DVD Review HTF DVD REVIEW: Friday the 13th Part 3 in 3-D (1 Viewer)

[RolandL]

Listen to this podcast on 3D TV:

MarketSaw - 3D Movies and Technology: CES 2009: "How Will We See 3D TV?" Panel Podcast

 

[Michael Elliott]

I just read that the UK got Blu-ray released of both 2 and 3. DreadCentral is also reporting that parts 4-6 are going to get special editions when the remake hits DVD.

I just got done watching this in 3-D and must first say my eyes are killing me. They actually started hurting before the stuff from part 2 finished. The 3-D certainly brings down the picture quality but I was willing to put up with this.

For the most part I thought the effects looked very good. Some of them didn't work too well like the rat and snake stuff from the grocery store. I also thought the biker's arm through the glass was rather weak. What worked best was when people were holding things at the camera like the pole at the grocery store. The arrow to the eye looked wonderful but the infamous eye coming out scene was rather weak in 3-D. Different people are reporting different things but the 3-D worked pretty well on my television.

As for the film....yawn. I think I'm done with this one since I finally got to watch it in 3-D.

 

[Joe Karlosi]

I watched it last night too and agree that the 3D worked pretty well, especially all the objects which come right out into your face, like poles and TV antennas, and so on.

As for Michael's "yawn", I like the stuff at the end of F3, but it takes a long time to get much Jason action. But then again, you can say the same about many of these. In fact, I watched the original F13 last night as well and was kind of bored too. I've seen these films many times, in the theater as well as on home video, and I'm wondering if they've had their time for me. That's not saying I'll never watch them again, but they are kind of tired for me.

 

[Brian Kidd]

Up until *very* recently, I would have agreed that anaglyphic 3D never works, but the JOURNEY 3D disc was excellent. Yes, you still didn't have a properly-colored image; however, the 3D separation worked exceedingly well. It is, hands down, the best I've ever seen anaglyph work. I suspect that it's because they didn't use the traditional red/blue glasses but instead opted for green/magenta. Also the image on the disc seemed to be matched up perfectly with the hues of the lenses. That goes a long way. I even showed the 3D version at our library on a *very* big screen with extra glasses I ordered over the 'net. It worked, even on that large of a screen with a *completely* uncalibrated projector. So it is possible to make a pleasing anaglyphic transfer. I just don't think the studios have cared enough to do it.

Yes, field-sequential is the best method for home viewing, but let's be realistic: the televisions that allow you to use field-sequential (I'm talking HD sets) are prohibitively expensive. For the foreseeable future, anaglyphic is the only option available to reach a broad audience. It's up to the studios to give a damn about the transfer, though, which hasn't been the case in 99% of 3D releases. I bought the POLAR EXPRESS 3D release and it was an unwatchable mess. My son was so disappointed, as was I.

I was really looking forward to finally having a legit 3D release of Part III. It's too bad Paramount screwed the pooch on it.

 

[Bob Furmanek]

I just saw the new disc of THE STEWARDESSES, and the anaglyph conversion is excellent. On top of that, there are some extra goodies (original 3-D trailer for THE MAZE) which show that - done properly - anaglyph can work well on DVD.

 

[RolandL]

Yes, I have the Blu-ray of Journey too, and for anaglyph, it is the best I have seen so far. But, field-sequential is so much better. I have seen field-sequential on one those 3-D 120HZ sets and it looks fantastic. Yes, the prices are high but they are coming down. Best Buy has the 73 inch Mitsubishi at $1,900, the 60 inch a $1,250.

 

[spookcentral]

Thanks for the review. I was going to buy it while at Blockbuster yesterday, but I'm glad that I opted not to.

 

[spookcentral]

[Sorry for the double post.]

 

[Joe Karlosi]

I'm certainly glad I didn't pass on it. Honestly, I can't imagine why any fan would skip it when the 3-D works and it's something we've not had before on R1.

 

[Laserdisc Archive]

Nice to see these 3D films coming out even if only issued in Anaglyph system. I missed the 3D of this film at the flicks so will be looking forward to watching it.
My Bloody Valentine in 3D was very good at the flicks, and my parents still talk about watching The House of Wax in 3D at a London when it came out. Now aged 90 and they still remember watching the audience jump!

Like 3D here very much and watch these types of films quite a bit for a fun evening in. Also have a few 3D cine films which add to the evening.

A clip of the 3D Fri 13th is here.

 

[TravisR]

Me and a buddy watched this tonight and we both need an aspirin.

It's not perfect but some of the 3-D came off pretty good but I could definitely see the 'double images' that were mentioned above. I thought the best looking 3-D stuff wasn't the show-y stuff (like the eyeball or the spear) but just normal shots when there's something in the foreground and mid-ground and a deep background.

Like the other two movies, the 5.1 remix sounds relatively good.

 

[spookcentral]

Well, the reason that I'm glad that I passed on buying it is because the reviewer said that the 3-D wasn't done as well as it should have been. At least that was the impression that I got from reading it.

I had read in many places that the 3-D in the new Polar Express DVD wasn't done very well either, which is why I skipped on that as well.

If it's done right, I like the 3-D gimmick, and wish more films originally done in 3-D would be released that way on DVD - as long as there's the 2-D copy as well, for when I want to see it with more accurate color tones.

 

[Matt Hough]

Well, the 3-D worked like gangbusters in the theater. It's just poorly implemented on the DVD as anaglyph 3-D often is. On DVD, you can see what they were going for, but it often just doesn't quite zero in for its full effect.

 

[Joe Karlosi]

I had a friend at the house last night, and he's not a F13 fan .. but he read all the 'negative' stuff about the quality of this 3-D from the internet. I had him sit down and he wore the 3-D glasses ... I showed him some of the movie, and he came away impressed, saying "yes, it's fine -- it's not perfect, but it works!". He was able to see depth perception and layers, and the objects pointing out from the screen. He noticed the "ghosting" outine of some people, but this isn't perfect.

And that's the deal. For the moment this is all we have (maybe all we'll ever have?) So if someone's a fan of the series, it makes no sense not to get this -- especially considering it's only $14.99, or less. The movie was meant to be seen in 3-D, even if it's not the best; not to be watched in 2-D.

Of course, I still recommend a bigger wide screen, not a 27" TV, or something.

 

[Bob Cashill]

The 3D worked fine on my 27" screen. Not a patch on how it looked originally---it may have been the best of the 1982-1983 crop of 3D pictures, at least of the ones I saw--but it's an OK memento at a good price.

 

[Laserdisc Archive]

Sounds about right to me. I remember years ago going mad with my mates and watching all the VHS Elm St videos we had. One hell of a day and so much beer.

 

[GregK]

After reading the comments here, I finally rented the new 3-D DVD anaglyph (red/cyan) version of Friday III to give it a closer examination. Here's my take on the 3-D aspects: The good, the bad, and the ugly- (And grab your anaglyph 3-D glasses for comparisons! Red lens over the left eye)

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The Good:

What's nice is the original theatrical "2-D notice card" that ran before the Friday Part II 2-D flashback is in the anaglyph version, and is the first time it's ever made it video. The Japanese 3-D VHD released in the late 1980's just stayed in black where the text should have been. This 2-D notice let the audience know the intro "flashback" from Friday Part II was not in true 3-D, but they should keep their 3-D glasses on.

The anaglyph color encoding used on the Paramount 3-D DVD is actually somewhat decent most of the time when viewed under optimal playback conditions. ..When the alignment is correct, the 3-D (for video anaglyph, that is) isn't too bad. But more on the 3-D alignment below.

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The Bad:

It's like someone loaded up the left & right sides and made NO attempt to correct or monitor alignment errors. (More on that in the "ugly" section) Sometimes the misalignment is outright horrible, as can be seem in the jpeg examples below. This is NOT something that should be seen from a major studio such as Paramount. Forgetting what color anaglyph 3-D video can do already, extended viewing of misaligned 3-D video of this degree is sure to cause eye-strain. At a conservative estimate, I would say 25 to 40% of the anaglyph DVD has vertical alignment issues of differing severity.

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The Ugly:

It would be one thing if Paramount simply had "locked and loaded" the original 3-D elements for Friday III and "let her rip", so to speak. But that's not the case. Unlike the VHD 3-D video release made some twenty years ago ..which were known to typically be direct port overs of the original prints, this new anaglyph version of Friday the 13th Part III has far WORSE vertical 3-D misalignment than what was transferred over to VHD in the late 80's. Sometimes misalignment is shifted drastically, other times the convergence is shifted for no logical reasons, etc. ...Sickening.

And the other inexcusable blunder of this release was the studio's decision to present the opening stereoscopic credits (which IMHO are some of the best opening 3-D credits of the 80's wave) in 2-D! Does someone at the studio not know how to encode bright reds in anaglyph 3-D?

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To put up, or shut up:

I make NO claim to fame on being "King 3-D", or anything even close to that effect. Others can argue over the title. With that out of the way, outside of my professional 'daytime job' as a video technician, I have worked on enough 3-D material over the years to easily say some 3-D common sense can go a long, long way.

To that effect, I've allowed myself one evening to select some scenes from the anaglyph DVD and then to make my own anaglyph versions. I also provided a 3-D image from the opening credits, which was not presented in 3-D on the Paramount 3-D DVD. The parallax on these stereoscopic credits is very wide, and pushes the limits of anaglyph encoding. But it IS possible to do. You be the judge:
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In summary:

Paramount could have done a far better job with this. Outside of my given elements at hand, if I had the transfer elements that Paramount used to perform alignments, I could easily do a better job than what was provided on the DVD, and even better than what I have provided here. And there are others out there that could do the same thing I did, if given the chance. Let us hope that Paramount strongly considers these options in the future.


Happy Friday the 13th everyone!



-Greg-

 

[Jack Theakston]

Great comparisons, Greg. I'm shocked at how misaligned the master was!

 

[Jesse Skeen]

Nope- over 20 years ago in Japan it was put out in field-sequential 3-D on the defunct VHD videodisc format. I have a DVD copy of it and it looks far better than anything using the red/blue glasses. I wish they'd just stop with these bass-ackwards 3-D releases, since they're going to convince most people that 3-D looks like crap so when the advanced systems finally come out they won't bother with them.

 

[RolandL]

They release movies on DVD in the crappy anaglyph format because the 3-D works (badly) with all TV's. The 3-D field sequential method is better but only works with the old tube TV's and the new 120HZ TV's. But field sequential halves the resolution so your eyes are only seeing say 240p on a 480p signal. With the new 3-D systems that will probably be coming out in 2010, for Blu-ray you will have the full 1080p for each eye.