Star Wars Films In 3D Due In 2012 409
bowman9991 writes "Star Wars creator George Lucas is converting all six films from his iconic science fiction saga into 3D and will re-release them in theatres in 2012. 'Episode I: The Phantom Menace' will be released first."
Re:Oh no. Not again. (Score:3, Interesting)
The first two are still very good when viewed as vintage films (which they are). But splicing in CGI here and there (and, I predict, adding 3d) makes them uneven and a pushes them into areas where they can't compete against contemporary films.
Re:2d to 3d??? (Score:1, Interesting)
I guess they'll ask artists to come up a depth map and fill in the occluded parts. There are only ~200,000 frames in a movie. With just $20M, you can get an artist to spend 1h on each frame at $100/h.
Re:Ya (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:All you haters ... (Score:3, Interesting)
Why stop with 7-14 years? With no copyright he must create something new directly after the old one leaves the theater, plus the DVDs of the old ones would not be so horrible expensive.
Before someone comes with the stupid argument for copyright, all movies makes their money in the theaters and you can't just copy the theaters.
2D + depth map = 3D! (Score:5, Interesting)
The conversion process is basically the computational equivalent of vacuum forming the 2D image over a depth map. Depending on the fidelity of the models that generate the depth map, the effect will vary between passable and looking like cardboard cutouts in a diorama.
From a technical point of view it will be interesting to see how Lucasfilm deal with the conversion. I think the conversion will be abysmal in the first 3 movies with lots of crappy dust & particle effects tossed in and some reshot CG. Potentially the 3D could be more passable on the prequels depending on how far they go. Most of the prequel scenes are pure CG or composite live action and CG so in theory all these scenes could be rerendered. I think in practice though that probably only a fraction will get the full treatment and the remainder will under go a 2D + depth map process.
Re:Ya (Score:3, Interesting)
Yeah. I can't see it being that spectacular past the opening credits (which will be cool).
Re:All you haters ... (Score:2, Interesting)
Because if they wouldn't pay, they wouldn't get the movie? The business model in that case would probably be, wait until X cinemas agreed to pay (contractually, so even without copyright they'd be forced to actually pay afterwards), and only then send the movie. The cinemas which pay would have the advantage to be the first to show it. The other cinemas would have to wait until someone makes a quality copy, if they don't want to pay the official distributor (a cinema probably won't have much success with showing a low-quality copy from the internet). And since those who at first have access to it would have paid for it, there's a good chance that they'd want money themselves for a copy, although less than they paid for their copy. So the price would probably not go to zero immediately, but follow a "decay curve" until it hits zero after a few weeks.
Squeezing more money from it? (Score:4, Interesting)
Well, in hindsight, squeezing additional money after a film's release is kind of the whole George Lucas "hallmark". It's really his "trump card" he played back when Star Wars was first released, which made him the man who beat Hollywood at their own game.
(He was the first to realize there was a potential fortune in marketing toys based on the movie characters, so got himself rights to any/all of those profits as part of his movie contract. Hollywood, at the time, didn't think that was important so they ignored that clause while trying to screw him in the usual ways,)
I've never really agreed with his premise that movies are always "unfinished projects" you can go back and revise at will, though. IMO, you're supposed to give your best effort and consider it a one-shot opportunity. When the final product comes out in the theater, it's "finished", for better or for worse. Yes, someone else can do a "remake" later, if they so desire. But remakes are other people's interpretations of the story ... not the ORIGINAL producer deciding to revise it.
When it comes to the Star Wars saga though? Enough time has passed so you've got whole new generations of kids wanting to buy/watch it, and inevitably, some of them will buy whatever the latest edition is on store shelves, vs. going to extra effort to obtain the "original" versions. So yeah, some profits will always be there -- but it's just an annoyance to people like me.
Re:Question is will they remain willing? (Score:3, Interesting)
It is something new, so people are intrigued
Only if you're young. 3D is a fad that has come and gone many times before; the 1951 film "Hondo" is an example of a 3D movie older than me. It used the primitive colored lens tech. I have a VCR tape that's probably 20 years old I recorded off the air of a Rolling Stones concert with 3D footage that uses that old tech. The beauty of the colored glasses is it will work with any device that can display a 2D picture, even paper. There are 3D pics of Mars and various asteroids at Nasa's web site.
The shuttered glasses are an incredibly unimpressive hack IMO; the polarized lenses used in late '70s and early '80s 3D was much better. 3D without headaches and without expensive electronics, yet without messing up color.
The photography and direction is what matters. I was watching a movie on my 2D TV someone loaned me the other night, I don't even remember what the name of the movie was or anything else about it except one scene where something flies at a vehicle's windshield at a high rate of speed and breaks it; it startled me so much I jumped in my seat. 3D wouldn't have made me jump any more.
Re: 3d??? (Score:3, Interesting)
The illusion breaks down at the edge of the screen, especially when an image that is supposed to be in front of the plane of the screen intersects with the edge.
The illusion breaks down when you get that choppiness from panning or from an object moving quickly from side to side.
The illusion breaks down every time there is a bright consistent background (like sky) and the screen itself becomes visible as an unmoving texture right in the middle of the depth of field.
The illusion breaks down whenever something is too close and your eyes have to strain because the focal distance is still the distance of the screen but your eyes are crossed looking at something that appears to be in the next row forward.
I hate 3d movies. I think they absolutely ruin the movie going experience so I am completely unsurprised that Lucas is going to do this to the Star Wars films.
Lets do the Mona Lisa in 3d, and howabout Starry Night.
Re:Oh no. Not again. (Score:3, Interesting)
The only thing missing is his reviews of Episodes 4, 5 and 6
From a film perspective, they were fairly well presented. I think you are assuming that his critique is a nerdrage, which it is not.
He does evaluate 4,5,6 in one point as to showcase one of the failures of episode 1. Primarily he goes into the details of the danger of splitting the plot/story into multiple lines and trying to keep it coherent for an audience viewing it for the first time.
In short, he shows that 4's ending worked VERY well because you had all plots converge into one single ending (Yavin), then 5 had 2 plots going on, and 6 had 3 (Luke line, endor surface, space battle)
It showed a progression from a clear concise story in which everything split for a reason, and came back together for a reason, as opposed to Episode 1's approach of 'Everyone split up and go do your thing!"
He presents it in a much better way than I can.