3D Meet Bob Furmanek: HTF Golden Age 3-D Consultant (3 Viewers)

[Ejanss]

I hope Bob will forgive us for discussing the 1980s revival in his classic 3-D thread.

As long as we're talking celluloid and/or dual-strip releases that require elaborate reconstruction to be mastered onto digital, ANYTHING non-digital before 2005 should be considered "Classic". Well, labeled Classic for sorting purposes anyway, if not necessarily considered Classic. (And as for Metalstorm, I'm not 100% excited about almost an entire hour of POV desert roads, but I'll defend the right to release it.)

Somehow, I just don't see either Columbia or Universal moving on this. The staff in the home video divisions release the films they are interested in. They have never shown one iota of interest in their old 3-D holdings.

The 2-D version of Spacehunter still shows up on Crackle.com for whatever cult audience it can get as an 80's title (next to Ghostbusters and The Last Dragon), so they're not about to dump it to an Archive any time soon...But if Sony's dragging their feet this long on Vincent Price or the Stooges, we know 80's 3D doesn't have a chance outside the cult true-believer labels.

 

[Richard--W]

Well then, maybe the cult labels like Anchor Bay, Synapse, Severin, Mondo Macabro, Blue Underground etc etc should start negotiating with the studios to release 3-D films from the classic era and from the 1980s revival. Anything to get the 3-D films out in the marketplace. But it could be the 3-D films are not "cult" enough for the cult labels. Come to think of it, I wouldn't mind seeing Richard W. Haines' RUN FOR COVER (1995) on 3-D blu-ray. He sent me a field-sequential disc of it several years ago. The depth is quite good. I think Pathinder DVD Entertainment controls that one.

 

[Ejanss]

Well then, maybe the cult labels like Anchor Bay, Synapse, Severin, Mondo Macabro, Blue Underground etc etc should start negotiating with the studios to release 3-D films from the classic era and from the 1980s revival. Anything to get the 3-D films out in the marketplace. But it could be the 3-D films are not "cult" enough for the cult labels..

The micro-labels like Synapse or BU couldn't do it, but high-end "maverick" labels like Criterion and Shout Factory have already dipped their toes in the water for current "art" 3D digital films--It's just a question of who's got the professionally remastered digital-3D print of the vintage stuff, since even they couldn't likely support the cost of doing it themselves. (Hence the bets that TMM is Twilight's "mystery" title, since the digital-3D master was already available from Sony.) Which brings us back to Bob's complaint of "But I've already DONE the work!"; now we just need to find some bridge between the studios and the maverick labels for one to do the hard mastering work, and one to do the hard selling work.

 

[RolandL]

Well then, maybe the cult labels like Anchor Bay, Synapse, Severin, Mondo Macabro, Blue Underground etc etc should start negotiating with the studios to release 3-D films from the classic era and from the 1980s revival. Anything to get the 3-D films out in the marketplace. But it could be the 3-D films are not "cult" enough for the cult labels. Come to think of it, I wouldn't mind seeing Richard W. Haines' RUN FOR COVER (1995) on 3-D blu-ray. He sent me a field-sequential disc of it several years ago. The depth is quite good. I think Pathinder DVD Entertainment controls that one.

Sensio released the Universal titles Jaws 3D and Taza, Son of Cochise in their 3D format DVD's a few years ago. The DVD's were not HD but I wonder how much work would be required to release these titles on Blu-ray 3D.

 

[Richard--W]

Oh, I forgot about Senzio, momentarily. I spent a pleasant morning with them in their exhibit room at the World 3-D Expo. I wonder how their business is holding up now that 3-D monitors are everywhere. It ought to be a simple matter for Universal to run a hi-def scan of Taza and Jaws 3 3-D but again I don't think 3-D is on their collective mind.

 

[RolandL]

Oh, I forgot about Senzio, momentarily. I spent a pleasant morning with them in their exhibit room at the World 3-D Expo. I wonder how their business is holding up now that 3-D monitors are everywhere. It ought to be a simple matter for Universal to run a hi-def scan of Taza and Jaws 3 3-D but again I don't think 3-D is on their collective mind.

Their web site talks about profits but they show a Net Loss of around a million each quarter.

 

[Richard--W]

Well, my heart goes out to them because I don't think they'll stay afloat much longer. They are sincere and dedicated and put out a good quality product before the industry started taking 3-D seriously.

 

[Bob Furmanek]

The Sensio release of TAZA contained many shots with mis-alignment that should have been fixed before release.

 

[Richard--W]

I wouldn't know, I never saw it. But I'm sure you're absolutely right, Bob. This has become par for the course. The studios obviously need a stereoscopic consultant to supervise transfers of their vintage 3-D films, but for some reason, they keep freezing out the experts, such as yourself Bob and we get problematic transfers. I include Dial M For Murder which could have been much, much better.

 

[pinknik]

Home Theater magazine gives a black eye to the 3-D on DIAL M FOR MURDER, describing "appallingly bad halo and ghosting effects around the actors and background objects, which is distracting to the point of aggravation." Which sounds to me like a monitor/projector issue. I didn't notice anything like that on my passive LG.

 

[Bob Furmanek]

We discuss the "halo" issue in our article. It's a Warnercolor issue and has been there since day one. The "ghosting" is their monitor. The 3-D, on a properly calibrated 3-D display, is flawless. http://www.3dfilmarchive.com/dial-m-blu-ray-review

 

[TravisR]

The "ghosting" is their monitor.

If that's the case (and I'm not doubting that it is), why isn't the problem always evident to them on every title?

 

[Bob Furmanek]

I suspect it has something to do with the fact that most contemporary 3-D movies have little depth resulting in minimal image separation. When you get into the vintage material, shot with dual-camera systems that are very deep and truly stereoscopic, ghosting on these displays is going to be more obvious.

 

[pinknik]

I suspect it has something to do with the fact that most contemporary 3-D movies have little depth resulting in minimal image separation. When you get into the vintage material, shot with dual-camera systems that are very deep and truly stereoscopic, ghosting on these displays is going to be more obvious.

I thought maybe it was just me. Are they shooting movies these days with less than 2 1/2 inch interoculars? I remember reading that Natural Vision was about 3.5". Technically too much, but they sure did "pop". P.S. Thanks for the link to the Dial M For Murder review.

 

[Bob Furmanek]

I'm not sure, but I've asked Greg Kintz, our Technical Director and 3-D camera expert, to chime in. Thank you, I'm glad that you enjoyed the article. It felt good to finally get the facts out there! Unfortunately, bad reviews like the one you mentioned, from reviewers with minimal knowledge of 3-D, are going to discourage potential buyers and further jeopardize the possibility of any additional Golden Age 3-D releases.

 

[EddieLarkin]

I must admit viewing DIAL M on my active plasma showed horrendous ghosting, much more so than all of my other 3D titles including Creature from the Black Lagoon. What is the best way to view 3D in home, if one wants to limit or completely banish ghosting? DLP, LCD, LED, Plasma? Active, passive?

 

[Steve Tannehill]

I must admit viewing DIAL M on my active plasma showed horrendous ghosting, much more so than all of my other 3D titles including Creature from the Black Lagoon. What is the best way to view 3D in home, if one wants to limit or completely banish ghosting? DLP, LCD, LED, Plasma? Active, passive?

DLP.

 

[pinknik]

DLP.

Agreed. In my personal experience, my rear projection DLP (Samsung) had zero ghosting. Next best, in my experience, is my new passive LCD. The height of the screen relative to your eyes' height can affect the degree of ghosting on the passive screen. Higher than your head and the ghosting increases.

 

[SAM33]

All I can contribute here is my personal experience, plus a little internet forum anecdote. I've always projected, not used a flat screen. As a big 3D enthusiast, I anxiously awaited the first full 1080p projectors, and bought the first one that came out and I could afford, the JVC RS40. Moving up form a Sanyo, the JVC projectors are just wonderful 2D units, with enough brightness to fill a big screen even at a long throw, and have amazing blacks and a super smooth refined picture with their so called D-ILA version of the LCOS technology. BUT... They didn't quite get the 3D right - the panels don't seem to be fast enough to really defeat ghosting. So I was never totally happy with this unit for 3D, and the brightness really isn't enough for 3D what with the light loss through the glasses. And as the bulb ages, ghosting became more of an issue. Indeed DIAL M had it pretty bad. In the subsequent 2 years, they've made great strides however. So as Bob says, passive seems to be a great choice, plus cheap glasses, but if you want to project the only passive projector I'm aware of is an LG and it's very expensive. Plus I think you have to have a silver screen to really make it work. The very best ghost free projection comes from DLP units, and now you finally have full 1080p ones to choose from. The BenQ 7000 gets very high marks, supposedly totally ghost free and bright. BUT,,, I see rainbows very badly with DLP unless it's very high end with fast wheels, so this was not for me. Therefore as I said in my post that "re-started" this thread, I recently got a new Epson 5020 LCD. This thing's great! VERY bright, great RF lightweight rechargeable glasses that don't lose sync, and honestly 98% ghost free. It has faster panels than the JVC and except for really high contrast hard edge things like black titles on white, you won't see ghosts (at least I don't), and even then they're really slight. DIAL M on this? Looks great! Anybody who's dissing it on line hasn't seen it right. I really have a theatre quality 3D set up now that can shoot a full scope image 12 feet wide, and trust me, that's how 3D has to be, B-I-G! So for reasonably affordable projection, I'd say a BenQ 7000 DLP or an Epson 5020 LCD.

 

[moviebear1]

"I've got the two golden titles available now (plus TMM and PMB on my PS3)" OK I know what TMM is. . . The Mad Magician. . . what is PMB?