How James Cameron Pumped Volume Into Titanic 289
MrSeb writes with ExtremeTech's account of how director (and deep sea explorer) James Cameron spent a reported $18 million converting his blockbuster movie, Titantic, to 3D. The article "looks at the primary way of managing depth in 3D films (parallax), how you add depth to a movie that was originally filmed in 2D, and some of the software (both computer and human-brain) difficulties that Cameron had to overcome in the more-than-two-year process to convert Titanic into 3D."
Wonderful, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Most importantly, are Kate Winslet's tits in 3d? (Score:4, Insightful)
Nothing else matters if they can't get naked Kate to look right.
Re:Wonderful, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Everyone's wife, mother, sister, girlfriend, etc.
All that work... (Score:2, Insightful)
And yet nothing of value was added.
Re:Wonderful, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:How much to make a good Titanic ride at Univers (Score:2, Insightful)
I'd like to see a Titanic themed ride at Universal or whatever. Throw in some 1910s decorations. Some classical music. And then have it like a roller coaster or tower of terror but in sub zero degrees at one of the drops to simulate the ship plunging into the ocean.
Yes, yes. Let's take an incident that killed 1,500 people in the frozen waters of the North Atlantic and make it a ride. It's bad enough that Cameron turned the tragedy into some bogus "love story" - that scene in the water with Winslet and DiCaprio makes me want to puke - then the woman ditches the necklace into the open water with an "oops". Call me jaded, but I think the movie is a bigger tragedy than the actual event.
Re:Wonderful, but... (Score:2, Insightful)
Some shitty geeks can never get over something that's ultimately not that big of a deal. How could Titanic be a straight up action movie, you moron? Aliens and Icebergs?
Re:Wonderful, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Nope, but even then this won't show you.
This is that crappy cut-out-silhouettes pseudo-3d. Think paper dolls at various depths, but each individual doll is flat.
Re:Wonderful, but... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd guess the 3d bit is a convenient excuse for some people to see it again.
What I want to know is, how much are they going to make on an $18m investment? I'm sure it costs more than that when you figure in promotion and such, but still, it cost $200 million the first time around and grossed $1.8 billion.
I'm going to guess they make a killing on this.
Re:Avatar (Score:4, Insightful)
While I don't necessarily disagree with you, people said the same thing about color. Color film (vs B&W) is a more "real-life" experience. Evidence suggests that "real-life" experience has a lot to do with movies - from color, to picture quality, to positional audio. 3D is a (if not the) next logical step.
To be honest, I thought Avatar was a masterfully executed film, if a bit cliched. It's certainly cohesive and "all-encompassing" in a way that few movies are. It's a shame the plot was so pedestrian. The 3D made the movie impressive, but since it seemed like a tech demo more than a proper flick, it came at the expense of me wanting to watch it again in 2D. By comparison, black&white never stopped me watching Casablanca, or Citizen Kane.
But there's all sorts of movies that are a lot of fun, if "safe". I can't exactly call them bad, in the same way that I can't call any of those Sundance films bad despite the fact that they're so boring. It's just a different kind of movie.
Everyone wonders why? Here's why (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Wonderful, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Titanic works for both men and women. For women, it's pretty obviously a love story about the poor little rich girl who falls in love with a man beneath her social stature and the trials and tribulations that they go through to be together.
For men, it has explosions, breasts, and a snobs versus the slobs storyline--think "Caddyshack on the High Seas."
See? It has everything!
Re:Wonderful, but... (Score:4, Insightful)
nope.. when I saw the title 'titanic' I assumed it was an action/disaster flick.. instead it was a shitty love story.. even terminator 1 and 2 do not make up for this trash.
Um... Terminator 1 was also a love story, or didn't you notice?
Re:Wonderful, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Just got done watching a Research Channel vid on youtube with Neil deGrasse Tyson. In it he told a story about Titanic where he talked about Cameron using a sub to check out the details of the Titanic to keep it authentic. However, with the scene near the end why the kid chooses to drown, he noticed that the night sky was not only wrong but the left side was a mirror of the right side. Thus, Tyson wrote Cameron a letter about it. Later, he met up with Cameron and decided to bring up the point, and Cameron mentioned how many billions it made and asked how much more the right sky would make him. Yet, that is not the end of the story. Years later Tyson gets a call - its some Hollywood type who says he's working with Cameron on updating Titanic and that Tyson would have a night sky for him. His next words had so much heartfelt emotion in them "YES!".
So, I guess anyone who wants to see Tyson's accurate night sky will go and see it...
Re:Wonderful, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
...who really wanted to see Titanic in 3D?
I never understood the public's continued fascination with the Titanic.
As for the 3D movies, please quit going to see them, so they'll let the format die.
Re:Wonderful, but... (Score:3, Insightful)
For men, it has explosions, breasts, and a snobs versus the slobs storyline--think "Caddyshack on the High Seas."
See? It has everything!
And people falling from great heights and hitting stuff on the way down. Don't forget that.