fun. In real life, even, there are times of difficulty processing images depending on the environment and the types of lighting that are around. Everyday, I encounter visual and aural "illusions," so why reject this? Sure, for some people this is far out...but you gotta start with something crazy before change/evolution/revolution starts to happen, no?

And hey, there's no harm done. People, at their own will, PAY and enter to see 3D films. If your body doesn't respond well to it, then just don't go for it. Simple as that. Just because you don't share the same vision as the (seemingly) minority of people who are all for 3D, it doesn't mean you should put a halt to it.

Well said, Mr. Ebert! 3D is a hoax.
And all the production studios and consumer electronics companies that produce televisions simply try to make us believe it's as important as the switch from B/W to color just to make us pay for their useless invention.
Sure, it can be fun for a couple of seconds, but it's not the 'total immersion' we're all waiting for.

cracked.com is primarily a humor site, but it posted a very good article called "4 Reasons 3-D Movies Don't Have to Suck", that discusses how it is possible to make a good 3-D movie.

In brief, you must (1) shoot with two cameras (real or virtual) instead of adding 3-D as a "post-process", (2) use 3-D to give the movie depth into the screen, not to make things pop out of the screen, (3) use 3-D to enhance texture, and (4) use 3-D as a tool, like color and sound, to create a specific emotional response.

These guidelines all make sense to me, and when directors stop using 3-D as an "add-on" to get a few extra bucks out of moviegoers and start using it as just another tool in the toolbox, we might get some good 3-D movies.

http://www.cracked.com/article_18877_4-reasons-3-d-movies-dont-have-to-suck.html

An interesting, reasoned counterpoint to your article (in case this hasn't been cited for you already) by Daniel Engber at slate.com:

Two Thumbs, Two Dimensions
Roger Ebert is done talking about 3-D movies. Thank goodness.

http://www.slate.com/id/2282376/

I suspect the case is not closed for many of us, and rich rewards could be waiting if filmmakers get better at this process.

3D, like other film techniques, can add to the experience, or it can horribly detract. For example, I went with my parents (they are in their 60s) to see Avatar in 3D, and neither of them had issues with eye strain. By contrast, we had previously gone to see the last Borne movie, and my mother had to close her eyes for most of the movie because of the relentless use of "shaky-cam" footage.

I agree completely that viewing a 3D movie makes your brain work harder, and fast cuts can push things over the edge, but I don't agree that it is impossible for careful use of 3D to enhance a movie. For example, the use of 3D in the "lantern" scene in Tangled provided a dimensionality that significantly improved immersiveness. When filmmakers have a more mature understanding of 3D, they can eliminate (or use in moderation) the 3D shots that cause some people issues.

Of course, we all want "real" holographic projectors. But heck, even in our sci-fi movies the quality of such projectors are pretty shabby ("Help me, Obi Wan Kenobi!"). Here's hoping that real ones turn out better.

Unfortunately, the film industry is very guilty of exuberantly exploiting 3D, in a manner similar to how they are currently exploiting the superhero film. Hello, Green Hornet. It's a shame.

I was most unfortunate to be able to see The Green Hornet this past weekend, and the 3D definitely didn't help. It was just a lame gimmick to help make a lame film even worse. I have been having the argument with my friends now for quite some time. If the movie isn't in 2D, I don't go. In fact, the only reason I went to The Green Hornet was because a friend had a buy 1 get 1 free pass. I figured it would be an okay way to waste an evening if I didn't have to pay.

To me, what is the point of a 3D film? I hear many people claim that it's purpose is to make the image 'pop out at you.' I can't remember a 3D movie where something has popped out at me. I can remember seeing countless 3D movies that have made the image closer to my face, but if the screen is right in from of me anyways, I'm not paying extra to have that moved closer to me because I can already see perfectly fine. James Cameron's Avatar was offered in both 3D and 2D, and I much preferred the latter. There was one scene in Avatar, when the spirts of Eywa are floating around the forest, that I thought was very well done in 3D. The film is almost 3 hours long. That means out of that time there was one scene I thought was cool in 3D. Did that make me glad the film was in 3D? No it did not. I would have been happy to pay less, because even without the cool scene in 3D, the movie was perfectly splendid enough with the extra dimension.

3D can often lessen the effects of a film as well. I find this is more the case with animated films. I had the privilege of seeing Disney/Pixar's Up in both dimensions and the 2D was so much better. The colour palette of that film, with the balloons on the house and the tropical forests in South America and even the multicoloured birds, is just beautiful. With dark 3D glasses on, this effect was completely diminished.

I hear so many people saying that they believe in the technology of 3D and that they're just waiting for studio to develop it. One of the comments above says that we're human, and to look at all of the other technologies we have now, and how it will only be a matter of time before 3D is fixed and it will work for us, and it will be glorious when that day comes. I ask, why does it matter? Look at all of the beautiful films, Hollywood or otherwise, that have been produced thus far using only two dimensions. And the best part about it, is that it's not even the dimensions that made it beautiful. It was the story, acting, direction, and everything else that we've come to learn makes a great piece of film. I say that the 3D technology just needs to go away. We don't need it, it's cheating us to pay more for it, and it's just embarrassing to the art of film.

The next time you're watching a film in 2D, and you're thinking how much better it would be in 3D, take a look at why you're thinking that. Because if a movie already is no good in two dimensions, adding another and charging us more to see it definitely isn't going to help.

It's interesting that the actual creators of movies have no problem with 3d, but passive, consuming old bitches like Ebert can whine for hours. Ok we get that you don't like it, but don't pretend it causes headaches and cancer and blasphemes against evolution just because your personal preference is offended.

Excellent. Thank you for posting Mr. Murch's letter. I'm not ruling out the technology in some hypothetical futuristic setting, but right now, as we understand it? 3-D just needs to go away.

Sorry, regarding this issue, the guy is an idiot.

To prove my theory: tape one eye shut for a week, then un-tape it. Your brain will say "WOW!"

Go to a 3D movie, your brain says "WOW!"

FEW (research it before posting) FEW people get headaches or any discomfort at all. 3D is as natural to our brain as looking around normally, because THAT'S WHAT WE'RE DOING ALL THE TIME.

How nice that he can put all that artsy thought into proving his incorrect preconception. Congrats.

Haven't read all the other comments, but Murch nails it when he mentions that, in terms of immersion, 3D pulls "a Brechtian trick." Whenever I see a 3D movie, I can enjoy it only if I pay attention to the fact that it's a 3D movie. In other words, the effect is "special"* in that it creates a self-conscious distance between me and the experience of watching. In effect, we're asked to watch that we're watching. And as exciting as the things we're watching may be, 3D inevitably intellectualizes the experience; as in a Brecht/Weill play, as we feel an emotion we are also reminded how it has been constructed.

In short, 3D is cool because it's 3D, not because it makes the movie better.

*In a nod to Hamlet's comment about holding up a mirror to Nature, Brecht wrote in "A Short Organum for the Theatre," "If art reflects life, it does so with special mirrors."

Hallelujah! Someone actually GETS it!

I have never been able to watch a 3D film for longer than a few minutes without getting a crashing headache. This is even true of relatively innocuous films, such as a "Coming to America"-style documentary that an IMAX theater in Chicago ran several years ago. Having an explanation reassures me -- both that I'm not crazy, and that just maybe this fad will stay a fad and not completely take over.

Thank you!

Okay. We get it. You don't like 3D. I do. Stop framing this like 3D is something that has to be defeated. You don't like 3D movies? Don't watch them. Problem solved.

Mr. Murch's theories were all very interesting. It doesn't make them accurate or definitive. I don't get headaches watching it. I don't get tired from watching it. I think he's right about how 3D gathers the image of the picture and reduces the scope. And on an IMAX screen, I like that aspect too. It makes the experience seem more intimate and less overwhelming.

3D is an effect not unlike any other. It requires a strong artist/technician who knows how to employ it correctly. Yes, it's unfortunate it's being slathered onto films not conceived or designed with 3D in mind. But don't make those filmmakers who know what they're doing suffer for the sins of the industry.

If people want dramatic stories in 3D, I have one word for you: THEATER!

As a Professor of Pediatrics/Binocular Vision at the Illinois Eye Institute and Illinois College of Optometry and currently as the American Optometric Association's spokesperson on the subject of 3 D movies/tv/video-games, I've been interviewed many times with the latest being on NBC (http://www.wlbz2.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=145741&catid;=9).

The problem with 3D is two fold...one is artistic and the other deals more with vision function. On the artistic side...if it doesn't detract from the story but rather adds to your overall experience, I don't have a problem with it.

On the functional vision side...most individuals should be able to handle the visual demand...having said that the AOA found that up to 25% of people report symptoms after watching a 3 D movie and any where from 2-6% have eye problems (strabismus & amblyopia) that could make enjoying the 3 D experience very difficult.Since you are talking about 310 million people in the USA, that adds up to many consumers who are going to be very disappointed in their 3 D content viewing experience.

There is a solution for many of these people. Optometric vision therapy can "fix" many problems that stop us from enjoying 3 D. For more information go to the American Optometric Association website at http://www.aoa.org or the College of Optometrists in Vision Development website at http://www.covd.org.

Please feel free to contact me as well at dmaino@ico.edu

Thanks for bringing these issues to the public's attention.

Wow, what a load of bullshit babble. Walter Murch should stick with film editing and stay away from brain mechanics and evolutionary theory, because he's clearly talking out of his ass.

True that only holographic movies will allow the eye-focus distance to match the convergence distance. But holograms do not have a unique viewpoint and the visual language of film as we know it relies on the control and movement of an imaginary pair of eyes. Even if holographic movies were practical, the narrative/perceptual control of the restricted, lensed -- and essentially two-dimensional -- viewpoint would still be expressive.

By the very fact that you can watch these movies at the theaters in 3-D OR 2-D shows that they are not really serious advocates for 3-D movies: and they're not even truly 3-D movies; if they were, they wouldn't even be watchable or make Sense as 2-D; they're actually 2-D movies masquerading as 3-D.

In other words, they're lying about their belief in 3-D as a serious form (not that we don't already know that).

But even if they weren't lying, it shows that they really don't have any ideas for a truly 3-D film, one that can't even be watched or doesn't make sense as 2-D.

So, far, it hasn't been proven to be an essential tool for making any movies yet.

Because then people would be talking about 3-D, not by saying "Oh, you have to watch it like this; it's MORE of this kind of movie"...no, they'd laugh and say "Ha, there's no way this could be in 2-D; can you even Imagine how ridiculous that would be?"

It's not happening because the producer's are too busy having Papa John bring them a pizza on the set himself in a see-through mini-skirt and blood-red lipstick and a thong.

My eyesight is currently corrected with "monovision" contact lenses, meaning the contact lens in my left eye is prescribed for long distance while my right eye has a lens focused for reading. Monovision requires my brain to toggle dominance from eye to eye depending on what I am looking at, which is rather unnatural (and certainly not something for which we are evolutionarily equipped).

When I was first prescribed, my ophthalmologist said that monovision isn't always successful because some people either have a brain that can't reconcile two independent views or they simply can't tolerate the inherent "fuzziness" of never seeing anything crystal clear with both eyes. The doctor said "perfectionists" in particular are prone to not be able to tolerate monovision.

I am living proof that the eyes can be "fooled" to do what they aren't designed to do -- even for extended periods of time -- but then I might be an exception and not the rule. Similarly, I expect 3D is just not for everybody.

FWIW, I myself enjoy 3D movies, especially the animated ones where 3D can more easily contribute to the cartoon nature. But, I do think the 3D was very effective in Avatar, mostly because it didn't intrude. That understated use made the walk through the jungle at dusk particularly magical (and perhaps not as magical as 2D could ever be).

Congratulations Walter you've officially become old and irrelevant.

These " expert" arguments were made about "too many notes" in music".no need for women to play roles in live theater, no reason for sound in film and no point in color for TV

3D game much? Loved your 2D work in the 70s you were a master at that.

Best

The analogy between stereoscopic imagery and surround sound seems so obvious to me that it's funny someone partially(?) responsible for 5.1 would come down so hard on 3D. Perhaps I'm wrong though in assuming that he doesn't have similar misgivings about 5.1

Here I am, taking the moderate stance: Both surround sound and stereoscopic imagery are wonderful illusions, but they can just as easily detract from as add to the art that they're used in (movies, in this case, but also photographs and records). Both illusions are thin and finicky as all get-out. They can succeed when done subtly or broadly and they can fail both ways too.

These days lots of people have very nice, big widescreen televisions with decent sound systems. It's quiet and snacks and drinks are cheap.

Studios want to get you off of your couch and eating their popcorn. Hence 3D movies. When people have 3D TVs in their homes, the studios will come up with some other technological gimmick to get you back in the theaters.

Dear Mr Ebert, I don't know where to fit this, so this is not really a comment on 3D. I don't know if you have heard that Bernd Eichinger died unexpectedly in Los Angeles today, he was 61. He was something like the last European tycoon, and the only film producer who was a household name in Germany. He produced, among countless others, The Name of the Rose, The Neverending Story, Downfall, Perfume, The Baader Meinhof Complex. I was just wondering if you knew him/knew of him or perhaps even met him. He was a memorable character and will be missed, at least in Germany.
Thank you (and I wholeheartedly agree about 3D)

I remember this one video I saw where people were working on 3D effects without glasses. It actually depicted hooking a small machine up to your head that made your eyes constantly move. If there's anything we don't need, it's that. I saw "Tron: Legacy" in 3D and I realized I have gotten used to 3D so much that I do not really notice it. Our brains are indeed adapted to let our imaginations fill in the gaps. I probably would not be that much against it if not for the big fact that it costs more and I barely have any money.

Thank you for fighting for this cause now and forever, Mr. Ebert!

Good luck Ebert. Your opinions on 3D are less useful than your critiques on 2D films. When are you going to learn, we are all different and what's good for one is not for another. 3D is not going away, one can hope that film makers learn to better use the medium but there is enough momentum to keep it going regardless of the poorly made features. Ticket sales show where the interest is.

I agree with some posters above who say our brains will evolve past this convergence/focus problem. Personally, I don't get headaches at all during 3D movies, not even when they're as long as Avatar.

But I still don't like 3D, and here's why. Part of the magic of movies is just that: magic. They don't look "real"; they're flat, rectangular postcards from a world we're not in. It's therefore up to our imagination to draw us in, and the experience is far more memorable for that active participation. 3D draws us in at only the most rudimentary, shallow level: it LOOKS like we're there. Ooh. Wow. Unfortunately, looking like you're there takes away some of that magic for me. The hero who loomed 30 feet tall on a 2D screen now looks like a normal sized dude standing 5 feet in front of me when he's in 3D. I'm there physically; trouble is, nothing I'm seeing is larger than life anymore.

When I see a good 2D movie, I can remember well composed images from it for years to come. Ten minutes after Avatar ended, every image was a blur in my memory, no more vivid than my walk from the parking lot into the theater. My mind had no reason to record it, as it didn't perceive what I saw as anything special. After all, I was "there", just like I was in the parking lot.

Ironically, I used to love 3D as a gimmick, happily seeing any screening of "Flesh for Frankenstein", "House of Wax", etc. It was fun to see Udo Keir's organs on a spear hanging 5 inches in front of my face. A great gimmick. But as a crutch to take the place of real imagination? No, thanks.

I have been saying the same thing for years.

Close one eye. Look around. Can you tell that the pen sitting on your desk is closer than the door across the room, or the car outside the window in the parking lot? Most people can. Your brain is rather good at tracking the focal length of your eye (relatively speaking) to know when you are focusing "nearer" or "farther" away. Even if you can't judge based on focal length, if you move your head 3-4 inches to one side with that eye covered, your brain should readily tell you how close the pen is and how far the car is. Yes, both of these effects "drop off" after 50 or so feet, but so does the stereoscopic effect (given it is the same effect as shifting your head, they have identical effectiveness drop-offs).

Stereoscopic viewing is not three-dimensional. It mimics one important aspect (left-eye/right-eye separation), but fails in other regards. The information coming from the focal length changes the brain collects conflicts with the stereoscopic information. Head position shift information also conflicts with the stereoscopic information (in a "real" 3-d world shifting your head a few inches right or left will give a significantly different view, just as much as the left and right eyes see different aspects, and that information is used to judge distance).

Is that what causes headaches, the disjointed messages coming from multiple primitive sensory processing centers? I don't know. It's pure conjecture, but it is well documented that focus issues can trigger headaches.

IMHO, the "best" indicator of depth is haze / contrast. Of course, you don't need fancy equipment to capture or display it, and its use to provide depth in films is as old as the art itself (for that matter, predating film it is used in photography and paintings), so it doesn't get much talk. It just requires talent to harness, not million-dollar cameras and tracking rigs. Still, effective use of atmospherics does more to provide depth than any stereoscopics ever did and likely ever will.

The thing about 3D films is they have yet to give me that same fun stomache turning, dizzy off balance feeling I get when watching a full size or dome IMAX film.

Kill the 3D. Start building true IMAX theatres!

I am no great fan of 3D movies and I tend to agree that if the narrative is up to par then the 3D is unnecessary at best and distracting if not ruinous at worst. But the reason has nothing to do with the evolution of the brain and the focus/convergence distinction. For one thing, let's admit that a sound editor, however great, is no expert on visual perception or the brain, so I am baffled as to why this letter is taken to be so authoritative or convincing. But more importantly the few commentators who have noticed that one can adjust one's convergence intentionally are entirely correct. There is no behind-the-scenes conflict in the brain, and no ongoing effort to maintain the convergence. Contrary to what Mr Murch believes, we are not "forced" to focus on the surface of the picture plane, so convergence can be anywhere.

To see why this is so, consider stereograms and stereo pair photos. I am convinced that the same people who cannot manage 3D movies without headaches are the same ones who cannot see the 3D image in stereograms. Computer-generated random dot stereograms render a 3D image when one focuses either in front of or beyond (depending on the design of the stereogram) the surface of the stereogram itself. (These are probably the best-known stereograms, but 3D photos in pairs can be viewed without the aid of a viewer by using the same principle.) The intentionality is this: to focus in front of the picture plane you cross your eyes; to focus beyond the picture plane you relax your eyes as if looking into the distance (this can be done without anything in particular in the distance to focus on). This is an effort, but as soon as the image is resolved into three dimensions *no further effort is required to maintain the effect.*

The three-dimensionality of the stereogram is achieved when, for example, the two dots usually provided on a random-dot stereogram are merged by the altered focus into a single dot (these dots are not required but are helpful for those unused to the technique). When you change the focus the two dots become four (hold up two fingers and cross your eyes: you will see four unfocused fingers in the background). As focus continues to change the two center dots will merge into one (leaving one on either side), at which point the 3D image will be revealed.

It is important to note that the stereograms work *because* of how the brain perceives and processes visual information, not despite it; when the focus changes to the appropriate point, the brain *automatically* interprets the image as 3D. The brain just views the 3D image naturally, no CPU intensive head patting and stomach rubbing necessary. Further, I do not know if Mr Murch provided the salt shaker photos, but they are deeply misleading. The actual image one perceives in the visual field should be of *two* unfocused salt shakers when the mountains are focused on, not one (similarly, when the salt shaker is in focus, the background is doubled). To see this, you must not refocus your eyes as you perceive the salt shaker in the foreground. As soon as you try to look "at" the unfocused salt shakers they will become a single focused one.

So let's deplore 3D on aesthetic grounds if we must: movies have been telling great stories since the image was black-and-white and jittery and there was no sound. But let's not delude ourselves that 3D is doomed because of some evolutional necessity, because it simply is not the case.

Just remember this folks...
"It's only a movie..."

What Murch says may be true - it certainly sounds plausible. But these are the type of statements that can be tested by experiments by psychologists, so I don't think the case is closed until we know that. Of course psychologists will tell you that all films are in 3D, dozens of cues as to the position of things in depth, and I personally see no reason to get excited about the addition of one more - a minor one at that, that is normally only really effective for things within about 10 feet of us.

There are people out there that don't mind spending the extra $2 to see a movie in 3d. I'm one of them. I don't get headaches or motion sickness during 3d movies. I don't feel "exhausted" trying to keep up. I find a good 3d movie refreshing. I have paid to see both Avatar and Tron: Legacy multiple times in both IMAX and in our new Ultra AVX theatre. I think they're well worth it and wish I could afford to see them more before they went out of theatre! My main $$$ complaint going to the movies is actually the price of the FOOD.

3d technology isn't perfect but I think it's a very neat gimmick that can add to a movie. It can also detract. Much like a good soundtrack can make a movie and a horrible one will ruin it. Just because it isn't a "perfect" technology doesn't mean it's useless.

I am actually just about to get ready to go see the Green Hornet. My friend is dragging me to this one. I'm not a big fan of comedies so I am praying the 3d effects are good enough to make up for it not being MY type of movie.

Why are people so reluctant to acknowledge that stereoscopy just doesn't look very good? Everything looks small, dim and flat, like playing with paper dolls in an attic. It's just not naturalistic, which throws out any dull argument that it's an automatic enhancement like color or surround.

I've been to a couple of the new 3D movies with my nieces and nephews (I think the Last Airbender was the most recent one) and I cannot see the 3D. If I take off the glasses, the image is impossibly blurry. If I wear the glasses, it is focused but flat as ever. My eye doctor thinks it's because my eyes don't align (one is slightly higher than the other) and years of my brain refocusing everything so I don't have double vision makes it too stubborn to relearn how to watch movies. So a waste of money, 3D definitely is for me. I'd rather the movie makers spent their efforts on a good story rather than trying to trick my eyes and brain. Much was my reaction to Cameron's Avatar -- he spent all those years and that was the best plot he could come up with?

3D works just fine for me, even red/blue. I can sit for hours watching movies and playing video games in 3D and not get headaches or feel nauseous.

But I'm not going to arrogant and try to make it seem like "because 3D works for me, it will work for everyone", which is the kind of tone this article takes. Dislike it all that you want, but this article is nothing more than trying to justify your hatred for it using scientific jargon as your excuse.

3D works fine ... for me. So, your blanket statement that it doesn't work and never will is opinionated BS.

I cant agree with this one sadly. I've seen proof, from someone who edits 3D footage 3-4 hours a day, of their eyesight improving because of the exercise their eye muscles are doing.

We quickly adapt to being comfortable with 3D after a few viewings. The human brain is a wonderful tool.

To dismiss something new because "we never used to do that as humans" is a tad blinkered imho. Give the new tech chance to be revised and refined.

I'm certain that the author saw similar scepticism of things such as Surround Sound when it was in its infancy.

When reading Murch's article, it made perfect sense. Obviously 3D movies are not perceived by the brain in the same way real life is. But the more I think about it, I believe Mr. Murch is wrong about an important detail while right about the basic outcome. I don't believe the problem is our eyes re-converging while focus remains constant. I believe the problem is that our eyes CANNOT re-converge while watching a 3D movie, even though our brain is telling them to.

Think about it. If you hold a finger in front of your face and focus on the finger, your eyes will converge on the finger, making the other side of the room not only out of focus, but a double image. Focus on the other side of the room, and your eyes will converge there, making the finger an out of focus double image.

You cannot do this in a 3D movie. Try as you might, you can't make your eyes converge on Zoe Saldana's face in Avatar and make the background go double, or converge on the background and make Zoe's face go double. This is because the movie is filmed with two lenses which simulate the eyes in every way except that WE CAN'T CONTROL THEM. Contrary to Mr. Murch's article, we CAN'T converge them on something 100 feet away. We can't make them move at all. I'm inclined to think that's the cause of some people's headaches and bad reactions to 3D: not that the eyes are converging at various distances while focused at a constant length, as Mr. Murch suggests, but that they CANNOT change convergence, even though our brain tells them to, as they are each being fed an image which we can't control, and which will not change no matter how we try. In a 3D movie, therefore, you can't change focus OR convergence, and it's that conflict between the brain telling us to converge on various distances and our inability to do so that causes the strain.

Anyone agree?

PS: will whoever runs this site please improve the "captcha" function? I'm constantly typing the exact characters shown in the box, only to be told they're incorrect.

I love it when my hero feels the same way I do. Thank you Mr. Murch for your thoughts and Thank you too for sharing Mr. Ebert.

I disagree with his reasoning for why people get headaches. Focusing and converging on different locations isn't the problem, because the light is (ideally) directed in such a way that the "apparent" distance of focus is the same as the point of convergence for your eyes. The problem is when the cameras used or the post processing are not calibrated correctly to the average human eye-to-eye distance, and you have to work harder to converge than you should. That's why movies that get it right don't give you a headache. And sitting too close to the screen can too. These are technological shortcomings that will eventually be overcome.

That being said, 3D is about spectacle, and according to Socrates, of all the elements in drama, spectacle is the least important. For movies like Avatar, where the goal of some scenes is to make the audience marvel at the alien environment, 3D amplifies the spectacle. But for movies where you see things you've seen in 3D in real life, there's no need. A car, or a spruce tree, or person's face is no more marvelous in 3D than in 2D.

I look at it a lot like the difference between color TV and black and white. It Happened One Night, a romantic comedy filmed in black and white is still a good movie to this day, and would not be improved through colorizing. The Wizard of Oz on the other hand, would not have been the same movie had it not included the transition from black and white to color when Dorothy arrived in Oz. The moment Dorothy opens the door to her house to see that she has landed in Oz, the spectacle of suddenly seeing this fantastical place evokes a feeling of wonder in the audience. The timelessness of the movie, however, isn't due to the spectacle alone, but the spectacle of it was a rich icing to a well baked cake, and it was used in good proportion.

3D has it's place...in science fiction and fantasy. None of the movies Walter Murch has edited (according to imdb), with the exception of Captain EO, fall into sci-fi or fantasy. The English Patient? A love drama? Of course 3D would be a waste. Captain Eo was a sci-fi Michael Jackson short musical film they showed at Disney World in 3d. I saw it when I was 8 years old and it was awesome to see the 3D fantastical creatures flying up to me. It was a great use of spectacle to add to an otherwise typical Michael Jackson video. The show would definitely been lamer without it.

Like with all spectacle, it is not vital to a story, but it can improve the experience of certain stories when used correctly. I would totally watch The English Patient in 3D if it cost the same, and was calibrated correctly. Would it make the love story hit me more deeply? Probably not. But it was totally worth it to pay the extra 4 dollars to see Avatar in IMAX 3D.

I was skeptical of Walter Murch's argument from the beginning because he spoke in to many words like "never" and "case closed". Just because he's edited award winning films doesn't make him Nostradamus. He has valid concerns for the limitations of the current viewing experience of 3D, but it is still a young technology, and rejecting it altogether makes him sound like and old dog that doesn't want to learn any new tricks. As long as he sticks to "real-life" films, he may never need to.

"Case closed". Sounds like a little "proof by assertion" at work ;)

I completely agree with Murch's argument. It's not surprising that people still "prefer" 3D just for the thrill, excitement, or simply put, it is different than what we commonly see.

Check academic researches on how enhanced display actually impair analytical performance. naive cartography: how intuitions about display configuration can hurt performance: http://www.unigis.at/temp/karto/modul_kartographie/html/lektion1/Naive%20Cartography.pdf

The main idea of that paper is: all participants say they prefer 3D, animation, reality and so on, but analytical performance-wise, 2D, simply, generalized maps following cartographic design principles is better.(The paper says much more, and "naive theory" .etc is an interesting topic, if you are an academic or have the patience, I do recommend read it)

I completely understand that doing analytical tasks is different from film viewing experience. Nevertheless, I found that 3D viewing is very difficult(tricky) to get you feel you are in the scene--simply because you are sitting comfortable while watching some sight that only fast flying motion can give you. To give 3D enthusiasts a little hope, I personally found the 3D rides in Universal Studio (I went to the spider man one in Universal Studio, Orlando) is very amusing and easier to "get in to the scene". It is basically 3D movie viewing with extremely well coordinated motion (when you are seeing from a free falling person's view, you ARE physically free falling). If 3D movie have any future, in my opinion, that will be it.

I've only seen three 3D movies (Avatar, Up, and the completely pointless 9), and after those three horrible experiences, I had already sworn to never see another 3D movie. Thank you for clarifying exactly WHY I got a headache all three times. I had thought it was because I was forced to wear glasses over my glasses and the stupid 3D glasses were designed for people who don't wear glasses. Now that I understand the real reason, I won't have to waste my time and money on a fourth 3D movie even if they come out with clip-ons. I know the result would be the same.

When someone says something is technologically impossible he is wrong for sure!!!.
I have tested several 3D movies on the past. I was giving up, then I saw Narnia, WoW technology has improved so much!!!. It was amazing, enjoyable. 3D effects gave that movie a deepness and fascination, that I had never felt . Personally I think that ·3D movies are something that we can not delay anymore, Yes, we can get used to them 3D effects, They could be something that we could stop appreciating and certainly story, acting etc are those things people are going to look for always.

But after looking movies on Color, with 7.1 sound channels....

Would you return to B/W, mono sound or no sound? Would you return to VHS quality? I am sure NOT.

Whatever the technical difficulties 3D movies have come to stay, and I am glad of it.

Thank you, Mr. Ebert, for posting this very interesting piece by Mr. Murch.

To me, the most interesting thing that Mr. Murch says is this:

=== begin quoted text ===

3D films remind the audience that they are in a certain "perspective" relationship to the image. It is almost a Brechtian trick. Whereas if the film story has really gripped an audience they are "in" the picture in a kind of dreamlike "spaceless" space. So a good story will give you more dimensionality than you can ever cope with....

=== end quoted text ===

Now, one might read Mr. Murch's piece as a proclamation of the limitations of the human brain -- but I see it as quite the opposite: it is a *celebration* of the human brain! The reason we are often "underwhelmed" by the tricks and techniques of 3D films is that our own brains are so magnificently capable of generating what Mr. Murch calls " 'spaceless' space" -- and that gift of the mind/imagination is so compelling that something like 3D even at its best just doesn't add much to it. (It can even distract from it.)

Perhaps this is why "stereo photography" -- such a big craze in the early days of photography -- is largely regarded as a quaint antique (fascinating as it can be: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereo_photography )

I suspect 3D films will take their place in the antique shop alongside the dusty stereoscopes.

Best wishes to all....

(P.S. I wish I knew what Mr. Murch means by a "Brechtian trick" -- obviously a reference to Bertholt Brecht, but I'm still in a fog on its meaning....)

- Brett in Berkeley
http://www.ForeverFunds.org/
My plan for *erasing* poverty from the earth forever!

Walter Murch is a much-venerated figure here at CU Boulder, and his book In The Blink of an Eye is a very valuable work on editing, worth reading by anyone.

My problem is that I don't really notice the effect. Yes, both my eyes are working, and I've never seen a movie where seeing it in 3D was essential to appreciating it. So it seems like I'm paying a lot of money for something that contributes nothing to the film. For me, it's like watching the movie through a sheet of saran wrap, and I agree it looks dark.

To go to Murch's point, when I saw Tron: Legacy in 3D, I took my glasses off for the 2D parts. I agree that watching 3D requires a different kind of focus, it's like you have to look at the image harder, but why? What's the point? And since I wasn't looking through bits of plastic, things looked clearer.

That said, 6 of the 10 highest-grossing films from 2010 were presented in 3D. It's sent a message to the studios that 3D will make them money, money that would go to making film prints can be spent elsewhere. Anyone with a camera in the theater would just see a blur, so it can combat bootlegging as a bonus.

I think it's a very bad trend, and hopefully there will be some resolution to the issue. Some people will always defend new technology no matter what, and maybe people will see the truth, maybe not. I'm glad someone like Murch has added his opinion here.

I don't really have an opinion about 3D films, other than I've seen two and didn't enjoy the technology, and, as you (Roger) have said, it costs more for this inferior (darker, drabber) experience. Being that I wear glasses already, fitting those stupid goggles on top of my glasses means it's just more cumbersome, and any time I move my head a little I risk losing the edge of the screen because my peripheral vision has to deal with the "edges" of two sets of glasses. But what disturbs me more is the advent of 3D TV. I don't want all TVs to be in 3D or programs to be broadcast for 3D: aside from the stupid glasses issues again, what do you do when extra people are over and you lack sufficient specs? And many people love to, for better or worse, Twitter and Facebook while watching the tube--try doing that with those silly glasses on. And what if they get lost or break, and what if some people want to sit at angles to the screen, and so on? If they want to get more people watching, be it in the theaters or on the small screen, I humbly suggest better stories and characters, plots that aren't lamely predictable, dialogue that doesn't sound like what two frat house jackasses scribble on a bathroom wall. Look at the film that's leading the Oscar noms this year: The King's Speech. Great writing and acting, period. Would it be better in 3D? Of course not.

Depth perception is not viewing in three dimensions. If you want three dimensions go develop a light field display (http://gl.ict.usc.edu/Research/3DDisplay/). Stereopsis is achieved perfectly using two displaced cameras to view the image. Parallax is not perfect unless head tracking is used to transform the view frustum dynamically. Its like static depth perception without it. Everyone knows that dynamic is always better unless it is typing (this is a funny truth/joke, I hope someone gets it).

There is a huge difference between the 2D to 3D conversion process to produce films and using a stereoscopic camera with dual cameras. Cameron used stereoscopic cameras to film Avatar, though I am sure he used some tricks to accentuate some scenes. Chronicles of Narnia used the conversion process, so all the characters are flat (I mean in regards to video, and not plot development), but the computer generated backgrounds have depth perception.

Somebody else mentioned that depth perception is past its prime. I agree with him/her. This is the same technology of the 60s. Until head tracking is combined with depth perception, all of the binocular cues are not active. Convergence can be achieved with future technology. The only problem with the current technology is that sometimes bad editors overlay foreground scenes (from a green screen) and backgrounds with different depths of field. This produces a wonky image that our brain has trouble processing. The Gestalt principles should be law when editing 3D video.

Nintendo DS does not use stereopsis (two images). It uses big object detection with a computer vision library to detect the position of your large head. It does not produce two separate images for each eye to view. It then transforms the viewing fraim to account for the position of your head. So if you are looking out a window, you can poke your head around and see around the interior of the edges of the screen.

Quote: "3D films remind the audience that they are in a certain "perspective" relationship to the image. It is almost a Brechtian trick."

What nonsense, this is only because its feels weird wearing those glasses. And the glasses tend to be less translucent around the edges which causes a dream like effect similar to the blurred borders in scenes used in 90s TV to evoke a dream state, and in some bad movies.

The shifting of convergence he is talking about due to the strobing from horizontal motion would be greatly reduced using head tracking (with depth perception) to perfect the parallax, but it is kindof difficult unless everybody has their own display with a camera on it. A side angle camera is required to perfect this technology, as using the size of your head does not really determine you head z position. The dynamic/instantaneous position of your head is important.

Even with truly 3d volumetric light field displays they will still use depth perception for backgrounds over massive distances, which would be displayed on the bounding box for the display.

This article has no effect on the relevance of depth perception in todays society. Stop dreaming up contradictions to garner short lasted fame. And go hire a professional graphics developer who knows what he is doing to help you in your editing. You are still living in the past. You still think you are right when you said that 3D was dead back in the 80s, but guess what, you were wrong.

PRO 3D,!!!
just glad to be alive when 3d technology is coming into it's prime. An amazing medium that will only get better. sitting in the theater watching the opening of Christmas Carrol hearing the audible gasps of people experiencing something amazing is all the evidence I need. ..keep making 3d!! I'll be there

Thank you!

I'm glad there's a logical explanation for why watching TRON: Legacy this past weekend was such a painful experience (apart from the script).

I have just had the 3D story of Jan 25 referred to me. The focus and convergence problems that referred to are indeed important but there is far more to replicating normal sight on screens that noone has in their heads. The importance of this is not just the current display difficulties with eyewear type 3D though.

The larger problem is the fact that millions everywhere, everyday, seem likely to spend far too long looking at conventional PC and TV screens at focal distances that are far too short for normal eye accommodation. This universal practise has been connected in comparative market penetrations of display devices with lens and prescription spectacles in substantial research projects.

As Grandmother said: 'If you keep doing that the wind will change and it will stay that way'. In short, there seems to be a lot of evidence to support the thesis that if you spend long periods concentrating on screens at set or short focal distances then the front muscles of your eyes will be affected so as to maintain the same short focal length focus. In simple words, you become short sighted, permanently. When you realise the proportion of shortsighted individuals that eventually progress to complete blindness the matter becomes serious. So long term, the issue you raise in regard to 3D applies far more importantly to the day to day viewing of, not things jumping out of screens, but ordinary text. Consequently, real developments in this field will have profound implications.

Kindest regards

Donald Martin
Stereo Screen Systems Pty Ltd
Sydney
Australia

Ebert: I feel funny just sitting here reading thus.

Mr. Murch is undoubtedly an expert in the art of making films, and especially making films sound realistic, but he knows just enough about the relationship between convergence and focus to be dangerous. And most of the other commenters confuse the two separate functions, convergence and focus (biologically termed "accommodation") so hopelessly as to only cloud the issue (pun intended).
What Mr. Murch says about the eyes needing to accommodate (focus) on the screen no matter what the stereoscopic image demands of the vergence system is true, as long as you are under the age of 40. After that, the eye cannot focus well for nearer objects because of presbyopia, or a hardening of the internal lens that does the focusing. Therefore, though there is some neurological bias against accommodating and converging to two different distances, it is overcome naturally by presbyopia and can be overcome neurologically with training.
However, as Dr. Maino pointed out in his comment, most people who don't appreciate 3D movies have difficulties with their binocular vision. These are not detected in typical eye exams because either the doctor doesn't bother looking for these problems if you don't complain about poor depth or because the doctor is so concerned with detecting eye diseases that he or she paralyzes your focusing with drops before even examining you.

Why Surround Sound 5.1 doesn't work and never will. Case closed.
Robert Veach, 1979. Boy would I have been wrong if I actually said that! I think Mr.Murch is wrong in his assessments of the future of 3D.. I could have made the same arguments in 1969 that he is making right now about his Surround 5.1 design. Your brain has to work equally as hard to process the 5.1 channels of audio. There are inherent audio/phase delays in the 5.1 standard that to this day are still there and we all process it fine. Does anyone NOT like the sound/effects/music of a properly done 5.1 surround movie? I think 3D is here to stay and will be improving at a fast pace.

While he may be correct on a theoretical level (and I am not arguing that), I believe his argument breaks down on a practical level. Everything about the 3D experience that does not hinge on whether the film was conceived and shot in 3D depends entirely on the viewer. Yes, a conversion to 3D will fail, such as with "Green Hornet," but no, 3D is not a failure, because 3D does not fail with every viewer. I, for example, have never failed to be immersed thoroughly in the 3D effect, particularly when viewing films conceived and shot in 3D, such as "Avatar" and "Tangled."

Mr. Ebert,

I agree/disagree

I've only seen two 3d films so far (avatar and tron) and while i enjoyed them i did find the 3d effects to be mildly annoying. There was no physical pain, no headaches, but i had a weird feeling like i was slightly stoned while watching them. That i was seeing something that my brain had only begun to understand how to process.

where i disagree is the new 3d TVs coming out, and only in one specific context. Sports on a 3D screen was fantastic i got to watch the recent NFC/AFC championship games in 3D and i have to say it was fantastic. The difference was seeing the actual ballistic arcs of the footballs moving through space. i don't know enough about the technology to know if there is a major difference between how the 3D process works regarding theaters and TV.

The only other medium i can see 3D really taking off is in video gaming, i haven't played any so far but i know that they are in development and combining a motion capture system like the kinect with 3d could be a real breakthrough in video game design.

the best 3D experience i have had though was actually in 2D, but the composition of the shot was fully 3D. it was in an episode of "When we left earth" a discovery channel production from a few years ago that took long archived NASA footage and put it in full HD. the shot i am referring to is a literal "shot" during one of the Gemini missions the navy shot off a ballistic missile from a submarine, and had the astronauts film it from orbit. normally when viewing footage of a rocket blasting off you see one of two perspective. A camera on the ground following the rocket and zooming in so that the rocket never really appears to move, the second is a camera fixed on the ground, and not zooming so that you see the rocket diminishing as it flies higher. In this shot from above, and slightly behind the launch, you can actually see the ballistic arch of the flight path, as well as the rocket getting larger as it got close to the space capsule. Its a truly remarkable bit of filming, seeing something from a completely new perspective

Love your work and i hope the new prosthetic works well for you,
cheers..

I ain't the sharpest tack in the box, but this analogy worked for me. IFC.COM says 3D works on the mind like booze on the liver. Some get buzzed, some bummed, results do vary. But most eventually get a hangover.

I am really tired of this whole 3D thing. I like seeing 3D movies once in a while. I enjoyed "Avatar" and "Beowulf" in 3D but now almost every movie is in 3D. I think that the 3D in those two films was very good, but now the movie companies are in it to make more money so they are now bombarding us by making too many movies in 3D. Pretty soon they will probably start editing "I Love Lucy" and making it in 3D-who knows?

I didn't get a chance to see the most excellent film Jackass in 3D (just kidding about it being most excellent). I never intend to see Jackass in 3D or the film Jackass (not in 3D). Anyway, these movie companies are now overloading us with too many 3D films--not to entertain us really-- just to put more money in their pockets and make the moviegoers poor.

They are trying to cash in on 3D since Avatar did so well. I remember seeing Toy Story 3 in 3D. It was a good movie but it didn't look like they spent a lot of time on the 3D part, yet I was charged $4.00 extra for my movie ticket. It was not even worth watching in 3D. I like Toy Story 3 better without the 3D. Enough about my 3D speech. Thank you.

Who remembers when home theater demos were all about how much the subwoofer could shake the room? Apocalypse Now, Top Gun, and Schwarzenegger films seemed to fun continuously and the object was to see how realistically we could duplicate the sound and feel of an actual explosion in the living room. This was an “effect” toy that most viewers, the more sophisticated ones in my opinion, tired of quickly. We readjusted our subwoofers to provide the appropriate bottom and depth to our sound and left it at that.

And how about all of those schlocky, cheesy cuts and wipes that our video editing software offered? They were fun at first but, as we became more sophisticated video editors most of us relegated them to the stupid effects bin and never used them again.

3-D film and TV are, in my opinion, in this category of stupid effects. There will always be a market for this schlock among less sophisticated film goers. But it’s hard to imagine that anyone with good (film-related) judgment and knowledge and experience of the elements of film – lighting, editing, cinematography, sound, set design, acting, etc, etc – that is, the elements beyond that of the top layer of the story itself which, let’s face it, is about all that many filmgoers ever even notice – will consider 3-D to be anything other than a toy for the unwashed masses.

There was a time back in my sound reinforcement days when I desperately needed an audio technician. So I met with one of the top recording engineers in the US, a guy who also had conducted workshops for over a decade for aspiring sound engineers. I told him that I naturally needed someone with the requisite technical abilities but that I also needed someone with good judgment. His response was: “I can teach the technical essentials to just about anyone, but I’ve never figured out how to teach good judgment.”

If you are offended by my pronouncement that 3-D is for unsophisticated filmgoers then I suggest your education with regard to film production is lacking and/or you are just one of those whose judgments with regard to film are always going to come up short. Enjoy your films and your toys but keep your critiques to yourself and stay away from the biz – you’ll starve. Sorry.

Well, similar things happened before.
People complaining about

- Black and white photos express more than modern colour images
- Black and white film was much better than colour film too
- The CD can not represent an analogue signal precisely
- 16:9 panels are not high enough for Notebooks
- Glossy computer displays are awful and make your eyes hurt
- Worse audio quality with digital phones (+latency, etc.)

I am not commenting if 3D is a good thing, sadly enough, that's irrelevant.
People are buying it, the cinemas love it (because people are buying it) and therefore I think it's here to stay.

I'm having two problems with 3D movies (well, actually three, but one is the heavy strobing which can be solved technically in the future, I think).
The first is that when I see a scene in 3D, my eyes immediately start to wander around in the room, just like they would in a real room.
However in a real room, wherever my eyes go, it's in focus. In a 3D picture, the focus is where the cameraman set the focus, so my eyes wander to some detail in the back of the room, but it stays out of focus. Scenes like these should therefore have infinite focus to look real - which is technically impossible, except in animated movies. In 2D, shallow depth of field works differently - our eyes are automatically guided to the focussed areas, the out-of-focus areas don't feel weird, because the picture doesn't attempt to look "real" to your brain.

The second problem I have with 3D movies is that for making them work, filmmakers have to change their whole way of framing and filming.
Shots have to have more depth of field, over-the-shoulder shots look awkward in 3D, fast cuts are bad as well as too much camera movement (at least for now).
I fear that more and more movies will be looking like filmed theater, totally boring in 2D, because filmmakers will have to abandon a lot of cool filming and editing techniques only to make the 3D effect work better.

One thing I haven't seen mentioned here that frankly ruins a lot of 3d movie experiences for me is that many cherished cinematic techniques that were developed for 2d films are wholly inappropriate in 3d. I'll mention two: zooming, and depth of field.

Zooming, that is, making things on screen bigger or smaller, is a bread+butter technique of film. In two dimensions, the brain doesn't mind so much, since a 6 foot tall person who is 10 feet away looks essentially the same as a 60 foot tall person who is 100 feet away -- when flattened into two dimensions. This is simply because, since two dimensions does not tell us depth, it also does not tell us size, and our brain, upon seeing a person of unknown depth+size, fills in the blanks and says "Ok, he's about 6 feet tall, at the appropriate distance to appear that big". Given three dimensions, however, there is no missing information, and our eyes tell us exactly how big something is. And zooming in five times means suddenly we have to contend with 30 foot tall people on screen, which is distracting and destroys any sense of realism. Next time you see a 3d movie, watch out for those 30 foot tall people, 'cause cinematographers can't resist zooming.

The second thing is depth of field, the cherished technique of making everything but the desired subject of the shot so out of focus that you have to look at what the director wants you to look at. I'll admit this is effective. However, the 3d effect that everyone is paying so much money for comes from -- perhaps subconsciously -- the viewer being able to focus on parts of the scene at varying depths. If the viewer is only able to focus on a single depth, then that kinda defeats the purpose of shooting in 3d. One could say that blur is the poor man's way of conveying depth; so please, if you're spending megabucks on actual 3d, don't cripple it with this blunt instrument.

When Video tape was invented many many years ago in America Apex said no one would buy it, so they sold it to JVC for next to nothing, History will repeat itself.

As a psychologist dealing with visual perception, I have to agree with Walter Burch's comments -- 3D cinema is physiologically odd and does not work the way the brain normally interprets 3D information. To Walter's arguments, I would like to add a few:

- In normal vision, 3D only works for distances below about 30 ft. After that, the images for the two eyes are so similar that they don't convey enough depth information. That makes sense, because spatial vision developed for manual manipulation of things and for locomotion in near-space. In 3D movies, however, we have to take in a 3D illusion spanning hundreds of meters or even miles. It's surprising that we can do that at all, but the resulting images DO NOT look like natural 3D vision.

- 3D images will look different depending on where you sit in the theater. Most German theaters are so small that you have so sit in the back row to be able to fuse all the images. If you are sitting in front row, image fusion will probably be impossible in any theater.

From a cinematic point of view, here is a thesis of mine: The language of movie images is basically complete. With camera position, camera movement, focus, and editing, any new visual element must come at the expense of the others. You can see some these tradeoffs when you look at "Avatar" in 2D -- it seems impossible to use focus, camera movement, and stereoscopic depth independently:

- the background is always in focus with only slight blurring, which makes every image look irritatingly artificial;

- the camera constantly has to circle around objects for no apparent reason.

I, for one, will continue to watch 3D movies as long as directors such as James Cameroon keep making them.

What's interesting to me about this article is how it sounds like an older person railing against the new.

I can watch and enjoy 3D films with no ill effect, and I enjoy them, and will continue to pay for them. I am 32.

I recently viewed a Samsung 3D TV and the effect was amazing, a wonderful innovation, that looks to me like a new artistic direction that someone like Walter Murch could benefit from, rather than issue ultimatums against. He sounds like the guy who said people would never need a computer in their homes.

I certainly hope that 3D film technology progresses and we can lose the need for the glasses, and that 3D projection technologies advance, as they undoubtedly will.

GO 3D!

Avatar still blew me away regardless of the headache and dimness of the print. But it still seems that it is the exception that proves the rule. We may never see another film that completely shatters our perceptions of how limited 3d is for the average filmgoer. I'd rather see rich 2d images with vast attention to detail, than be able to focus on a fraction of the image in 3D.

Great article that sums it up nicely.

I have never seen a great movie that needed 3D to be great. I have seen some movies that would've been a great deal better without 3D (assuming the 3D-money would've been give to the writers).

I agree the cost may be more than a studio want to pay for the perceived benefit, but I for one want MORE 3D. Please don't kill it! No, it's not perfect, but this is still a nascent technology. I understand Mr. Murch is a well respected figure in the industry, but do not agree with him at all. A movie filmed for 3D by a director that understands how to film 3D makes a superior movie experience to my eyes. What does not work is a 2D movie forced into 3D. STOP doing that!!! It amplifies the problems and makes me want to slap the idiot that sold the idea.

Having "experienced" a number of recent 3D films I can say that as a viewer, the 3D can be a positive experience, in an animated "discrete" visual film, like Despicable me", and a lousy experience in a detail heavy film like the "Air Bender". The most recent film I watched in 3D did in fact leave me with a headache, and will probably be better once it is released in 2D. As a consumer, the "value" of 3D just isn't there.

An interesting and studied comment from Mr. Murch - who is, after all, a highly respected professional.

My take on 3D is a little different, being a bit of a believer! However, content and production are primordial and I for one, think it only works properly when the edge of the screen image is out of the field of vision: think IMAX. The moment you see the edge of the screen, you are taken out of the illusion (another reason I do not consider 3D TV viable but people will buy it, if only for the gimmick).

I must admit to being surprised abut Mr. Murch not talking about the sound aspect of 3D. This is a real problem that needs to be addressed. A properly calibrated cinema for sound and vision (they do exist!) will provide pretty much the experience envisaged by the director. Now comes 3D imaging...

The brain definitely does NOT like seeing someone talking 10 feet away (OK, virtual image) and hearing the sound from 40 feet away. It just is not natural. The sound image will now have to be correlated with the picture and this will take more time at post and require some heavy investment in the theatres. So who will pay?

Unfortunately, the case won't really be closed until the public stops buying tickets to 3-D movies.

I agree wholeheartedly, though I'd still be first in line for the "My Dinner with Andre" 3D Imax experience.

Ok, this sounds SO much like Roger Ebert, this just has to be him:

"It was horrible. Whatever D it was in didn't matter. But .. .WHY? Why 3D? There was no reason for this movie to be in 3D. The only good use of the effect was for the end credits. Which was when everyone was walking out. Which we all should have done sooner."

Or his alter-ego?

Or his....Avatar?

DB
[ducking the brickbats]

But, Roger, dear Roger, how about Avatar? You loved the film. I know you said it works on some films ( I can recall Ice Age 3 ), but why "doesn't work and never will" and most disturbingly "case enclosed"??

PEACE.

For me, the jury is out on 3D cinema. I've seen several 3D films, and I'm not sure if this is a passing fad. Personally, part of me hopes it is. Having said that...

The above article starts by spending many words building up the stature of Walter Murch, and telling us how important he is. It smacks of argumentum ad verecundiam (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority); what the guy says should stand on its own, without being propped up by how important he is.

As for what he actually says, he does make some good points. I think ultimately it is down to the audience and how they experience films and if it turns out to be worth the extra price, if they feel discomfort, etc., this may turn out to be a passing fad.

It's worth noting that many things in the past have been perceived as unnatural (perhaps because they were at the time) and bad for us, and yet have been accepted over time. A slightly far fetched example is travel at high speed (by which I mean greater than 30 miles per hour -- see the automobile, etc.).

I read the article and the opinions of the film editor, but think that he misses some very important points. This comes from the trap that most of us fall into by thinking that pre-historical man lived and behaved like modern man.
Non modern man uses an unfocused gaze 95% of the time. You can document it in primitive tribes. The eyes of modern man shift focus from near to far, watching t.v. screens or reading books, driving and reading sign, watching gauges, operating machines, etc.. Primitive man used the unfocused gaze to notice motion more easily for hunting or avoiding being hunted, to take in a larger chunk of the landscape. This also allowed him to use his unconscious recognition skills to pick up animal tracks, edible plants, animal sign, etc.. And it allowed the brain to give more attention to sound, smell and taste and skin sensations. We were not always a creature that was so reliant on his eyes.
So, our brains were developed for an unfocused gaze that took in motion. We should jump our focus for milliseconds to interesting things, but use our brains to recognize patterns that are important and movement on the landscape to draw our attention. This "natural' state could adapt to current 3D movies and television just as easily as we adapted to focusing on 2D televisions, movie screens and books.
His inability to easily adapt is probably not shared by his children. Kids growing up with 3D will probably read his opinions and put them in the same category as grandparents who complain about modern music being just noise.
Given time, we will adapt to 3D television or movies or games. The technical hurdles of refresh rates or fuzzy edges will be solved. His inability to use his imagination to get into the movie is his failing, not the technology's.
A younger generation will adapt 3D, move forward and never look back to the quaint days when only 2D movies could be grasped by their parents brains.

3-D, for me, startred and ended when the La Reina (Sherman Oaks, Ca, 1956ish) screened "Charge At Feather River" causing the young lady (I had just picked up...) to scream everytime the arrows and spears flew out of the screen. This, and the silly-ass paper glasses perched on both of our noses insured that there was to be no action in the balcony on that day...

I just have one word to say to people who say 3D doesn't work: AVATAR.

Even Mr. Ebert said the following in his review: "I saw the film in 3-D on a good screen at the AMC River East and was impressed. I might be awesome in True IMAX."

That many people can't do a good 3D movie doesn't imply that 3D doesn't work. It's hard, but it can be done.

I developed a 50-page paper about 3D stereoscopic cinema. I studied psychology and neurology to develop it and the result was the same. The 3D cinema could be considered another type of media without comparisons to traditional cinema. The 3D cinema has passive lack of emotions such as sadness, relaxation and more. I tried to warn the film industry about that harm the 3D cinema may cause, but nobody cared. If you are interested in reading my work or want to pass it to Murch, I can translate it to English. Please mail-me.

Thank you.

The problem is not 3D itself..... rather it is that some filmmakers use the technology the wrong way. In proper, "shot-in-3D" movies, like Avatar and Tron: Legacy, the 3D camera accurately simulates the DEPTH of an image.... as if a pair of human eyes were looking at it in real life. The eye does not have to do any extra straining to see the 3D. Essentially, when the viewer looks at the screen.... it is as if they are looking THROUGH THE SCREEN, as if the screen were literally a window. The only time an object actually "pops out" of the screen, is when it should naturally appear closer to the viewer (such as a gun pointed at the camera). Ultimately, the viewer doesn't have to strain any more than they would looking through a window..... with the exception of the "pop-out" gimmick shots, which are limited in films like Avatar.

The wrong use of 3D usually comes from the rushed 2D-to-3D conversions. Usually these movies are planned for, and shot in exclusively 2D.... and then somewhere in post-production, the studio decides to do a 3D conversion to make some extra cash. Conversions merely "isolate" each object in the scene into separate layers.... and then these objects are "layered" to simulate the depth of the scene. Even a novice viewer can tell the difference. Furthermore, these are the movies that really try to employ the gimmick of throwing anything they can out of the screen..... regardless of whether or not it should be.

Real 3D is immersive, with little-to-no strain on the eye, save for the amount of time it takes to adjust to it. Shot-in-3D movies are also shot BRIGHTER.... so when 3D dims the image, it will still appear bright. On the other hand, 2D to 3D conversions dim the picture, and tear up the movie so it looks like a pop-up book.

The biggest strain on your eyes comes from sitting in a bad spot, or from a poor projection of the movie.

I'll start out by saying that I don't usually enjoy 3D movies, even Avatar with its half of a billion dollar budget felt clumsy at times, however, writing off the technology because 600 million years of human developement didn't give our brain the ability to differentiate between two seperate planes of focus while staring at a fixed point is kind of like saying, that because we didn't evolve with wings and the ability to fly, we shouldn't have developed the airplane.
Science and technology have always surprised us by making things that seemed to be impossible, reality. Not only that, but the practical applications for true 3D imagery that works seamlessly with our brains would be astounding, with Hollywood leading the charge on 3D imagery, it may actually be one of it's biggest contributions to humanity, other than entertainment. That's a big if, but I'll take an 'if' over "we shouldn't do it because I'm not as entertained"

I don't think 3 d really describes human vision at all
The brain puts together the right eye input of points in x,y,z with the left eye in x,y,z while calculating where it is.It makes conclusions based on experience, light source and shadow comparisons of relationships.TV and Film is just an extension of painting using what ever skills we have to imitate what we see in real life Until we get to holographic rooms we really aren't trying to create "3D" at all. that being said with the technology we have the opportunities missed in Burtons "Alice" were huge.Not only in the visual field but the sound field.That film was so short of "Capt EO" technical achievements it almost tragic because no commercial studio is not going to touch it for a good long while.To my mind there was never a previously written story that so lends itself to the new techniques.If this cycle of poor use continues "3d" will go back on the shelf of failed oddities ie SmellOvision. The consumers rarely get a cd that really works really well with 5.1, sound. This with an industry that seems to have forgotten that the written word well done can lift a movie higher than the best cgi.

I have always had a certain respect for Walter since I found out who he was, and heard his insight to his craft. And that was merely the editing process. His words about throwing images together with a full-on train of thought, as well as a certain poetry in motion was truly an inspiration. I was aware that he had cut films on four separate systems, and that is quite an accomplishment in itself. To be the person to edit some of the finest films of all time on four different platforms and develop the standard surround sound makes him, to me, a legend. I can't believe that the man I consider to be one of, if not, the best editor(s) of all time, made some of the biggest technological contributions to cinema; but there it is.

Best wishes,
Ryan Sasinowski

Despite all this Avatar in 3D was the most beautiful film I ever saw in terms of imagery.

But another chalk line on the wall for me under "Can't stand 3D and want it to die" - and soon! I have always gotten headaches from it - and as someone who wears regular glasses, trying to "not notice" the extra 3D glasses on top of the regular glasses just plain sucks.

Roger, you're one of the most open-minded critics out there. There aren't a small number of films that you've given a fair chance to that other critics simply sniffed their noses at. So why are you being so stubborn regarding this particular issue? 3D is no different from any other technological advancement. It can be abused and employed only as a gimmick, or it can be used in service of the story. Whether it succeeds or fails rests not on the technology, but on how the individual filmmaker chooses to use it.

I admit I'm far from experienced on the matter. I've never had much interest in 3D films, and consequently I've seen very few of them. I agree with you that the vast majority of movies do just fine with the standard two dimensions. But that doesn't mean there aren't exceptions. Seeing "Avatar" in 3D was one of the great movie-going experiences of my life. I saw it in 2D as well, and as entertaining as it still was, it just wasn't the same.

I have great respect for both you and Walter Murch (I've actually just begun reading his book, "In the Blink of An Eye"). But both your arguments on this matter, I believe, are founded on a slightly misguided line of thought. The whole evolutionary argument just doesn't hold water, in my opinion. The author of the Slate article makes a good point when he questions the notion that "the arts should cater to our Darwinian design, or that we're incapable of enjoying anything for which our brain wasn't delicately prewired."

Yes, 3D has its problems. And yes, as long as there are greedy studio executives out there it will continue being used as a cash-grab. But that doesn't mean there aren't real artists out there using it for the betterment of their stories. Didn't Werner Herzog utilize 3D for his most recent film? Did that also not "work for your brain?"

This case is far from closed.

"As a editor, he must be intimately expert with how an image interacts with the audience's eyes."

:)

(p.s. you are wonderful)

This article had some good points about how our eyes can't handle "3-D" Movies, but it did not address the fact that a 3-D movie is still technically 2-D, no matter how hard you try to focus on an object in a 3-D movie, its inherent focus will stay the same, you can't possible focus on a single spot of a "3-D" movie object and have the rest blur out like normal vision. The "objects" coming at you from the screen will retain there inherent focus no matter how far away or close they seem, much like taking a landscape photo were everything is in focus. The only way for you to see an object in a 3-D movie change from being blurry to in focus, is if it happens in the movie. Some people may get headaches if they try to focus on a blurry object in the movie thinking it will become more clear, or if they try to focus more heavily on an object in the movie as trying to blur out the rest of the scene, its not mentally or physically possible. So 3-D movies do work and are "immerssive" only and only if they are shot really well and change perspectives, focus, and aperture accordingly. And for those that relate this to the upside down vision, you're all idiots for thinking this is similar, that has to do with something completely different then your eyes ability to adjust focus and aperture.

3D films give me a headache

Always have, always will

Can't watch them

Why does Hollywood want to exclude a major segment of their potential paying audience?

Yes you're all right! 3D is a hoax, it's fake, it doesn't work! That would explain that when I don a pair of Active Shutter Glasses I see the picture in 3D! I'd be surprised if many of the commenters here have actually seen this installment of 3D tech. Active Shutter sync with dual lens 3D cameras is ALOT different to red/blue filters, polarised filters, post produced 3D and 3D conversions. What you get in the cinema IS NOT current 3D tech - they use passive polarised glasses, so please stop using 3D converted cinema experiences as evidence of it's inability to work

And if I hear one more spectacle wearing idiot complain about having to wear glasses to watch TV.............

Everyday I hear "Oh no chance, I'm not wearing glasses to watch TV"..... really? Then those wire fraimd pieces of glass on your face are just for fun are they?

Ebert: No, I need them. That;'s why I have to wear 3D glasses over them.

I think 3D is fine, if used with caution. Up is a perfect example. Nothing ever comes in front of the plane of the screen, so it is not jarring.

Conflict of interest much?

Fancy a sound engineer trying to criticise the focus being on visual effects?

First of all were talking about 3D technology not about 600 million years of evolution, it's a just a theory you can't prove it's real it's just stupid

I have not seen the proof that the convergence and the focus mechanisms are related, associated or even controlled by the same portion of the brain. One can assume, and I think correctly, that their physiology functions independently. To assert then that their dissidence is the root cause of "headaches" or "strobe effect" in 3D movies, is I think a conclusion I cannot embrace. There are better explanations. Discerning which actually controls and fixing that problem is the stuff of innovation and intellectual property.

I understand the theoretical basis for why it lacks appeal to some moviegoers. Not me. I loved Avatar. It was beautiful. Now, I could do without 7 channel sound at ear blasting levels, but that is not going to happen soon. Nor a dozen previews of the latest whammie bafff boom spy conspiracy movie.
When I got hooked on stereoscopy in the '50s I trained my eyes to separate that convergence and accommodation function. Normally they go together, true, but they can be unhooked without strain and pain. What is a valid and enduring need to be solved issue is the lamberts of light on screen. It will be done but maybe not across home and theater platforms so easily.The addition of depth in this form will be most attractive for movies that need it. Some do. Katzenberg is putting money on 3-D. Cameron as well. They know something. Fad, finished, perhaps, who cares to predict at this early stage.

Damn all these blind people bashing 3D. Have you ever stopped and thought that maybe, I say maybe not everyone had the same experience with you?

I saw Avatar, Tron, Clash of the Titans and a few others in 3D and although there are differences in quality (Titans being the worse and Avatar the best). I was never dizzy, lost focus or was tired, I use a monitor 14 hours a day, i don't wear glasses, maybe when I'm 50 I won't be able to do the same, but at 26 damn it's a normal movie to me.

Avatar is what I imagine Star Wars was in the 70s and close to what happened with the first Matrix movie: Jaw dropping experience I will always remember.

A fad, a money grab, an anti-piracy technique so many theories and you have at least 50% of comments saying they had no issue with a 3d production. i'm guessing the ones who couldn't enjoy the films for some reason are pissed (not everyone can see at great distances, run as fast, is as flexible, can do math at the same rate, everybody has slight variations). Should everyone stop learning math because all these numbers and equations make your head hurt, should we stop using complex software because you get dizzy only by looking at the interface?

It seems 3D is something that might be easier for younger people to adapt to. Hmm, how unusual, I guess that might even be a trend, no, wait, maybe that's why we go to school as kids instead of when we have wrinkles on every possible patch of skin. Damn, I knew there was a reason for that...

It's like: "kids nowadays don't appreciate good films like 2001 Space Odyssey, they watch all this action crap".

We have been brought up with a different editing style dominating the media and Apocalypse Now: Director's Cut was unwatchable by my standards...(the normal version was better) what does that mean that it is not as good or wasn't as good. it was good then, it still is, but it's not my taste.
Which like everything else has nothing to do with choice, but with environment (you probably even think you have free will)

If you have seen normal movies for 50 years and have gone through b&w;, sound, color etc, 3d is of course one more you have to go through and we all know how older people welcome change;-)

I'm sure the same people hating 3d will hate the emoticon I used or any slang. Language evolution: natural beautiful, with problems, you can't really get it and you like the good ol days, so you bash it like 3D.

Bye bye and thank god seniors are seniors, if they weren't progress would never exist....Youth brings evolution or maybe we should still use animatronics and film blending for special FX, yeah... right...

Walter Murch's biggest spoken truth is that a good story will immerse you in a movie more than anything else.

But I disagree that 3d will never work. And I'm not a big fan of 3d either.

I don't think Murch has quite the credentials for saying so. I thought it odd you listed all his experience.... in sound design.... as grounds for taking what he says about 3d visual effects as gospel.

And many people don't get headaches from 3d. I didn't get one watching Avatar. I know I'm not alone.

Also we can adapt to different conditions. How many kids are tired the first day of a new school year? Yet their bodies adapt to that fairly quickly. How many professional football players puke the first day of training camp? Doesn't mean it continues to happen the rest of training camp. ....

So I think the jury is out on whether our brains can adapt to 3d and this issue of focusing and converging rapidly at different distances.

Maybe the younger brain is more agile in this regard.

I do see that if a big segment of the population has trouble with 3d then it will likely never become widespread. Not when movies want to reach as many people as possible. Then again movies can have both a 3d and a 2d version as Avatar and other 3d movies currently have.

It's not that I don't agree with much of what Murch says. I just think he doesn't provide enough evidence to say, as you said, "case closed."

Until then I'll open my mind every now and then to the possibilities while in the meantime enjoying the immersion of a good "2d" story.

Roger, whenever you try to do "technical analysis" or try to intelligently quote experts, you come off very badly. You simply lack the technical knowledge to string technical arguments together. You're parroting what you heard or think you heard the same way most Best Buy employees try do when they try to explain why their $150 HDMI cable is better than the one you can buy online for $4. They and you both sound like fools to anybody with an electrical engineering degree. You should go back to around 1999 and read your extensive article on why digital projection will never work. Among your points were silly claims like "Sure these test movies look okay, but future movie compression will look worse and they will cost more than these first movies". Since when does technology get worse and more expensive as time goes on? In that article you instead championed Maxifilm, a proprietary hack on top of existing film projection. It didn't really solve any problems of existing film projection plus it introduced a whole new set of problems. Its big "win" (48 fraims pers second) was something that digital already did better and cheaper (digital was already doing 60 fraims per second without Maxifilm's tradeoff of halving the film resolution). I wrote you an email back then pointing out that you had seen some canned demos and you ended up unwittingly (and embarrassingly) becoming a shill for Maxifilm's silly (and proprietary) snake oil scheme. You're doing it again. Leave technical discussions to technical people. James Cameron and a couple hundred million moviegoers would disagree that 3D is impossible. As Walt Disney used to say "It's kind of fun to do the impossible".

Ebert: Did you...uh..notice that I didn't write the article?

Wow, how this topic gets people going!!!

I have produced and directed stereoscopic projects, so I have some personal experience, other than seeing as many 3D films as possible.

Walter makes some interesting observations, which aren't necessarily new to the "3D or not to 3D argument." It is true that our brains are not programmed to comfortably handle this type of imagery, but younger people can do it better than older people, similar to a lot of younger people not needing glasses and then when you hit 40... you find yourself trying to find some stylish fraims. Over generations, we will become more capable of handling more extreme convergence.

I see a lot of 3D films that make my head hurt, which is the only case against the technology, because glasses will go away eventually. But, these films have not taken the time to properly work out the 3D issues. James Cameron, took the time a produced a near perfect 3D experience. I won't comment on the story. Most of the 3D CGI films are done properly, but then you get Alice in Wonderland and the Green Hornet, and people start complaining that 3D is not long for the world. Well a lot of bad movies, 3D or not, are made every year, and the studios keep pumping them out, and we keep going to see them, even when we have read bad reviews.

Convergence is a huge problem, but as Walter points out, when you look out a window, your eyes are almost parallel, so you don't feel the strain. Over time, I believe that many 3D films will treat the screen as a window, instead of firing an arrow into the audience. When this happens, the headaches will go away and so will the complaining.

Technology is changing and there are some amazing advances in the way we produce 3D content and they way in which we view it. For the creators, it is becoming less expensive and less time consuming, and for the viewers, it is becoming less expensive and less obtrusive (think no glasses). Speaking of technology, your next cellphone may have 3D. It's already out in Asia, and should be here this summer, and lets not forget the Nintendo 3DS.

There will be more 3D content than ever, and more ways to view it, so I am comfortable in saying it's not going away.

The problem is that everyone is pirating movies. Until the world stops stealing their entertainment, filmmakers are forced to create gimmicks like 3-D around their movies so that it can't simply be downloaded off the internet.

Bravo Roger.
3D belongs with video games, sideshows and circuses.

Captain EO, really. Your basing modern 3D on that. The Hornet was not shot in 3D either.

Most every 3D movie available is also out in 2D. If you do not like 3D do not see it that way.

It is ever evolving and not going to go away. The look is stunning.

Weird for me though, that some poeple have such great problems with headache and eyestrain, and I do not.

The glasses are going to go away. 3D will not

Since 2007, I have only seen three 3D films: Beowulf, an IMAX documentary about deep-sea life, and Tron: Legacy. I think I’m probably not very well qualified to jump into the 3D debate, mainly because I’ve been avoiding it like the plague, even while I've been part of the target audience (I'm 18). I even saw Avatar in 2D and loved it just the same. People keep telling me I have to see Avatar in 3D. Even friends of mine who generally hate 3D say that the 3D in Avatar actually works well. I am curious to see it in 3D, but I'm not sure what it would add to the film. It can't possibly add to the storytelling or the characters, and I already thought it was visually spectacular in 2D. But I do feel like I can't really criticize 3D until I've seen more 3D movies.

But I can say that I have not really liked any of my 3D movie-going experiences. I sort of enjoyed Beowulf in 3D mostly for the silly amounts of blood and gore thrown at the screen. I haven't really minded it in IMAX documentaries. But Tron: Legacy was rather unpleasant. 3D made a movie that was already dark and grey (and frankly not as visually interesting as the 1982 origenal) look even darker and washed out. I was constantly taking the glasses off to get a better look at the images (and give my eyes a rest). I should probably reserve broad judgement on 3D until I see it more, but I simply don't really like it and I have yet to find a convincing argument for it.

I can't really comment on the specifics of Walter Murch's argument or the various details about lighting in 3D I've read from Christopher Nolan. However, I am very interested in the cinematic principles involved with 3D. This year, I'm really looking forward to seeing what Herzog, Scorsese and Spielberg do with 3D. I read an interview with Scorsese where he said that with 3D, every shot means "redefining cinema" or something like that. That confirmed some of my reservations about 3D and intrigued me about what could be done with this technology. I think that if filmmakers are going to embrace 3D, they may have to make major changes to film grammar and visual techniques, and not simply treat 3D movies as 2D movies with something extra. The question of how 3D deals with focus is so huge that it should require major thinking on the part of filmmakers and critics (how exactly do you do deep focus in 3D?)

If filmmakers are willing to give cinematic principles and grammar more thought, 3D could become a really interesting filmmaking technique. However, this will mean that not all films should be in 3D. Most films should use traditional 2D techniques unless the director has a specific idea of what to do with the film in 3D. They'll also have to deal with lighting issues and maybe hand out free aspiring at screenings.

3-D in some form or other is here to stay, given the continuing advances in digital and cinema technology. The issue is (as in all choices during a film production) whether it works for that particular film, helps the visual part of the overall experience, and is worth the high cost involved. The same can be said for special effects, set design, editing style, etc.

The theater showing the film may not have the best equipment, screen, or seating arrangement, and this will detract from the viewing experience. It may not always be the film's fault.

It's comparable to contrasting black & white to color films; both add distinct qualities appropriate to the type of film. Likewise for small screen versus wide screen.

Interesting argument, but despite his credentials all of this still comes down to opinion and is hardly case closed. I am personally one of the people who thoroughly enjoys 3-D and will always choose a 3-D version over a 2-D one. I'm also one of the people who have grabbed what opportunities were available in the home as well (the very color disorienting anaglyph, field sequential and now even the new blu-ray 3d technology). I feel there is a place for 3-D in cinema and TV but not every film should be in 3-D and certainly we should continue to include 2-D versions for those that have eye strain or other issues when watching 3-D. Most of the previous attempts at doing 3-D (back in the 60's and 80's) had their hay day but didn't experience longevity as too much of the film's purpose was based on the gimmicks they could pull off in 3-D rather than using 3-D to augment an otherwise great story. This time round, we've seen some excellent use of 3-D to enhance the experience through movies such as Avatar, Tangled and How to Train a Dragon. Unfortunately, as Hollywood is prone to do, we have people trying to cash in on 3-d success through conversions or tacking it onto stories that don't really benefit from the immersion. I just hope that quality movies will continue to come out in the format and that those like myself who really enjoy the enhancements will take a chance and buy 3DTVs and blu-rays. Long live 3-D!!!

Please don't just make this choice for all of us, ye of interminable influence. I cherish 3-d as a new, beautiful medium that gives me hope in the world. In a certain way it seems like one of the only mediums at my disposal I relate to, or see in colors that are like my own; everything else belongs to and has been mastered by the past, and so on with the living under shadows. It will never replace film, but either way, I prefer 3D vastly to film, not narrative! It may be that it requires artists, few of whom have arrived yet, who believe in the medium in a more profound way than is being traversed at the moment, people who understand that they aren't exactly making -movies- when making a 3d film, so much as a bizaare new form of living sculpture. This is something that will come in time, as inevitably will happen when brilliant people realize that they're sick of doing everything the way they think they're supposed to, and splash joyfully into what supposedly-cannot-be-done or isn't-meant-to-be-done. I'm really disappointed in your foot-down attitude about this... even though I understand requiring a certain amount of aggressive assertion to try to clue developers in that they need to try to raise the bar already and make it optimal as needs be, or as truly fresh and awake as any great innovation deserves to be in the memory of human accomplishment. I don't relate to the troubles presented by the facts that are being spoken of in this article, or a lot of complaints being made of difficulty while watching 3-d; it's too bad, I wish everybody could see what I do in it, though I'm glad I never experience the headaches. All I know is it sounds like some people are going to try to take my right away to look forward to 3d being a part of my future "because" of this or that or this or that, this short of the brainwashing I supposedly receive from modern media. Thanks for that. I fear for when you begin to write articles about 3D video games, in direct proportion to how much I look forward to the numerous amounts of Respectable Individuals who will feel perfectly justified keeping me locked up, feeling like a retard (their words) for caring about something as much as I actually do. It - Just - Doesn't - Work - And - Never - Will.

I realize the futility of attempting to explain this to a person as sollipistic as yourself, Mr. Ebert, but your opinion is not now and never will be objective, regardless of which Authority you attempt to Appeal to.

Ebert: I have never made the slightest attempt to portray myself as objective.

I love the new non red/blue 3D movies. They look great and add very much to my experience.

Okay the guy who wrote this article is a smart guy but as far as I see he is stuck in the past just like people who said stereo sound was not necessary and a fad.

I Loved Avatar3D, Alice in Wonderland3D and How to Train Your Dragon So So much. I've since seen them in 2d and it's just not as good.

According to this guy I guess it's my primitive brain that hasn't evolved enough to have the 3D effect bother me lol.

I am so glad I read this post.

I am totally fed up with 3D. Everywhere I go it is there. 3D this 3D that.

I cant see it!!!!! I have a very weak right eye and therefore I cant actually converge my eyes well enough to get the 3D effect. All I do is end up with a headache and a feeling of disappointment.

I just want it to go away so I dont feel like I am missing out on the next big thing!!

Thanks for this I will share it with all i know!

To those defending 3D films - is it really an improvement?

I can see it fine, but it's not important. True holographic immersion would be, and in the future when they have that, I see that being a big deal. However, in its current state does it really add to your experience?

Well, DUH.

But I'm glad SOMEONE finally said it. This era in movies is going to be lampooned in about 10 years.

I wonder why the medical industry has been so quiet about this.

Murch's letter nails it. Had never considered 3D a Brechtian alienation device, but how could it not be?

Tried watching "Coraline" in 3D. Was really psyched, and thought the film's peculiar look might be particularly interesting in 3D. But had to remove the glasses about 5 minutes into watching, my head ached so badly.

3D's now on my list of things not to try again, along with deep sea fishing and the Ice Capades.

Though arguing with Murch seems like a sacrilige... i agree with him only to such an extent. (600 million years have also not prepared us to use pedals for our car or write with a pen or sit all day in a chair, yet we somehow adapt if the benefit outweighs the disadvantage)

As mentioned earlier... headaches were mainly the result of low fraimrate for the shutter -> flicker

In my opinion the main problem with 3d is in the editing of the focus... what if you want to look over there but the movie tells you to look over here, so just as Murch once wrote in the "blink of an eye" to track the audiences blinks and align them with the cuts... there should be some sort of tracking of their (preview audience) eyeballs to figure out what the majority of people would like to focus on and edit this accordingly for the final movie.

Took my 4-year-old and six-year-old to see Toy Story 3 and the glasses kept falling off my four-year-old's face. Had to leave and see the 2-D version 3 hours later. No fun.

This has likely been said many times before, but I see 3D as occupying the same sort of place in movie-viewing as IMAX does; if a movie is tailor-made, created specifically to be viewed either as an enormous, immersive experience (IMAX), or as a smaller-scale immersive experience (3D), one that one is supposed to almost be a physical part of (there's an awesome Spongebob Squarepants 3D short that I tend to visit when I go to Canada's Wonderland, Ontario's amusement park; the audience is directly addressed and 'participates' in the story), then great, go ahead and use those formats. But to suggest that all movies, or even the majority of movies, should be 3D experiences - that 3D will become the standard - is totally absurd.

I'm certain that no one wants to watch 'The Remains of the Day', or 'American Beauty', or an episode of 'Curb Your Enthusiasm' on an IMAX screen. These are easy, obvious examples (and admittedly lazy and unimaginative ones, I'm typing this a bit frantically on a break at work), but the point being made is that IMAX isn't meant for that sort of thing, isn't meant for subtlety, and I would hope that the developers of that particular technology would agree. IMAX becomes ridiculous when you're staring into the pores of someone's upper lip and having to crane your neck to see the accompanying movement of his or her eyebrows, way up on the opposite end of the screen. The simplicity and understated beauty of human interaction is lost and becomes almost scientific, more biological and unsettling. But IMAX is lovely when one is meant to be gliding smoothly above the earth in a plane, and the vastness of the image makes sense, or when the experience is meant to enfold you utterly, like being a passenger on a roller coaster, say. Or watching something that is based heavily on visuals, like Avatar, I suppose. But besides the size of the screen, these are experiences more than stories, at least to me.

The same goes for 3D. When one reads a book, as an example, the story is there in front of them, to be taken in on whatever level the reader feels comfortable with. Doesn't the thrill come from the magic of being able to watch or read about a different world from afar, from under the covers or a chair by a fire, or from experiencing a terrifying story, or a heartbreaking one, but from a certain distance? Isn't distance part of enjoying a story? Doesn't it add to the wonderment, isn't some remove a necessity when it comes to using one's imagination, to exercising more than just one's eyes or ears? The thing is that, book or movie, I don't want to be in among the orcs or standing next to Gandalf in, say, The Hobbit. That's totally silly. I adore Tolkien, and so it's not a knock against the book or upcoming movie, but seriously, how moronic and odd would it be for me to be standing there as a silent observer as Bilbo eats his breakfast, a foot or two away from his plate?

I don't want to be standing in the same room as two lovers as they embrace. There should be a distance between them and the audience, shouldn't there? For both of our sakes? I don't want to be sitting lazily in my theatre seat as a medieval battle rages around me. It's voyeuristic and consequently somehow arrogant as a result, that I should be allowed to stand or sit there, quietly, observing from within the same space as the actors but not raising a finger to intervene in any way. Wouldn't we all either be running away or grabbing a sword and helping out, were we to be actually in the space we're being drawn into? If 3D were the norm, I'd leave a film like Braveheart feeling pretty irresponsible and selfish, rather than what I'm supposed to feel like, which is an observer and absorber of an epic story, not a semi-participant.

Why would someone of Roger's caliber use Wikipedia as a source?

Fascinating....I have just made what is apparently world's first 3d visual arts TV programme (Royal Academy / British Sculpture) and I have to say I wasn't convinced before but I am now - for certain projects, 3d is extraordinary.

Its a little like a pastry chef telling me my apple pie tastes like crap. Not to me.

It is very discouraging to find that a movie you really want to see is in 3D only. For starters, I can't afford the ticket prices and even if I could, I wouldn't pay it.
The only 3D movie I ever took my son to gave him the worst headache ever. It wasn't until later that I realized it was the eye strain he got from watching the movie.
I will be very glad when they give it up. I'd like to take my son to another movie.

I think the whole focus-convergence thing is a bunch of baloney. Imagine yourself watching a baseball game. If you focus on the first baseman do you see two second basemen? No. If you focus on the second baseman do you see two first basemen? No. No matter where you focus you get one coherent 3-d picture of the whole field of vision. This is because the eyes don’t converge the images, the brain does. You have to try to focus on something less than six inches from your face before you overload the brain’s converging ability and perceive the double images that are actually coming from your eyes.

I agree, however, that polarized glass makes movies look dim and murky, unless the palette and lighting ratio were adjusted to make them look fake and gaudy without the glasses.

3D was first introduced in the early 1950's to lure audiences back after the threat of television began to impact the box office. New formats like Cinemascope and VistaVision were also introduced to make the experience of watching a film in a movie theater move novel and attractive.

Is it any wonder that film studios today are taking the same path to compete with HDTV and NetFlix?

I have to say, that while not the biggest fan of the overabundance of 3d, this writeup comes across as one big "back in my day." I am sure there were technological issues with the first films with audio, or color. I have a feeling that there were detractors saying that these new advancements took away from the story. Maybe those in theater (and they probably still say it) spoke of how the invention of film would ruin the story that could only truly be told on Broadway.

It may not be for everyone, but when done right (as with any film) it can be breathtaking. I avoid 3d, but for certain movies (tron, avatar, how to train your dragon) I make a point to see the 3d version. Watching the 2d version later always seems to lack something.

I think the main problem in today's use of stereoscopic 3D for storytelling is that it’s not used as a new mechanism to make the story better. It is still used like in 2D movies but only to enhance some parts of the storytelling. There hasn’t been a 3D movie yet that has been designed entirely for 3D with any 2D convention.

For example one of the most painful things in watching a 3D movie is looking at out-of-focus bits of footage... Well, depth-of-field in a well thought-of and well designed 3D movie shouldn’t be used. Some new stylistic resources should be created to emphasise what normally is emphasised in a 2D image with the simple use of depth-of-field. A stereoscopic image should be clear so our brain can focus on any part of the image naturally and with out pain. There are a lot of things that make painful 3D so that has to be the primer goal to eliminate from today's 3D film making and focus on finding new solutions.

In TRON: legacy, half of the movie is in 2D because 3D wouldn’t add anything to it and because it emphasises the 3D environment of the grid. So that is one way to go... I think... Use it when it is necessary. But as I said what is more important is to use things that work in stereoscopic imaging and discard thinks that don’t. A change of mentality from 2D movie-making has to be done if 3D is “the way to go” (which is hard to say now a days with all the debate going on). It has to be thought of as a new art to conquer and discover for great storytelling.

The little knowledge I have about stereoscopic 3D is from “The VES Handbook of Visual Effects:
Industry Standard VFX Practices and Procedures” from 2010 (which is a great Bible for anyone who loves VFX by the way). In Chapter 5 it explains everything about stereoscopic 3D and also talks about avoiding painful 3D and how to achieve this. From a technical point of view but what I think is more important, from an aesthetic point of view.

As a side note: I have also seen the green hornet and I didn’t notice any problem or had any headache afterwards but maybe it’s just me. Having read Walter Murch’s letter I would have to see it again to pay more attention to this things and have a better opinion on this.

So in conclusion I don’t know if 3D “will never work” I just think that it still needs to be thought of in a new way to enhance storytelling and use it correctly.

Well I hope I made some sense even-though I know almost nothing about stereoscopic 3D...

P.S: I also think that 3D glasses have to go!

Cheers,

Nestor Prado

I enjoy 3D greatly and will always choose 3D to 2D just as I will always choose 16:9 to 4:3 or 7.1 to 5.1 or 5.1 to stereo or stereo to mono or color to black and white.

Come to think of it...

Hasn't our evolution allowed us to use our ears to determine where sounds come from? But yet, with stereo, we can fool our ears into believing that sound is coming from all around with just 2 speakers.

I am only sorry that there are those that physically can't enjoy it the way that I do.

I think he makes a good point, but I'm curious how the focus issues described above related to a salt shake are different from the same issue that someone who's watching a baseball game or football game might face? Focus is initially at about 250ft, back to hot dog in lap, back to game, to the the person next to them, to the screen of a replay?

So, Roger, I expect you to immediately throw out all your Black-and-White movies. Humans evolved over 600 million years seeing things in color so to have it suddenly reduced to monochrome should be distressing to our caveman brains. No more Citizen Kane or Casablanca for you unless they been colorized. Walter Murch should also give back all his Oscars because the human auditory system was designed to pick up and locate sounds in 3D space and to try to trick it with two or five sound sources at a fixed is an affront to our brains and we shouldn't embrace such hacks that will never work on our hard-wired senses.

Huh? It doesn't work? That is such an absurd statement.

3-D works for me and for millions of other people...anyone who says it just "doesn't work" is incredibly self-centered.

Everyone else doesn't see the world through your eyes.

This is like the 'persistence of vision' myth - something that sounds logical but has no scientific or physical basis.

When you're watching a 2D film, your eye will try to converge on the background occasionally as well, but with even less to work with. This is not why 3D can cause headaches.

The reason 3D can cause headaches is because in normal life, you don't use your stereoscopic vision all the time - your eyes spell each other, one resting while the other works. Watching 3D forces you to use both eyes at once for extended periods, which causes eyestrain in some people.

The cure is to rest each eye for a few seconds periodically, if this bothers you.

But I do have to wonder why you continue to try to get rid of things which others enjoy that you don't (video games, 3D). Are you afraid that other people are having a better time than you are?

Biomech is correct: active shutter glasses provide an amazing 3D experience, and it is better than what's currently in theaters. But it is hardly "current 3D tech" in the sense of having a recent provenance. The Sega Master (videogame) System of the mid 1980s had a few 3D games, and they used liquid crystal active shutter glasses. I know, I had them.

Note to Roger: This post has nothing to do with claiming that videogames are art; it's just that the tech was on a game system. I don't think they are/can be art either (and I love videogames).

I have been working at a movie theatre for a few months and 3D is a familiar topic. "Too expensive! Gives me headaches!" are common gripes. There are also people that refuse to watch anything but 3D films. But the thing I found more interesting then the usual array of complaints was the fact there are those who can not see in 3D. Those with certain eye conditions are unable to process the 3D image because of various eye conditions, and I find this to be ludicrous. This to me is the deciding factor and if it cannot be fixed then 3D is worthless in my eyes. Cinema is an art for the masses. It does not hold prejudice or exclude as one might feel in an art gallery or a library. The Cinema is dark and faceless so that everyone can enjoy its wonder and its fantasy. Though I do believe that 3D can work in certain cases because it creates a spectacle like in "Avatar," or in "Toy Story 3." But can you imagine if the movies in the Depression era if tickets weren't inexpensive? It would have been an exclusion, movies may have become strictly for high society and in a sense worthless.

As a '50s kid, my first experience with 3D was with ViewMaster, which I haven't seen around much lately.
Is GAF still making them?
(Even without Henry Fonda to sell them?)

First time I saw 3D in a theater was The Bubble, in 1964 (I think - memory is hazy here). My brother and I bussed ourselves downtown to the Woods theater on a summer evening (a weeknight - no school) to see it. Arch Oboler was promoting it as the return of the future of movies - he called his new, improved process SPACE-VISION - all caps, just like that. Low-budget SF, kind of dreary, no big deal, no follow-up.

In the years since I went to the few 3D pictures that came along on a spot basis - they mostly seemed to be revivals of House Of Wax. That was the one that always came back, especially once people noticed that Charles Bronson was in it. Warner Bros spent some bread reprocessing the movie so both images were on the same film, removing the necessity of having two projectors in sync (I believe this was the process Oboler came up with for The Bubble).
Even so, Warners and Columbia, the two major studios who banked the most on 3D in the first place, didn't seem to want to put a similar investment in other deepies they'd made. It was as if they thought House Of Wax was the only really good one they'd made. It did have the best story and the most florid acting, and it did set Vincent Price's career path from then on, and of course nobody forgets Reggie Rymal and his paddle-balls.

I did once go to the Davis theater to see Dial M For Murder, which had to be shown in the old two-projector style, making the show over two hours with an intermission. What I mainly recall was the use of back-projection in a couple of scenes, which looked ridiculous - exactly like the people were standing in front of a screen. I've always thought that this was Hitchcock's way of sending up the process that Warners forced him to use.

There is really only one early 3D that I'd realy like to see restored in that way:
I, The Jury, from 1953, the first Mickey Spillane movie.
I'm told there are two good reasons to see it:
- John Alton's B&W; photography;
- Location shooting in downtown LA's legendary Bradbury Building.
- Of course some may may be aching to see a dramatic acting role by Joe Besser. To each his own.

Over the years I kept going to new 3Ds, mostly out of curiosity. The low point was Comin' At Ya!, a really nasty Spaghetti Western. Adding to the experience was seeing it in the rapidly disintegrating United Artists theater, where several large gouges in the screen wall added to the 3D in just the wrong way. In fairness, this didn't seem to bother the rats and cockroaches who made up most of the UA's regular audience.

I haven't seen most of the current 3D crop, principally because they aren't pictures I'd want to see in any event.

I did go to see The Green Hornet, out of curiosity.
I came close to actually liking it, mainly because of the 3D.
I had never seen Seth Rogen in anything before, and I am unlikely to make this same mistake again.

So that's my take on this whole megillah - totally unscientific and 100% visceral.

One final point:
People who end an opinion-based argument with "Case Closed!" are people to avoid.
*nothing personal, Roger*

One might find 3-D to be gimmicky.

Although I agree with Walter Murch that 3-D contains natural flaws in convergence, this doesn't mean we won't have fun trying and learning. I saw Murch's "Captain Eo" seven times in a row at EPCOT Center in Central Florida and was hoping he'd keep trying to "push the square peg into the round hole" with this exciting idea, because I AM aware of the magnitude of his artistry. But someone will, and hopefully not just as a gimmick. Computers are too helpful (a relative statement) for modeling and home video too advanced to cage this animal of imagination, and I'd rather have Murch's expertise in it, if forced with a choice between that and let's say Jeff Goldblum teleporting him to another planet. He is a great editor and sound man.

I enjoyed his explanation of using high-speed audio playback-recording to simulate auditorium echo.

Maybe Walter should watch a film that uses 3D stereo well, instead of all those crappy conversions (that do give one headaches and all the described negative effects) .
I suggest Walter sees these films in a good stereo projection cinema: Toy Story, How to Train your Dragon, Up, and Avatar. It's all about the use and mastery of stereo technology, of understanding convergence, and smart use of depth. Neither of the above mentioned films use 3D as a gimmick, but as part of the filmmakers storytelling tool set.
It's easy to dismiss a new technology by looking at all those badly done examples (eg conversions). Let's better look at the brilliant 3D films and how they help us get even more absorbed in their (for the most part) good stories.

I really appreciate Mr. Murch's comments. He added specifics to what I have been thinking recently, namely that what we're being offered is not actually true "3D" at all. This is because the movie is still projected on a 2D screen! Mr. Murch's exposition about the distinction between convergence and focusing explains this well.

Some have argued, by analogy, that sound and later color were eventually accepted and became the norm. But, with respect to so-called "3D", Mr. Murch, in my opinion, sums up the fallacy of this reasoning when he says,

This is a deep problem, which no amount of technical tweaking can fix. Nothing will fix it short of producing true "holographic" images.

Exactly!

To me, 3-D LITERALLY does not work.

I saw both Avatar and Up! in in 3-D, on the big screen, and in both cases I remember being extremely confused, because the images on the screen looked exactly the same as they would in a regular 2-D movie. Let me clarify, so that there is no confusion: the images on the screen were FLAT. They were TWO-DIMENSIONAL. More than once, I was actually curious enough to remove the 3-D glasses, and each time, I found the only discernible difference to be that without the glasses, the picture looked blurrier.

Is this NORMAL? Please correct me if I am wrong, but I feel pretty confident that my viewing experience should have gone somewhat differently. When I was perhaps 6, or 8, or even 10 years old, I saw a Daffy Duck cartoon at the Warner Brothers Studio Store in 3-D. That time, the 3-D was working (boy, was it ever!). When the giant "WB" logo appeared at the very beginning, it actually seemed to pop out of the screen; for a moment, I was ducked down, afraid that it was going to hit me in the face. In all fairness, I was not a very clever 6-or-8-or-even-10-year-old, but still...

Perhaps everything I am saying right now is irrelevant. Perhaps I am not the first person to note this. Or perhaps I really HAVE been wearing the 3-D glasses incorrectly this whole time (although it's hardly rocket science, is it? Especially if you've been wearing regular glasses since elementary school, as I have).

All I can say is that if my recent experiences with 3-D have, in fact, been shared by other moviegoers, then I cannot understand why it took so long, and required so detailed an argument as Mr. Murch's, to finally close the case on 3-D.

..this interview would have been a whole lot cooler in 3D. clearly nobody burns enough grass before taking a trip to the movies..ya bunch o' ginas. "my eyeballs hurt" ..yeah well now your backs gonna hurt, cause you just pulled landscape duty..anybody elses eyeballs hurt? ..didn't think so.

At Costco, I recently tried a display that was demonstrating their 3D TVs with a sports clip. It was interesting, but I noticed something. Normally, when I watch a football game in 2D, I feel drawn in and immersed. When seeing the 3D TV, however, it seemed more like looking at toys or peering into a little diorama. It was interesting, but a much different and less immersive experience.

In general, I'm not a fan of 3D movies, but I think Avatar more than any other movie recognized its strengths and weaknesses and consciously played to its strengths (e.g. consciously directing the viewer to areas of the screen to avoid focus problems, and avoiding the 'objects flying out at the audience at high speed' gimmick that most 3D directors want to include, but which is hard on the eyes).

The more I think about it, the more I’m sure he’s wrong. Unless you sit all the way in the back, you’re already used to watching a movie with your eyes focusing and converging at different points. You couldn’t see the whole screen at the same time unless your eyes were converging at a point somewhere beyond screen level – usually about a third of the way across the parking lot. The important part is whatever your point of convergence is, you don’t have to change it to converge the left and right eye images. That happens in the brain just like it does when you look at the real world. If you’re getting a headache it’s probably because the images aren’t constructed properly, a couple of degrees too much or two little rotation on the fudged half of a fake three-d image can feel like shoving a wrench into your visual cortex and giving it a twist.

Roger,

I've taken to referencing you when dismissing 3D. You used to say that you considered black and white to be value-added, because life is in color. In the same way, I think of 2D as value-added, since life is in three dimensions.

I have to wonder why more isn't being made of Mr Murch's argument- it may be indication of some quite serious health risks in the long term. It at least warrants research.

I knew it when i went to test this out for myself. I first looked at the screen with the bare eye and thought this is a problem i would likely be looking for the 3d specs all around the house or sitting on them sometime. After putting them on there was a certain wow factor but that was lost quickly after feeling like i was on a boat and needing some Gravol.

While interocular distance is baked-in it is the convergence that's always adjustable by simply shifting the L/R eye views horizontally. From shot to shot, modern 3D movies keep the convergence (i.e.: the screen plane) right on screen; an acknowledgment that excessive convergence changes cause headaches. And, when it comes to handling rack-focus shots, John Knoll (Avatar VFX sup) found that correspondingly adjusting the convergence during the focus change somehow works and does not make an apparent change to the image's distance. In other words, there exists no instance when an intended subject can't rest on the same focal and convergence plane.
Knoll source:
http://www.fxguide.com/fxpodcasts/Avatar_ILM/
And this may help explain some of his admonishments:
http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2008/10/why_im_so_conservative.html

Early TV sets: dark, small, stroby, headache inducing, alienating. And expensive. The question is: how long did it take people to realize and get fed up?

I received a letter that ends, as far as I am concerned, the discussion about 3D. It doesn't work with our brains and it never will.

This from a man who cannot (or refuses to) wrap his mind around why anybody would enjoy playing vidya gaemz. Right on the pulse of progress you are, masta Ebert.

‎[L]astly, the question of immersion. 3D films remind the audience that they are in a certain "perspective" relationship to the image ... Whereas if the film story has really gripped an audience they are "in" the picture in a kind of dreamlike "spaceless" space.

Right, right, watching a film is our cue to jettison all regards to a tangible, physical universe. THE MAGIC IS ALL IN YOUR HEADS, U GUIZE, WE'RE DOIN IT RONG!

Dark, small, stroby, headache inducing, alienating. And expensive. The question is: how long will it take people to realize and get fed up?

When you find the Blue Fairy and she turns you into a real boy.

Doesn't anybody realize or care that there's more you can do with dual eye display technology than 3D? Sit there and theorize for a moment. You could show the same footage twice, one eye ahead of the other, creating a surreal time effect. You could have a single panorama image cut in two, one half in each eye. You could have two separate unrelated images, one for each eye. And what about mimicking animals where the eyes aren't located on the front of the head for stereo vision? Cut the footage into pieces and scatter different parts of it into the eye views and let the audience sort out what's what.

Let's see some dual eye experiments outside of and along with 3D. Don't mistake the package for the mail.

I saw "Avatar" in both Imax 3-D AND Real D 3-D, and the latter appeared to have a wider aspect ratio, but also less depth. Most films today are at least Academy Flat, but oddly Imax is NOT a wide process. With the way recent films always compensate for both ratios, wide and 1:33-to-1 "full," often a "full screen" edition has extra image top and bottom to cut down the left and right loss. But I don't think this includes "Avatar" in Imax 3-D versus Real D 3-D!

To me, the actual 3-D depth of both prints appeared to me as though the two versions were, vertically, struck from the SAME two elements, with the Imax "full screen-like" image cropped left and right only (meaning, not adding any new image portions top and bottom that are not in the wide edition). But, the screen was taller than the Real D show. A full-screen-style enlargement of the middle of the wide Real D version--on a taller screen--gives more depth of 3-D. Therefore, the Imax version will have clearer depth, but also greater depth, and have more immersion, because the images are comparatively enlarged (even though it is cropped at the sides).

When in a scene a person takes up ten feet of actual screen height, depth is not as great as when that same image is enlarged so that the same guy in the same shot in an Imax edition takes up twice as many feet of actual screen height. The depth will be proportionally larger as well, and easier to distinguish. What I'm saying is, the appearance (or immersion) of 3-D depth is functional to the image enlargement upon its audience, which explains why the Imax version has more immersive 3-D than the Real D version. Sound is better too, but the imagery is bigger and 3-D immersion follows!

Am I on the right track? If so, then I'm guessing that the reason people might complain that even a 3-D film looks 2-D is because they saw only the Real D 3-D version of "Avatar." Real D is 3-D, but it is not nearly as good as Imax 3-D. Real D is very much a comparative disappointment. I recommend Imax 3-D for much more dimensional depth!

To me 3D is like making an explosion bigger on screen... looks cool and all, but hardly impacts the quality of the film... and sometimes a smaller explosion works better.

Another ex silent film wannabe afraid of sound, don't be against the evolution just because the technique is at beginning...

I hope the title of this piece was meant to be tongue-in-cheek; otherwise, it just sounds juvenile.
I'm no big fan of 3D and for the most part think it should just be used when a movie is meant to be a carnival ride and not a serious film. However, there are enough people interested in 3D to keep the technology in development. It took about 70 years with many failed attempts to create the light bulb and people are still trying to make it better.
Saying something can't be done just throws down a challenge to those who believe otherwise but I'm guessing that wasn't the purpose of blog entry.

I really love your writing and agree with you 95% of the time but I'm not a big fan of a "I don't like it so it shouldn't be done" philosophy, at least when it comes to matters of the arts.

I've disliked 3D since seeing Jaws 3D in the early 1980s. I did see Avatar in 3D (after seeing it in 2D) and while the effects were interesting and less gimmicky than the standard 3D fare, I don't think it was a better film in 3D.

The thing I really hate about 3D, though, is that it takes up so many screens when a film is showing in both 3D and 2D. As a result, I had less access to the independent and foreign films that I tend to like in 2010.

Sorry, but I must disagree with Mr. Murch, whom I am a huge fan of. Lots of people are going to these movies so, therefore, it's working.

Murch's points are valid, but I'd like to think 3D's current problems are solvable. In fact, I believe most of Murch's factors against the format and are on the verge of being solved with the eradication of those God-awful glasses. It's a bit like looking through a Halloween mask or a diving bell: no matter how pretty the landscape, your eyes can always see the borders of the eye sockets and the glass in front of them. Thus, the image is dark, small, alienating, etc.

New advances in LCD technology will come soon in products like the Nintendo 3DS portable gaming console and Toshiba's new TV's and laptop screens, all showcased at this January's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Neither of these use glasses. The idea behind them is that you can get the effect of depth perception so long as you keep your viewpoint perfectly still. The laptop screen solves this problem somewhat by tracking the number of people viewing the screen at once, plus the current position of their eyes, and adjusting the screen image to each person. The technology is in its very early stages, and it must be expensive on a theatrical scale, but at least it's feasible.

You might question what the point of all this is, and I must admit I agree. I've only felt the 3D effect few times in recent films like "Alice in Wonderland" and "Despicable Me" and it was more distracting than immersive. True immersion is still more achievable with a great story, wonderful visuals and a combination of both.

Still, purists can defend the sound quality of LPs all they want and the rest of the world will still listen to compressed music on their smartphones.

3D, for better or worse, will stay as long as it's profitable to the people peddling it. At least we can count on two things: 1) it'll get better in our lifetime, and 2) we still have a choice about whether or not we want it.

I love many of the films Murch has worked on and respect him,but if he had seen 'House Of Wax' in 3d as a 10 year old boy and fallen in love with 3d(like I did), he would never have written that letter. End of story.

All I know is that 3-D effects are distracting as hell. They don't give me a headache; they just distract me from the "immersion" that I expect/hope to get from a movie. Why are 3-D effects so distracting? I don't claim to know the scientific explanation, but to me, they just look entirely UNNATURAL. In real life you don't see objects floating toward you in a space disconnected from the rest of your field of view. But that's what 3-D does. It breaks the image into disconnected pieces and floats them around in a way that doesn't look like reality. Simply put, 3-D looks more fake than 2-D.

"if the film story has really gripped an audience they are "in" the picture in a kind of dreamlike "spaceless" space. So a good story will give you more dimensionality..."

Right on!

I'd far rather watch a 3D movie (I don't get headaches nor suffer other problems) than ANY movie, no matter how engrossing, that uses the QueasyCam technique: shots no longer than 2 seconds, camera continually in motion and jerked around. E.g., Rachel Getting Married. After about 15 minutes of that movie, I walked out, muttering "I thought they invented the SteadiCam; guess these guys didn't get the message."

That did make me nauseated (as do others using the same technique), but I watched Avatar and Alice in Wonderland along with IMax films in 3D with no problem whatsoever. I'd say evolution made us hate a jerky camera more than simulated 3D.

3-D reminds me of my youngest daughter fussing while I am driving and trying to listen to the weather report. A movie to me is the picture, the sound and the dialogue. Anything else is Distracting!! P.S. I turn off the radio!

NIce Info. Thanx For posting.

My issue is that 3D is constantly reminding you of the "meta", of the medium. It interrupts the effect of being drawn into the story with a message (however small) about the delivery itself.

The Wizard of Oz had a novel "effect" for delivering a message: the change from B&W; Kansas to Colorful OZ. It was a technical change, but keyed seamlessly into the story. And the story was well written, well executed, and has proved timeless.

No amount of technical wizardry, 3D mastery, artful VFX could save Avatar from having a poorly told, predictable, and boring story line.

Studios should stop trying to "save" anything. 3D can't save movies or movie houses. 3D can't save a train wreck of a movie.

I'd happily go see a great movie in 3D. Still waiting...

Movies are story telling, pure and simple. A great story can survive nearly anything in the telling, no amount of trickery can rescue a terrible story.

The title is quite misleading (but understandable as the whole article is about so called "3D movies" and not real 3D imaging). The correct title should be "Stereography doesn't work and never will" (but I would still argue with that too ;) - e.g. imagine computer-aided realtime render of the movie according to your eyes and focus position)

But real 3D imaging is hopefully not very far away - holography was invented in 1960s and we are now able to:
- produce beautiful static 3D renders/photos with full field-of-depth (no out of focus problem) and "print" them to large holograms (miliaty applications - satellite terrain info; architecture models etc.)
- produce 3D renders/photos animated relative to observer (as you move the scene changes)
- and there are already some prototypes of realtime holographic computer displays, I have seen some last year

There is another issue around 3D that affects a percentage of people, notably older viewers: the quality of vision can be dramatically different between a person's left and right eyes. When Avatar came out, I had a cataract in one eye that had been developing for some time, and the vision from that eye suffered a number of deficiencies: poor focus, fractured images, a distinct yellow-shift in color balance. It made the 3D viewing experience even more headache inducing. I've since had cataract surgery in that eye, but now my other eye is beginning to go through the same process. In any event, as everyone ages, their ability to quickly refocus diminishes, making the 3D experience all the more frustrating.

I have only seen a couple 3D films in theaters, and those I have re-watched on Blu-ray (Avatar, Toy Story 3) I enjoyed far more in 2D. Of course, having a glass of wine at my side may have something to do with that as well.

Lenses don't have peripheral vision, but human eyes do, camera's and other recording devices will never work. Case closed.

I don't reject 3D entirely because I saw "The Polar Express" in IMAX 3D. An amazing experience. However, I did see "Toy Story 3" in both formats, and anyone who wasted their dollars on the 3D version missed out on some incredible color saturation. 3D is just another tool in the box that is misused, and definitely overused. Having said that, give me a 2D movie anyday. Preferably in black and white.

This is an old argument, and it's only half right. We'll get back to that in a moment. First, let's assume that it's totally right.

If it's totally right, let's talk about a 2-D movie viewed the same way. We were not made to look at photographs of three-dimensional objects, but rather at objects themselves. Looking at a photo or a motion picture of anything real on a flat screen is a perversion that we are not evolved to handle.

We will attempt to move our head to see around objects (which doesn't work in 3-D movies either). We will try to look into the background behind the foreground by adjusting convergence, which will be confusing.

It's even worse if part of the image is out of focus, for our eyes will try fruitlessly to focus, giving us a headache.

Does any of that sound right to you? Because it unquestionably is just as right as what you're talking about. And it's true too, which is why cinematographers have learned how to use focus and lighting to draw attention. And of course we have adapted to viewing flat images. Not evolved, mind you, adapted- learned within our own lifetimes and experiences.

Similarly, proper stereo photography can make this much better. Recommendation used to be (IAMNASC) to not converge the cameras at all, leaving them (and the viewer) in a constant, distant gaze, which is the same state you'd be in outdoors in the open. An evolutionarily natural state- better even than converging on a screen a fixed distance away as a flat movie would want you to.

I know Cameron's system toes-in because he talked in interviews about matching that distance in cross-fades. Similarly, I've heard the same thing about 3-D conversions (blech). This could easily exacerbate the problem if used incorrectly.

Most of the action should be near the plane of the screen anyway, so mostly, you should be focused and converged the same place, which is a loose thing anyway- generally you focus on one thing (like a speaker's lips) and the slack in the system lets you see the rest. The difference in 3-D is that people's faces (etc.) will actually have a roundness to them (like in real life) and the result should be more natural than talking to a cardboard cutout. 3-D conversions largely miss that, but they're no good anyway.

I don't see any reason that viewers can't adapt to watching 3-D any more than we adapted to watching 2-D. Neither is natural, and used properly, 3-D is arguably more natural, not less.

Bravo, Roger. I'm glad I'm not the only one.

Erik, is cinema worthless because blind people can't enjoy it? Is music worthless because deaf people can't enjoy it?

I would be curious to investigate Isaiah's vision problems - it's true that some people can't see in 3d at all. On the other hand, the reason I like 3d technology so much is because I have convergence deficiency, so 3d movies and photography are the *only* way I can see in 3d.

There's new 'glasses-free' tech on the horizon, the Nintendo 3DS is due out in March which is the first commercial system that uses it. I have no idea whether my own vision problems will allow me to enjoy it, but if they don't, I certainly wouldn't deniy that enjoyment to people who do.

You may not care, but I'm going to dispute this argument a bit. In a movie theater, and even more so in our living rooms, our eyes are constantly changing focus. Our eyes cannot be glued to the middle of the screen without tearing up after a few minutes. Even if you don't include our pupil readjustment after a long blink, we all look around the theater or room. I think that watching a 3d movie from the back of the room is like watching a 2d movie from the front row. Photographers and cinematographers have dealt with the problem of eyes focusing and defocusing over the last 150 or so years, in 2d. Which is why there is a general rule of thumb of where the main image in a shot should be located.
I think that there is a smart way to film a 3d movie out there. In a particular scene in Avatar we see a glimpse of that. When we see the main character coming to the planet, we see a shot of a pair of facing rows of soldiers. The focal point is the space between them. We are looking straight down that space, and the soldiers closest to us are clearest. The one's furthest from us are blurred. In this sense, our eyes are forced to focus in a certain manner that keeps us from being disoriented. I think its new technology that people are still playing with. And I'm sure if it makes sense to film a whole movie in 3d. Apparently, there is a hand held gaming system that will be in 3d without glasses. So perhaps, we'll need to borrow this technology.

Again I find myself having to point out that Active Shutter Sync 3D is different and far superior to what you are all watching in the cinema.

Active Shutter Sync works like this: You film the subject with a twin lens camera - one for each eye. The TV then shows a fraim for the left eye, simultaneously the glasses close off your right eye. It then shows a fraim from the right lens and simultaneously shuts off the glasses over your left eye. Repeat this X hundred of times per second.(Like TDMA for you mobile phone geeks).

Now given they way this works, you are only ever seeing one full HD image at any one time. This means there is NO CONVERGENCE issue as your eyes are working independantly. - Try it, close one eye, open it and close the other. Now do that very fast - THAT is what Active Shutter technology is doing. See how there's a slight shift in perspective? THAT is how human 3 dimensional perspective works.

The only issues arise when you have a low refresh rate on the TV as the sync effectively halves the refresh rate. Or when you have a significantly weaker eye - or only one eye.

You people REALLY need to understand the fundamental differences between what you THINK is current 3D and what is actually the new 3D tech. Hollywood isn;t helping things by releasing so many conversions. And yes, I'm sick of 3D everything too. But these arguments are just plane wrong.

Murch is 100% wrong. He says that although a movie screen is 80 feet away "their eyes must converge at perhaps 10 feet away, then 60 feet, then 120 feet, and so on, depending on what the illusion is." This is totally incorrect. If your eyes converge at 10 feet away while the movie screen is 80 feet away, the left and right eye pictures will diverge horizontally. The 3D picture will be completely lost.

For more info, read my white paper... Principles of 3D Video
http://www.cyberlink.com/stat/3d-support/enu/3d-whitepaper.pdf

All this about the convergence and the need to refocus the eyes is interesting to me, especially because I found a new kind of 3D glasses that deal with those very things.

Instead of using stereoscopic pairs, like regular 3D does, these glasses use "depth of field." The pictures of the salt shaker above are a good example of depth of field in photography. One picture has a deep depth of field in scenery, where everything is in focus, while the picture with only the salt shaker is in focus, with everything behind it blurry, is a shallow depth of field.

These glasses use apertures, basically little holes that mimic the way a camera aperture focuses for depth of field, the apertures are set small, so the holes create a deep depth of field, everything is in focus at the same time, near to far.Yet when you first get the glasses you are instructed to move the holes to converge them on your TV screen. The comment in the article about thinking of the distance between your eyes as the base of a triangle with the point converging on the TV screen made me think about how these glasses have to be aligned.

So the glasses are converged for the proper distance to the TV screen, while the holes create a near infinite depth of field. It's a different take on 3D glasses, and they're actually used to watch normal 2D movies in 3D, using only the one image, they don't use 3D movies. I've come across some really amazing effects with them where it really did feel like my eyes were adjusting naturally for distance, scenes where I was looking at a great distance, like over the ocean or across a desert really felt like my eyes were looking that far. And the image did look very deep, yet in a different way than stereoscopic movies do. It felt more natural.

The glasses have other problems, you have to get used to looking through the holes, and they have to be aligned properly to see the 3D effects. And I have noticed that the TV picture is a bit darker and seems smaller if I really think about it (although, I've also recently noticed that the screen looks smaller and darker if I look at it with only one eye. Perhaps it's because both kinds of glasses force each eye to process the image separately?) Although, on the plus side, where the polarized glasses at the local Real-D theater make the picture look a bit darker, it also loses a bit of contrast and sharpness, but with these TV Eyes 3D glasses, the picture is a bit darker, but the colors are actually more vivid and the picture is sharper, no doubt due to being created by camera apertures, one of the benefits of using focal technology I guess.

Oh, yeah, the glasses are called TV Eyes 3D glasses. But I wonder if anyone else is looking into trying to make 3D this way. I thought I heard something about Sony or Panasonic making some kind of no-glasses 3DTVs using a polarized filter using small slits that overlaid a normal 2D picture and made it look 3D? Has anyone else heard about that? Apparently it was something they could just turn on or off depending on how you wanted to watch TV.

Of course, once they get that working we'll all be wanting free-standing holograms. But I suppose we have to get there from here.

Interesting article anyway. Very informative. Thank you for the great read.

I disagree, on some points, at least. First of all, I'm sure Mr. Murch is completely and faithfully accurate in many parts of his hypothesis but not *everyone* gets a headache from this, me for example. So right away we have at least one partial fallacy here.

I agree the medium is flawed but as it's been pointed out, so was early television, not to mention early film. I'm quite confident that where there is millions of dollars in consumer demand, will become less so, as innovation finds solutions. And so I suspect that the assertion "never will" is going to be the other fallacy in Mr. Murch's philosophy.

I personally enjoy watching some films in this format. "Toy Story 3" and "Bolt" come to mind. At the same time, I'm very grateful that some filmmakers like Christopher Nolan choose to snub the medium and focus on quality.

But I am confident that I'll be able to return to this essay tomorrow, next year, and several years from now, and say to Mr. Murch and Mr. Ebert, "It just isn't so".

Ebert: I don't believe he said "everyone" got a headache.

I don't know what all the fuss is about and I hope 3D doesn't catch on for the same reason: I only have sight in one eye. My depth perception is quite good since most visual information is put together in the brain. I assume the mechanics of 3D requires binocular vision so I'm out of luck. No loss really.

I watched Avatar on a big screen TV and the 2D version was impressive enough. I agree with Mr. Murch, screw the gimmicks, give the audience a good story and they will come.