You don't need to be in 3-D at every step of the way. I cut on a normal Avid, and only when the scene is fine cut do we output left and right eye video tracks to the server in the screening room and check the cut for stereo. A shot is judged on the merits of performance, operating, lighting, etc., and not 3-D. I think this is a healthy approach.
There are already calls to increase the frame rate to at least 30 frames per second for digital 3-D because certain camera moves, especially pans, look jumpy in 3-D. You've been an advocate for both 3-D and higher frame rates. What do you think is the solution?
For three-fourths of a century of 2-D cinema, we have grown accustomed to the strobing effect produced by the 24-frames-per-second display rate. When we see the same thing in 3-D, it stands out more, not because it is intrinsically worse, but because all other things have gotten better. Suddenly the image looks so real, it's like you're standing there in the room with the characters, but when the camera pans, there is this strange motion artifact. It's like you never saw it before, when in fact it's been hiding in plain sight the whole time. Some people call it judder, others strobing. I call it annoying. It's also easily fixed.
Our current generation of digital projectors can currently run up to 144 frames per second, and they are still being improved. So right now, today, we could be shooting 2-D movies at 48 frames and running them at that speed. This alone would make 2-D movies look astonishingly clear and sharp, at very little extra cost, with equipment that's already installed or being installed. I've run tests on 48 frame per second stereo and it is stunning. The cameras can do it, the projectors can (with a small modification) do it.
So why aren't we doing it, as an industry? Because people have been asking the wrong question for years. They have been so focused on resolution, and counting pixels and lines, that they have forgotten about frame rate. A 2K image at 48 frames per second looks as sharp as a 4K image at 24 frames per second ... with one fundamental difference: the 4K/24 image will judder miserably during a panning shot, and the 2K/48 won't.
If every single digital theater was perceived by the audience as being equivalent to Imax or Showscan in image quality, which is readily achievable with off-the-shelf technology now, running at higher frame rates, then isn't that the same kind of marketing hook as 3-D itself? Something you can't get at home. An aspect of the film that you can't pirate.
Of course, the ideal format is 3-D/2K/48 fps projection. I'd love to have done 'Avatar' at 48 frames. But I have to fight these battles one at a time. I'm just happy people are waking up to 3-D.
Maybe on "Avatar 2."
