Recently I saw that Nintendo is coming out with a 3D game console, which was announced at E3 this past June.

The 3DS is a hand-held portable game console that produces 3D effects. The best part, now you can play all your favorite 3D games without glasses. Be prepared to experience Mario tossing bananas like never before or go head to head with your favorite soccer players in vivid 3D with FIFA Soccer from EA. Release for the Nintendo 3DS is this spring.

The PS3 is 3D capable with the latest downloads, but you will need to buy a 3D television. For those of you who are planning on shelling out the $1700 to $7000 for that new TV there are now a handful of 3D games at your disposal and the handful grows to about 20 or so by years end. Also 3D Blu-Ray movie playback is coming this year through a firmware update. The amount of 3D Blu-Ray discs will be about 25 or so by the end of the year.

For those that do have the 3D televisions or just want to sport a hot pair of shades, Oakley, the high-end sunglass company is coming out with a pair of 3D glasses. Apparently the idea, “isn’t to make cool looking 3D glasses, it’s to make cool looking glasses that happen to work with 3D movies.” (http://www.fastcompany.com/1700962/oakley-unveils-first-optically-correct-3d-glasses)

The company decided to release a special edition set of glasses in conjunction with the release of the film Tron: Legacy. For $150 you can look cool or so says CEO of Oakley Colin Baden, “We like it better than anything out there. At the very least, Oakley’s glasses look a lot less dorky than other products we have seen in recent months.”

Perhaps Baden is referring to the Hasbro 3D Goggles.

These goggles are 3D glasses with a slot built in for an iPhone or iPod Touch. Now you can view all of your favorite 3D content from your Phone. The goggles are clearly reminiscent of the View-Master, and are being marketed for both children and adults. The retail price is set at $30. With this cool gadget, Apple is sure to see a surge in game appsbeing developed specifically for 3D.

Of all the products out there, frankly this is the one I happen to be the most interested in. I use my phone for pretty much everything, reading email, scripts and books, updating various social media accounts, and viewing content. Plus for $30 I get to relive my childhood with a pair of glasses that look like a View-Master and have access to 3D content I otherwise could never experience.

The biggest question I have regarding all of the 3D technology being pushed out is do you care? Is the public excited for 3D content and all the gadgetry that goes along with it?

I spoke to Leslie Ekker about what prompted the conversion.  “It started out as an exercise and a demonstration piece.  We finished the 30-second spot and it turned out really well so we decided to convert it to 3D.  The spot is CG so we knew we could get high quality.  We went through the process of converting it to 3D and it essentially turned into a cautionary tale.  We found out that certain kinds of shots just don’t work in Stereo, fast moving shots, shots with zooms or foreground objects that are out of focus, depth of field shots where you have lots of blur all generally don’t work in Stereo because the human eye doesn’t tolerate that kind of domination.  You’re ordering the viewer to focus their stereoscopic gaze on a certain point in space in the shot.  It’s one thing to present a composition that dictates where the audience looks; we do that routinely in 2D by lighting, rack focus, depth of field that kind of thing.  When you do that in Stereo you tell the viewer to focus closer than further, to ignore something in the foreground or to see things of a scale that doesn’t compute in Stereo.  It all comes back to viewer experience.  It’s like story.  If you have a shot that isn’t enhancing or supporting the story, it takes the viewer out of the story.  You’ve lost them.  So it’s important to make all the shots work so it doesn’t distract the audience from the story and the message.  You have to design your shots so they can work in Stereo comfortably for the audience.”

On the production side of things, how long will it take for productions to adopt 3D equipment in order to shoot in Stereo?  “That’s a good point.  The only camera systems available right now are twin camera systems with beam splitters or binocular side-by-side systems.  They are all prototypes.  There aren’t stock manufactured systems.  They are all bulky, heavy and complex.  You need a convergence puller as well as a focus puller so your crews are bigger.  Reloading film or digital media takes twice as long.  You have double the rate of camera failure; lenses themselves don’t match.  You can have ten different 50mm lenses to put on a cine camera and only two of them will match close enough to use for Stereo production because lens manufacturers never had to make them match.   It’s not so much the optical quality of each element in the lens; it is the mechanical function of it.  When you rack focus on a lens there is a slight focal length change with a very subtle directional change as well because they aren’t perfectly made.  If those variables don’t match from lens to lens you will find that your images won’t line up.  Image line up in a twin image stream is critical.  Lens manufacturers are struggling to come up with new manufacturing standards that will make their product much more uniform.  When we bring these image streams into our post – production process, we have to make sure they match.  If they don’t we have to be creative in how to make them match.  Any mismatching will cause eyestrain and again it all comes back to viewer experience.”

Ekker knew what the ideal shots were when producing a 3D spot, but the conversion of the Chevy Volt from 2D to 3D helped the team at Zoic learn more.  “We definitely learned more.  In the end some shots work exceptionally well and it was interesting to find out why they worked well.  It comes down to the fact that simpler cinematography and simpler editing works better in Stereo, you need deeper depth of field where everything is sharp.  We knew that, but we saw how they worked in a practical application in the animation of the shots.  The last sequence in the Chevy Volt spot is the car finally landing on the road and the camera pulling up and craning down.  You’re looking straight down at the freeway.  Normally in Stereo, the further away you are from a subject, the weaker the Stereo effect.  So what I had our animators do was widen the interocular distance as we went higher and higher and moved further from the freeway.  At the end of the spot we are at a 12-foot interocular and we are about 20 miles from the surface.  What happens to the viewer is the freeway system turns into a miniature and remains a miniature in Stereo.  So it is basically shrinking in size not distance because your eyes are widening and widening.  It’s all about the ratio of distance between the eyes and the distance to the subject.  There is a range that the brain is comfortable with and understands.  When that ratio is exceeded you lose your 3 dimensional analysis of the scene.  When it is exceeded in the foreground, it becomes straining to the eye and it no longer feels good.  For us, it was a very useful project and confirmed our approach.  One of the things I emphasize in my presentation was that once you become comfortable with the parameters and variables in Stereo shot creation you start to play with them.”

Zoic has been presenting their findings to various agencies around the country.  The next stop is New York City on November 11, 2010 with the Stereoscopy 3D presentation at the Crosby Street Hotel.  To RSVP for the event check out the site:
Stereoscopy Event

This past June, ESPN launched ESPN 3D and showed 25 matches from the World Cup.  ESPN was one of the first networks to broadcast in HD and it seems the network is pretty comfortable adopting the latest technologies.

Bryan Burns, VP of Strategic Business Planning and Development was quoted in Wired.com saying, “Our company has a rather incredible track record of involving ourselves with emerging technologies before things are really finished or finalized, both from the standpoint of technology and of knowing what consumers really and truly want or need.”  Cable providers Comcast, Direct TV and AT&T are currently providing subscribers with the ESPN 3D option.  ESPN 3D will  be broadcasting thirteen college football games in 3D this season including #  16 ranked Auburn vs # 13 South Carolina on September 25th.  Verizon FIOS got in on the action by producing and broadcasting the preseason NY Giants and New England Patriots game in 3D to subscribers in the NY city, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Rhode Island areas.  Verizon also is working with Slate Bar in Manhattan and Snookers in Providence, Rhode Island to set up 3D televisions at the popular sports bars.  Next year the Discovery Channel will be rolling out a 3D channel.  The channel is a joint venture between Discovery, SONY and IMAX and Discovery plans to launch a 24/7 3D channel that will launch sometime in the first quarter of 2011.  I’m curious how Discovery will be able to sustain a channel that solely has 3D content 24/7 considering there still isn’t a great deal of content being created in Stereo.  As a comparison, this is ESPN 3D’s current schedule, which is pretty sparse: 3D Schedule

Though program selection may be somewhat limited, ESPN has seen interest from advertisers to showcase 3D spots on the channel.  “Advertiser insiders say that luxury automakers Mercedes- Benz and Lexus have already produced 3D spots… and predict that gaming will be a big 3D category.” 3D Ad Flow May Be Faster than Predicted Tag Garson, ESPN Senior Director of Acquisition Strategy says, “Companies want to be seen as ‘tech savvy’ by having their brands associated with 3D.  Enthusiasm is greater for 3D than HD because of the movie experience.”  SONY, Gillette and Disney/ Pixar Toy Story 3 ran ads when ESPN 3D launched this past June.  ESPN also introduced a 3D commercial for This is Sports Center.

Another network that has been talking 3D is Sky Network .  Sky, based in the UK has come up with broadcast standards for Stereo content and other networks may soon follow suit.  Leslie Ekker, Creative Director of Zoic Studios says, “Interestingly Sky Networks released their broadcast standards for Stereo content the day we started our lecture tour.  Sky is fascinating because they were the first Network to publish their broadcast standards for Stereo.  It was shocking to see what they were.  They said that they will not accept any 2D conversions for broadcast; they will only take original 3D content that has been shot in 3D and finished in 3D because of the bad quality that we have been seeing in 2D conversions.  If you were trying to get them to air a 2D conversion they would have to be on board with your vendors, your pipeline, and your methodology before you begin that conversion process so you have to clear it with them before you even start the job and they will have a say in everything.”

As more and more Networks move towards creating 3D channels, it seems like the standards could be universal across the board.  “We are thinking it will be similar because the Networks are trying to protect their viewer experience.  They want their viewer experience to be positive so viewers come back.  If you have poor quality content, viewers aren’t going to think of you as a comfortable experience.  Bad 3D is uncomfortable and not rewarding so they are opting for quality over quantity.  That will reduce the amount of material available to them in the beginning, but will increase the level of quality of the material they do show.  It’s about viewer experience and overall quality, which is a really positive thing.  It will slow down the rate of content supply in the beginning, but in the end it will promote a permanent conversion to Stereoscopic presentation.”

Moving forward, Stereo technology may just be a natural part of the process.  For instance, it used to be that visual effects were the icing on the cake of the filmmaking process, but now it is as important as lighting or sound.  Do you feel this will be the case for 3D technology that it becomes a natural step in the process of filmmaking?  “I think within three years every screen we see will be Stereo; all products will have Stereo screens in them.  I think they will be free view; free view Stereo screen is one that is 3D without having to wear glasses.  You just look at it and it is 3D.  That is already happening.  At the Howard Hughes Center in Culver City there is a movie theater called Rave, once known as the Bridge, and there is a fifty-inch monitor on the wall that is a free view Stereo monitor.  It runs Stereo trailers and it’s remarkable, really effective.  It’s a plasma screen also which means it is the highest level of quality of flat screen.  It’s mounted about 12 feet up on a wall because I am sure the surface is what they call lenticular, which means it has very fine little ribs on the surface, which is how it achieves the segregation of images between the eyes.  Lenticular refers to the word lenticle, which means lens.  They are linear lenses that uses a prismatic effect isolates the image that each eye gets. Lenticular lens surfaces are very fragile.  These free view screens are becoming available to certain exotic branches of image presentation right now.”  In fact when I went on Rave’s website there is a section for 3D movies and special events.

Toshiba is going to be releasing a Stereo TV without glasses in Japan this December, but the television is  mere 20″ big!  For those consumers that own a 50″ screen I can not imagine something 3″ bigger than your laptop screen is going to cut it.

“There is a digital still camera from Japan made by Fuji that has twin lenses and shoots two ten mega pixel pictures in Stereo and on the back of the camera is a free view screen that shows you the picture in Stereo. 3D Fuji camera

They also sell a digital picture frame that is a free view screen where you can put your pictures; it is a seven inch diagonal screen that sells for $600.

This is what you would normally get for $60 for a 2D screen.  So that gives you an idea of how difficult it is to create, the manufacturing process is very exacting, very delicate and it is very sensitive.  They are working feverishly to improve it because the whole glasses thing is a turn off.”

If 3D television sets are coming out at Christmas, but you must wear glasses and glasses is a turn off, I have to wonder realistically how many people are going to be running out to buy something that they know in a few years will just be better.  Naturally there are those that always want the latest and greatest in gadgets and technology, but I for one would rather wait till the technology gets better.  Plus I would rather be able to use something once I know there is more content available.  Again though the prospect of watching the next World Cup in 3D excites me; watching the new episode of Dexter or Fringe in 3D excites me a lot more.

Stay tuned for the next article on 3D Stereoscopic when I talk about 2D conversion to 3D and is it possible.

I would put the reels into the viewfinder and watch, as Mickey Mouse and Goofy seemed to come alive before my eyes.

As a child, I vaguely remember trying on the red and blue glasses for the first time and not understanding what the big deal was until I saw Jaws in 3D at the movie theater the next week; I still have a hard time seeing the shark exhibit at the aquarium.

At sixteen, I had the chance to go to Disney World and experience the Muppets in 3D, a mix of 3D and animatronics. Of course my most recent experience with 3D was seeing James Cameron’s AVATAR in the theater, as did about forty million others.

However, when I heard that soon we all could be watching 3D television shows and commercials from the comforts of our living rooms I wanted to find out when and how that was going to be possible. This isn’t your mom and dad’s 3D; this is the future!

Leslie Ekker, Creative Director and Visual Effects Supervisor of the Commercial division at Zoic Studios has been working with 3D technology for many years.  In fact, Ekker worked with James Cameron on Terminator 2 3D, the ride at Universal Studios.

Ekker worked as the model shop crew chief on the project and supervised the miniatures during the shoot.  With his vast knowledge and experience, Ekker alongside Steve Schofield, Executive Producer and Co-Founder of Zoic Studios, decided to begin a tour around the country to different commercial agencies to educate and inform them about the 3D process.

“There is very little knowledge about Stereo image presentation and Stereo production and we are trying to help educate agencies about what is involved in producing 3D commercials,” says Ekker.  In this first part of my series on 3D, I will give you the I Design Your Eyes readers a glimpse at how 3D technology works and how the commercial world is responding to the technology.

The nationwide tour began in Chicago a few weeks ago with a presentation given to Leo Burnette and Draft FC.  Then, it was onto Minneapolis with Fallon and Carmichael Lynch, then San Francisco with Goodby Silverstein & Partners and Venablesvon.

Zoic partnered with Executive Producer Jan Jacobsen and Director Roger Tonry, co-founders and partners of 3DFilmland.  The group brought a consumer 3D screen with them around the country. The group took the television on the plane and then proceeded to take it in taxis in the cities as they met with the various agencies. I kept thinking it would look something like this:

On November 11, 2010, Zoic takes the tour to NYC at the Crosby Street Hotel.  Doors open at 6:30pm and there will be presentations at 7:00pm and 8:30pm.

For someone like me who has no understanding of how the process of 3D works, I asked Ekker to go into greater detail about how the process of seeing 3D actually works.   “On most 3D or Stereoscopic screens, which is the proper term for it, there are two different systems to allow you to see Stereo on a screen.  What you need to do first to create a Stereo image is to isolate the right eyes image from the left eyes image.

Each eye sees a different image, which is displaced slightly.  This is the way human vision works with the innerocular distance, the distance between the eyes.  That separation can be achieved in a variety of ways, but the most common way is to have a pair of glasses called shutter glasses that alternate their transparency from the right eye to the left eye, right eye to the left eye etc.

They switch back and forth sixty times per second.  An infrared light beam sent from the monitor synchronizes them.  The monitor in synchrony with the glasses, displays the right eye image and the left eye image, right eye image, left eye image etc. on the screen so each eye sees only its designated image.  It’s a very clean way of displaying 3D and it’s considered the best way at the moment to see it with glasses.  The second method we use is polarized.

That is a system where the screen itself has very thin stripes of polarized filter over it that alternates A, B, A, B, one is right eye and one is left eye.  The image is then broken up into stripes that align with those filtered stripes on the surface of the screen so you now wear polarized glasses that block the image of the left eye from the right eye and reverse for the other eye.  That segregates the left eye and right eye and that image, that striped or interlaced image, is displayed at any frame rate.   That is a more straightforward system because you don’t have an infrared beam; you don’t have an electronic pair of glasses.  We used a JVC polarized monitor and it was a pretty discrete filtration where you don’t have a lot of crossover from right eye into left eye.   It was a very slight amount of bleed through the lenses.   That is why it is not considered as good a quality an image as shutter glasses. Shutter glasses completely block the left eyes image from the right eye and vice versa.  With polarized there is a very small amount of leakage because the filtration is not perfect, but it worked very well.  The down side of the polarized system also is you are essentially wearing sunglasses so you have to have a much brighter screen in order to achieve the same sense of brightness.  Your eyes do adjust, but when you get into dark detail it can be a little tricky at times.”

From my research everyone seems to be saying that 3D is the future.  I even talked about it in a post about NASA’s use of 3D in their government film projects, 3D The Final Frontier. However, if the future of 3D is now does that mean we all are going to run out and buy the 3D television sets coming out this Christmas?

That’s right, if for some reason you have been living under a rock, all the major brands will be selling 3D television sets just in time for the holiday season.  However, can even Santa afford the price tag?  Back in March Panasonic said it would be selling a 3D television package for $2899.99, 2499.95 for the TV, $399.95 for a Blu-Ray disc player and $149.95 for a pair of 3D glasses.  A study about consumer attitudes toward 3-D television found many who were less interested in the technology after they actually experienced it.  Still, 52 percent of consumers who tried out 3-D televisions said it was a better experience than they had expected, according to a study conducted by The Nielsen Co. for the Cable & Telecommunications Association for Marketing.  The study was released on September 9, 2010, Concerns About 3D TV sets.  Ekker says, “This is an early adopter phase; early adopters of 3D are often gamers, people who are comfortable with new technology.  Many are the same people that bought hi def screens before there was hi def content available.  Now they are probably the ones buying 3D screens when there isn’t a lot of 3D content available yet.”   The big brands that you will be seeing pushing 3D television sets are JVC, SONY, Samsung, Panasonic and Phillips. All of these sets for now will rely on 3D glasses.  I wonder ultimately what will be the chicken and egg in this scenario?  Will consumers need to buy 3D television sets to then get companies to produce 3D content or will commercial and production companies need to create the content in order for consumer to begin buying the sets in order to consume it?  Ekker believes that consumers will have to buy the televisions in order to see more 3D content being produced.  “We will need to see some market penetration of these sets in order to stimulate commercial production.  We have cable stations coming out with Stereo versions of themselves like ESPN, Discovery Channel, Sky and others and they all need content.  However, there aren’t eyeballs for the content because the screens aren’t out there yet. They are coming and they are selling, but they aren’t being adopted too rapidly.  Mostly because we all went out and bought the fifty inch plasma screen for our living room 1 – 5 years ago so that will slow us down a bit.  In a way it is a healthy thing because the gradual adoption of a new technology like this will ensure that the standards will fall into place that there won’t be a systems war like Betamax situation. Also it will give all the production entities time to learn how to do it right.”

So how do you do it right?  That brings us back to the nationwide 3D tour.  The point was to break down the process from production through post for the agencies to have them better understand what the process entails.  Essentially in order to successfully produce a 3D spot you need to have a company behind it that knows and has experience in the technology from production through post. Ekker said that the agencies are really open to Stereo commercials, but there are challenges.  “The clients and the agencies often aren’t prepared for how expensive and time-consuming Stereo can be.  At the moment, and this is evolving as we speak, it is more expensive and takes longer depending on the content and what is desired.  There is a gap in knowledge at the agencies so when they see a job come in or request for a 3D spot they will send it out to the usual production companies and directors and they get back bids.   The trouble is that these production companies nearly always have no experience producing 3D work and that is an essential flaw in their system. That is one thing we are trying to make sure the agencies understand you need a company that has knowledge and experience in Stereo production from concept to delivery.  There are so many ways to get tripped up and I want them to understand those ways.”

The biggest way to get tripped up is simply the technology.

“The only camera systems available right now are twin camera systems with beam splitters or binocular side by side systems, and they are all prototypes.  There aren’t stock manufactured systems.  They are all bulky, heavy and complex. You need a convergence puller as well as a focus puller so your crews are bigger.  Reloading film or digital media takes twice as long. You have double the rate of camera failure; lenses themselves don’t match.  You can have ten different 50mm lenses to put on a cine camera and only two of them will match close enough to use for Stereo production because lens manufacturers never had to make them match.  Lens manufacturers are struggling to come up with new manufacturing standards that will make their product much more uniform.  When we bring these image streams into our post production process, we have to make sure they match.  If they don’t we have to be creative in how to make them match.   Any mismatching will cause eye strain and then it is about viewer experience.”  Obviously no one wants eye strain when viewing content.  Can you imagine watching a 3D commercial and then having to leave the room because you just got a headache?  I for one would not be happy about dropping a bunch of money on a television set to then only view content that caused me to pop an aspirin.

Based on the research it looks like 3D is happening whether you like it or not.   I am someone who is not an early adopter.  I still don’t own a Blu-Ray player, I held onto my dial up Internet as long as I could bare it, and I still would rather buy a CD rather than download music.  However, I am excited to see more 3D content.  Would I want to see the next World Cup games broadcast in 3D?  OF COURSE!  Would I want to buy a television to do that?  Probably not, but I would buy my friend’s beer and pay for a set of glasses to go watch the games on their television set because I know people who would buy a 3D television at Christmas.  All of this said, I ultimately agree with Leslie Ekker, gradual adoption ultimately means the standards can fall into place and there won’t be system wars; anyone remember HD DVD?  Well as of 2008 it was discontinued and Blu-Ray is now the standard.

Stay tuned for part two of this article where I talk about what happens when you convert 2D to 3D (I’ll give you a hint, it isn’t pretty!) and when you can expect to see your favorite cable networks expanding into more 3D content.

Based in Washington D.C. Starobin has seen his fair share of production, but more on the industrial and corporate side.  When Starobin was in Los Angeles two weeks ago, he was excited to get a tour of the Zoic Studios’ facilities.  “It was a thrill to come out to the nerve center and get to see what Zoic is doing.”  Starobin considers himself a film geek, and he loves being creative.  However, he does feel there are differences when you work outside of Los Angeles and for a government agency like NASA.  “There is a different philosophy and attitude because we don’t have the Los Angeles infrastructure with infinite crew and technical support.  There are a smaller number of people to draw on and production cycles tend to be slower. There is an independent way of thinking of high end post-production and production.  It isn’t just indie filmmaking by running out with a camera and you try to make your movie.  You can think about it on a really high level for short pieces and interstitials.”

Starobin is the Senior Producer at NASA and is in charge of high profile special projects including Congressional events, exotic platforms, which could be 3D and spherical projection.  In fact, a good portion of the work Starobin has been doing is for the 3D sphere.  The sphere is a screen that hangs in space; four projectors illuminate it, shining in from the corners of the room at 90 degrees.  The sphere’s technology is technically called Science On a Sphere, which was invented by NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), NOAA.  Starobin began working with NOAA in late 2005 and expanded on the uses of the original technology, “When I got a hold of it they (NOAA) were essentially doing round PowerPoint presentations.  They were showing pictures of spherical objects like planets.  If it wasn’t round they couldn’t do anything.  They couldn’t move, cut or do anything with filmmaking.  My assignment was to write a speech and use it as a round slideshow.”

After his first assignment, Starobin essentially took it upon himself to find ways to film for a round sphere object.  “If you have a ball hanging in space that is six feet in diameter, where do you put your camera?  There is no left or right end of the frame and how do you dolly in or zoom out, all of the basic things you know about filmmaking falls apart and so you have to start over like a blank sheet of paper.”  NOAA has largely distributed these screens around the country.  “These round screens are really cool.  They aren’t for everything.  I wouldn’t want to tell the next season of Desperate Housewives on one, but I do think you could do more than planets.  You don’t have to show just spheres.  It’s like on a regular movie screen you don’t have to show just rectangles.”  Starobin just produced a film about renewable energy that played in Copenhagen and screened on the sphere, “You could also treat it as an elegant information device.  If you were to place a sphere in LAX in one of the main terminals you could essentially have news go around the screen, but as people are walking by they could get a sense of news events in a different format that is conducive to a circulating crowd.  You can simply make it a beautiful piece of art too.  It’s an interesting element for a large stadium to place corporate signage.”

Everything Starobin does for NASA is free and in public domain. “You can download things from various web sites or if it’s theatrical, it’s free to the public.”  Starobin has made four films that were for the spherical projection that have played all over the world in about forty five theaters and a variety of different languages.  “Our first film, Footprints, was named best invention of the year in Time Magazine.”  Currently, Starobin is focusing on low cost, high quality 3D solutions for NASA.  “NASA has done some work in 3D in partnership with movie studios, specifically Warner Brothers with Hubble 3D and a number of IMAX films.”

Starobin was an anthropology and medical ethics major and was a science reporter for many years, but always had a very keen interest in the arts.  “I had the science interest and the arts interest and then an opportunity came up and I was able to build a position and it’s grown.  I think, possibly like Zoic, it grows because you discover there is a new idea and you do the research and suddenly you enter a bold new area.”

As for the 3D space, Starobin began doing a great deal of research internally with his colleague Victoria Weeks, Chief Technologist and Senior Editor at NASA.  Weeks and her husband made a small seven minute, 3D film to showcase the importance of the 3D technology.  For Starobin, he thinks the interest in 3D didn’t really spark until Avatar was released and became a worldwide hit.  “I wrote a paper for NASA saying 3D is coming, a year and a half before Avatar came out saying we need to start doing research internally. Then Avatar hit and they said let’s give them some seed money… NASA is interested, but they are a government agency.  They don’t make money and they don’t have shareholders so they are nervous to get in.  At a federal agency there aren’t commercial budgets.”

Even though Satrobin believes in the opportunities of 3D, he has some hesitancy about it.  For one Starobin hopes that people don’t forget about story when utilizing the 3D technology.  Like with fictional narrative films, the non fiction films of NASA also rely heavily on story.  “By being immersive, 3D says, ‘come be in this world.’  I think there is excellent non fiction 3D out there.  I am interested in it and doing it, but we just don’t want the technology leading the story.”

Does Starobin have an interest in taking more of a Hollywood approach?  “Yes I have interest.  To be honest, it would help facilitate story telling.  One of the things that Vicky, myself and our colleagues at NASA appreciate, is how we are freed a little bit from the extraordinary clock pressures that I think Hollywood can impose on creatives.  On the other hand, we don’t have the budgets.  It’s a trade.  We would love to continue to build our relationships to the west coast community without giving up some eastern aesthetics if you will.  In an era of high speed Internet and inexpensive plane travel, that’s a very exciting proposition.  I think it is possible to benefit from the best of both worlds.  I do insist on creative meetings that we get together face to face if we can.  The ability to talk via phone or Internet is not the same; I think evolution has trained you over two million years to read people’s faces, bodies and tone of voice.  Isn’t it incredible when people are actually together?  So we try getting together in person as often as we can, though we all have a SKYPE account.”

So does Starobin know what is coming next?  The short answer is no.  There will always be something new when it comes to technology.  “Now in the digital era of storytelling there is no new next big thing.  The skies are pretty much the limit.  Now it’s about invention and storytelling.  Do what you want, choose whatever color brush you want.  That to me is exciting.”

So I Design Your Eyes readers what do you think?  Is 3D the future of all filmmaking?  Do you have ideas of what the next big idea in filmmaking is? Would love if you shared your thoughts in the comment section below.

Starobin will be launching a new website in a week so check it out at:

http://www.1auglobalmedia.com

and follow Michael’s work on the sphere on twitter @SphereNASA

It all started in the music industry, when Napster, the original digital music sharing service, was launched in June of 1999. With music freed from the baryonic prison of vinyl, polyester tape and polycarbonate plastic, consumers could copy, edit, sample, decode and redistribute it and other copyrighted content at will.

Rights holders had always controlled their intangible product by controlling the tangible media – records, cassette tapes and CDs, as well as radio frequencies, for music; television channels and chunky videotapes for video; multiple 40-pound reels of motion picture film for movies; floppy disks and CDs for software; plus dead-tree books and photographs. Suddenly, their control of intellectual property was just gone, vaporized in a mist of ones and zeroes. On one side, many music executives saw digital media as a tremendous new opportunity for both creative expression and for business. Zoic’s Jeff Suhy, a former record company executive, was quoted in the May 2000 Village Voice: “I love that the world is quite obviously changing before our eyes and no one really knows how it’s going to play out!”

Suddenly, control of intellectual property was gone, vaporized in a mist of ones and zeroes.

On the other hand, some rights holders saw any perceived change to their traditional revenue stream as a threat to be destroyed at all costs. They dug in their heels and fought the future – engendering numerous disasters, from Circuit City’s Digital Video Express, which sold consumers DVD movies that “expired” after two days, to the RIAA’s litigious pogrom against file-sharing college kids and soccer moms. And money spent to develop various copy-protection and DRM schemes was almost always wasted, as consumers found ways to defeat protection, or avoided protected products altogether.

But some in the business world saw opportunities, not enemies. When Steve Jobs first laid eyes on the Xerox Alto in the late 1970s, with its GUI user interface and mouse controller, he saw the future of computing. Decades later, Jobs understood that the original Napster, driven out of business by the record companies, was the template for media distribution in the new millennium. With Apple’s iTunes software and online store, Jobs went from computer mogul to media mogul, taking advantage of record companies’ desperation to gain control of digital music, and appointing to himself the power to single-handedly set prices for online entertainment. But iTunes by itself would not have been enough to compete with free MP3s – it was the convenience, portability, style, incredible ease of use, sound quality and price point of the iPod that gave Apple control first of the personal music player market, and then of legitimate online music and video distribution.

Now the media industry has reached another watershed moment of change, as file-sharing endangers the revenue models of film and television creators, as well as publishers and journalists. But media moguls have absorbed the lessons of the music industry’s tribulations in the last decade, and there is a new humility in the face of change — a willingness, even an eagerness, to adapt to the new digital world, rather than to deny it. In the last few years, movie and television creators have moved their product online, to free video sites like Hulu, which will soon experiment with for-pay models; and are offering high-definition, appointment-free content on demand to home televisions through cable companies and Netflix.

There is a new humility in the face of change — an eagerness to adapt to the new digital world.

In 2010, how else are media producers taking control of the future of their own industry? What are they doing to reimagine their businesses, and insure that the media world of 2020 is profitable and stable?

Some of the answers were on display at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Publishers are betting that consumers will gladly pay to read their content on a new breed of flat, portable, easy-to-read e-book products. Just as the iPod saved music, publishers hope that Amazon’s Kindle and Barnes & Noble’s Nook will save literature and journalism, at least until true e-paper is developed.

The greatest buzz at CES was elicited by a whole crop of new HDTVs with 3D capabilities. The motion picture industry and the movie theater chains are increasingly turning to 3D and IMAX as ways to lure audiences into theaters, and the current success of James Cameron’s Avatar demonstrates that even in a serious global recession, moviegoers are willing to pay extra for a high-tech movie experience they can’t get at home.

The new 3D TVs, including the Panasonic TC-PVT25 series that won the Best of CES award this year, promise to provide an in-home 3D experience for only a few hundred dollars more than ordinary HDTVs. In addition, satellite television provider DirectTV announced at CES that it has teamed with Panasonic to create three HD 3D channels, to launch this spring. Working with media partners including NBC Universal and Fox Sports, DirectTV will offer a pay-per-view channel, an on-demand channel, and a free sampler channel, all in 24-hour 3D and compatible with the current generation of sets.

Like the original HD offerings in the mid-1990s, which focused on sports events and video from space missions, the new 3D channels will offer existing 3D movies, 3D upgrades of traditional 2D movies, and sports. Unlike with HDTV however, there is no indication the government will legislate widespread adoption of 3D TV. And there are issues.

3D will likely establish its foothold in the living room is not with sports or movies, but with video games.

The greatest usability issue is the need for viewers to wear glasses. While there are experimental technologies that work without glasses, today if you want to experience high-quality 3D television images you need to wear pricey shutter glasses. Unlike the polarized glasses patrons wear at theaters, shutter glasses respond to signals from the TV, directing alternating frames to alternating eyes. The glasses are expensive – only Panasonic is promising to provide a pair with your TV purchase, and additional pairs will run around $50. At least one manufacturer is already offering lighter, more fashionable, more expensive replacement glasses.

And wearing special glasses while watching TV at home is not conducive to the average person’s lifestyle. As Microsoft exec Aaron Greenberg told GameSpy at CES, “when I play games or watch TV, I’ve got my phone, I’ve got all kinds of things going on… I get up, I get down, I’m looking outside at the weather… I’m not in a dark theater, wearing glasses, staring at a screen.” You cannot walk around comfortably wearing modern shutter glasses, and just happen to be wearing them when you want to watch TV. Until 3D TVs don’t require glasses, consumers are going to have trouble integrating 3D television watching into their lives.

The new 3D TVs also suffer from varying levels of picture clarity and a pronounced flicker, although these issues are expected to disappear as the technology improves. More importantly, 3D media demand changes in how movies and television and produced. Right now, only computer animated films are expressly produced with the needs of 3D in mind, producing stunningly realistic depth-of-field and fine gradations of perceived depth. Film and video produced according to the traditional rules of 2D creates flat, paper-thin figures moving in a 3D environment that can appear shallow or truncated. Sports coverage, intended to be a killer app for 3D TV, particularly suffers from these issues, and 3D broadcasts of sporting events may require drastic changes to the technology used on the field.

Filmmakers are still learning how to deal with changing depth of focus. In the real world, the viewer chooses unconsciously where to focus their eyes; but in a 3D production this decision is made for the viewer. A plane of focus that appears to constantly shift can give audiences headaches and eye strain. A largely different language of cinema is being developed, to produce content in which 3D is a core component rather than a faddish trinket.

And finally, CNN Tech reports that between four and 10 percent of consumers suffer from something called “stereo blindness,” a sometimes treatable condition that makes it impossible to experience 3D movies or television. This is hardly a deal-killer, but one wonders how the spread of stereo music technology would have been affected if 10% of listeners had not been able to appreciate the difference.

Honestly, how 3D will likely establish its foothold in the living room is not with sports or movies, but with video games. Video gamers are already accustomed to buying expensive high-tech peripherals. They are used to content designed for one person, one screen. And when designed properly, 3D does not just add visual excitement to a game, but actually affects and enhances the gameplay itself.

So will 3D television lure viewers away from legitimate free Internet video, and from illegally pirated video files? It is too soon to tell. But there is a key difference to this strategy, as compared to some of the previously unsuccessful responses to piracy and the Internet. As with Steve Jobs and the iPod, 3D TV producers are offering consumers something new and exciting that, once the issues are worked out, will enhance their news and entertainment experiences. Rather than treating customers like the enemy, they are approaching customers as customers. And iTunes proves that people are more than willing to pay for their media, as long as they can experience a clear benefit.

More info: “Keeping Up With the Napsters” on Village Voice; “Why I can’t watch 3D TV” on CNN Tech; “DirectTV to launch the first 3D HDTV Channel” on Device; “Microsoft Exec Not Sold on 3D Home Gaming” on GameSpy; “3D TV? Too Soon Now, but One Day You Will Want It” on Singularity Hub; “I’m Sold On 3D TVs…And I Kind of Hate Myself For It” on Gizmodo.

Google wants to enhance its Google Earth global mapping product with three-dimensional representations of pretty much every building on Earth. But how can even the $32 billion web search daikaiju manage such a feat?

1. Outsource the work to Indonesian orphanages?
2. Use Google Nuclear Arsenal to flatten all existing buildings, allowing Google to create 3D models as the new buildings are constructed?
3. Turn the creation of Google Maps models into a puzzle game, and cloudsource it?

The correct answer is (c).

Google Building Maker is a browser-based web app (based in Google SketchUp; Google Earth installation required) that lets you build 3D representations of buildings around the globe, using image resources provided by Google. Your work will be eyeballed by a Google staffer, and if approved will become a permanent part of Google Earth.

The app works by showing you several photos of a building (one you choose or one chosen for you), taken from various angles. You manipulate and resize a 3D bounding box to show Google Building Maker what image elements will go where on the 3D model — a task that will undoubtedly be automated within the next few years, but which right now requires a wetware engine (that’s you). The app assembles the model, which can be composed of a number of rectangular or triangular shapes, each skinned with a portion of a photo.

I can’t currently play with Google Building Maker, because I can’t install Google Earth at work. But let me know how you enjoyed it in the comments.

Some people think Google Building Maker will help the “terrorists.” I would call such people “brain-impaired Philistines,” but that’s unfair to the brain-impaired. And Philistines.

Via Google’s Lat Long Blog (with video); via CG Society.

Yesterday evening, Culver City, California’s Zoic Studios hosted an exclusive salon event, featuring an open discussion of the history of, and trends in 3D entertainment;  plus an exhibition of stereoscopic (3D) art.

Leslie Ekker, Zoic’s commercial creative director, hosted the informal, free-of-charge event, which attracted about 60 entertainment industry professionals.

Electronic stereoscopy pioneer Lenny Lipton discussed the history of stereoscopy in film. Lipton is recognized as the father of the electronic stereoscopic display industry, having invented many of the current state-of-the-art 3D technologies.

Johnathan Banta, Digital Supervisor at Sassoon Film Design, discussed the conversion of 2D moving images to 3D. His most recent work includes the films The Brothers Bloom, Quarantine, Milk and Public Enemies.

Digital effects animator Franklin Londin spoke about new autostereoscopic displays, which do not require the polarized or anaglyph (red and blue) glasses formerly necessary for 3D. Londin brought to the event his brand new digital stereo camera from Fuji, soon-to-be-available om the US, accompanied by a stereo picture frame.

Londin also brought a collection of his amazing sculptures, integrating 3D photographs displayed through illuminated viewers.

A number of 3D books and stereoscopes were on hand, for attendees to attempt to ruin their vision trying out.

Ray Zone, film historian, author, artist and stereoscopy pioneer (the “3D King of Hollywood”), explained the functioning of a 1950s-era 3D slide projector. Franklin Londin used the projector to show stereo slides from his collection.

Zoic provided food and wine for the participants. Based on the success of this first attempt, the VFX and digital production firm intends to host future salons, although no specific plans have been announced.

Learn more: Zoic Studios; stereoscopy and anaglyph images on Wikipedia; a biography of Lenny Lipton (he invented Puff the Magic Dragon!); Johnathan R. Banta on IMDB; Franklin Londin’s 3D display art; Ray Zone’s web site (wear your red & blue glasses); UPDATE: read this story on Computer Graphics World.