A blog about 3D cinema

Background: Bait asks the question none of us were asking: what would happen if you were trapped in a supermarket, after a tsunami... with a great white shark? Any self-respecting fan of B-movies already knows the answer to that question though: death, and lots of blood. Bait 3D caps off a year of 3D films like Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, Piranha 3DD  and Frankenweenie  that take the idea of 'high-concept' to ludicrous ly brilliant  extremes. Indeed, Bait went on to become the highest-grossing Australian film released in China, so this type of 3D cinema is likely to continue. Native 3D: Bait  was filmed in Australia by many of the people who shot the Second Unit photography in films like the Matrix trilogy and Superman Returns . Despite its many and varied challenges under-water, they filmed Bait in Native 3D. Until now, shots like the ones they pulled off have been considered one for the 'too hard' basket. Water photography has al...

If you're reading this site, you're probably savvy enough to understand what it means to watch a film with a higher frame rate. If you're interested in a real discussion about the shift in projection technology represented by the first Hobbit ( An Unexpected Subtitle Journey ), then read our post on the matter . If, however, you want a corporate-styled explanation, then feel free to read the officially released briefing below (click the image to expand)

Breaking news: Disney has bought the rights to produce future films in the Star Wars series. Disney plans to release ' Star Wars: Episode VII ' in 2015, likely based on treatments written by George Lucas himself, and they intend on releasing the film in 3D. The film will be produced by one of the most successful producers of all time, Kathleen Kennedy . You can read a fantastic break-down of 'what is known' so far over at Arthouse Cowboy . We'll have more details on this as news comes to hand. For now, you can watch Lucas explain the deal here:

Background: Frankenweenie is one of the more unlikely films to be released this year. Black and white, 3D, stop-motion animated, released by Disney, and an homage to 1930s horror films from Universal... you know, for kids! Bizarrely, this is the second time its director, Tim Burton, has tried to get the film made. Many years ago, the project was canned, after an exec realised that its subject matter might be a little, erm, off-putting. So, why has Frankenweenie been made now? We're inclined to blame Alice In Wonderland ; after earning a billion dollars at the global box-office (despite its atrocious 3D effects) Tim Burton was probably in a solid bargaining position to get a few 'personal projects' made. But who cares about all that background info, you're here because you want to know... how good is the 3D in Frankenweenie ? Should you see it with, or without, glasses on? Post-Converted 3D: Given Burton's history with post-converted 3D, we were worried ho...

Background: It's 3Defence's mission to chronicle the development of 3D Cinema. Dredd arrives at an interesting time in the medium's modern history: ultra-violent, reverent to the comics it's based on, filmed in native-3D on location in South Africa... it's hardly 'the norm' amongst 3D films in 2012. To make things even more interesting: Dredd was written by Alex Garland, who is fast becoming the 'go-to' writer for dark and semi-believable takes on near-apocalyptic sci-fi tales. Dredd is also probably the most kick-ass English language action film to come out along in a long time. But... how good is the 3D? Native 3D: The majority of the film was shot using Paradise FX rigs, on location and in sets in South Africa's Johannesburg and Cape Town. Digital extensions were used to transform the city into the post-nuclear-war landscape of Mega-City One, but the original footage was seamlessly integrated into this sprawling urban chaos. I...

A couple of days ago, Ang Lee unveiled his new film  Life of Pi  at the New York Film Festival. Though the film's not quite finished (Lee has another fortnight of tweaks to go, apparently) it's amazing that a version of it exists at all. There's an old Hollywood adage, that says "never make a movie about kids, animals or water," yet Ang Lee has somehow managed to make a film about all three. If an 'unfilmable' novel weren't challenge enough for him, Life Of Pi is also Lee's first 3D film. What can we expect from Ang Lee's usage of 3D? Well, for one thing, the film itself is going to be painterly. If the trailer 's anything to go by, the film is a fifty-fifty mixture of real-world footage and digitally-created backdrops. Life Of Pi 's crouching tiger is a CGI construction too, though computer-assisted characters have come a long way since Ang Lee attempted one in 2003's  Hulk . In sum, with all this digital information avai...

Background: Katy Perry now ranks amongst the best of the early-21st Century's pop stars. She ties a record with Michael Jackson for the most number one hit singles from one album, and was the first female to do so. It's been several years since she invaded the airwaves with  her hit single,  I Kissed A Girl , and now Perry is out to dominate movie theatres with her own quirky take on the doco/concert film. To do this, she's recruited  the directing team of Dan Cutforth and Jane Lipsitz. The pair are producers on the wildly popular 'the show must go on' TV series  Project Runway , and they made Justin Bieber's 3D film  Never Say Never   in 2011. Safe to say they know how to manipulate documentary footage into a narrative! Since Katy Perry: Part Of Me 's release last week, critics have been unexpectedly kind to this particular manipulation of Perry's life and recent worldwide tour. It deftly juggles three narratives: Perry's rollercoaster of a personal...

Britain's BFI IMAX screen, the biggest of its kind in the UK, just had a major overhaul. They documented the process in amazing detail on this site here . The team responsible went to enormous effort to make sure the screen, all 500m2 of it, could take advantage of the latest and greatest in projection systems. The end result will surely look stunning, and - thanks to a laser-guided paint job - will glisten bright silver. The silver coating applied will ensure that light from the projector is reflected in straight lines from the screen, lessening refraction.  So, why are we writing about this here at 3Defence ? Well, firstly because the photos are so damned cool. And secondly, because we love it whenever a cinema goes to great lengths to supply the brightest and clearest image in town. Brighter screens and projector bulbs are key to the ongoing success of the 3D format, and it's nice to see world-class theatres like the BFI London IMAX leading the way forwards for the r...

We at 3Defence have decided that film critics aren't giving audiences enough information about the usage of 3D in modern-day cinema. As such, we've been working on an ongoing series that can help you decide whether to fork out a few extra dollars or not to see the latest and greatest blockbuster while wearing glasses. Today we're looking at The Amazing Spider-Man, the fourth webslinger film, and the first to get the stereoscopic treatment being heavily pushed by Sony. You'll notice the article below is separated by sections; we've standardised these sections, to help regular readers compare one film's usage of the 3D technique to another. Let us know if you think of anything else that'd be useful in the comments section! Native 3D: Like Prometheus , The Amazing Spider-Man was filmed using Red Epic cameras, in 'native' 3D. In 2012, we've seen a string of high-quality post-production conversions, and we were hoping that Spidey webslinging in thre...

Men In Black 3 , in 3D. Too much e-ink has been spilled over the fact this is the second needless sequel in a series that should have remained in the 90s. Very little ink has been spent discussing the film's post-converted 3D job, and even less has been spent talking about how it was implemented. MIB3 just never attained 'event film' status this year, but we're keen to ask the hard questions anyway: how good is the 3D? Is it worth seeing the 3D version? Conversion: The film-makers made a conscious decision to film in 2D, and then convert it after the fact.  It seems they could have filmed in native 3D, had the key creatives preferred to do so. Ultimately they settled on post-conversion for a number of reasons. The most compelling is that the director, Barry Levinson, has always shot with really wide lenses, and usually frames the 'hero moments' dead-centre, just like the images you see to your right (Levinson is the dude in the right-hand corner)...

Over the weekend I bought the Blu Ray for the gorgeous film  The Red Shoes . Since its restoration in 2009, it has grown in its reputation amongst cinephiles, so the movie's remembered as a Technicolor gem. The colour used is painterly in tone, with vibrant reds that seem to pirouette off the screen. Glorious hues and fluid movement in a film like The Red Shoes remind us that 3D isn't needed to make movies seem 'alive'. I mention this, because regular reader Andy tipped us about a great Tumblr post written by Rian Johnson . The post is partially about the "polarised polemic" being used in the 3D "debate". Johnson's opinions are worth considering, because he's a good director and writer (he made indie-hit Brick, followed it up with the under-seen Brothers Bloom , and he's about to kick our asses with the upcoming Bruce Willis / Joseph Gordon-Levitt time-travel thriller, Looper) . Anyway, Johnson suggests that we should frame...

Prometheus is the most eagerly awaited sci-fi film since Inception. Geeks around the world have been losing their mind with the release of each new trailer, and it's subsequently taken on "Event Film" status. Despite all this, Prometheus is saddled with a lot of baggage. It's Ridley Scott's first science fiction film since Blade Runner;  it may-or-may-not-be a prequel to Alien ; it's Fox's biggest film since Avatar ; it's Scott's first 3D movie; it's hopefully Michael Fassbender's home-run performance and.... well. You get the picture. Let's put that all aside, and focus on the 3D. Because this article's aimed at people who haven't seen the film yet, I'll try and keep it relatively spoiler-free. If you want the experience to be completely pure though, disconnect the internet, and run to the nearest big screen you can find! Native 3D: 3Defence has already written an article about how Prometheus was shot in...