3D World 3D Film Expo III @ Egyptian Theatre (1 Viewer)

[Mike Ballew]

Richard--W, I regret I did not see your earlier post, else I would have posted this much, much sooner for you.

I'm very glad you asked about it, though: I had neglected to transcribe my own hastily jotted notes until now.

I hope this helps you.


1. Melody Vectograph reel (It was agonizingly obvious that this reel will never make it through a projector again, owing to vinegar syndrome. We were surely the last audience who will ever watch it.)
2. Louisiana Territory footage (I have a note in my margin, "jumpy.")
3. Accidental 3-D -- Charlie Chaplin in The Circus
4. Crespinel footage
5. Alternate footage from Gentleman’s Friend (By "alternate," I mean it was different from the footage shown a week earlier at the European Rarities show.)
6. Audioscopiks
7. Real Thing -- Capstan Cigarettes 1952 (2-D print only)
8. In Tune with Tomorrow (2-D print only)
9. College Capers (In anaglyph format, which was somewhat disappointing because the late Dan Symmes had prepared left and right separations that could have been projected using polarized transmission, but his digital files for them are misplaced or lost.)
10. Kelly’s Plasticons
11. Lumiere test footage (mid-1930s)
12. Segments from New Audioscopiks and Third Dimensional Murder
13. A Day in the Country (Now dated at about 1941, not 1953. I have a note in my margin, “Stereo Laffs,” but I can’t remember what that refers to. It is possibly the name of a projected series of comedic shorts that were meant to be filmed in 3-D, but don’t hold me to that!)
14. Thrills for You (1940) -- Pennsylvania Railroad film
15. Ring of Fear 3-D footage
16. Son of Sinbad outtakes, projected without sound
17. I’ll Sell My Shirt (I have a note in my margin, “1/2." My recollection is that only half the short was shown, because that's the only portion for which a duplicate print could be made. Since that half involved a burlesque girl as opposed to an unfunny comic, I don't imagine anyone was too disappointed!)
18. 3-D Jamboree from Disneyland. (At one point, this appeared to fall out of sync by about one frame in one eye.)

 

[Mike Ballew]

Let me add one more thing, and in so doing invite you to laugh with me at myself.

A fleeting thought crossed my mind when they announced that next on the program was the Crespinel footage from the early ‘20s: “Oh, that again. This makes the third or fourth time I’ve seen it.”

Immediately I laughed at myself. “You ungrateful knucklehead! Twenty years ago you never dreamed you’d get to see that footage at all, ever! Now you have the audacity to be bored with it!”

Of course, I want to emphasize that, apart from that one momentary lapse, I have always been grateful for the preservation and presentation efforts of Bob Furmanek and Jeff Joseph and Jack Theakston and others whose names I am forgetting. It has been a privilege and a blessing being able to see all these 3-D films, and I am thankful.

 

[Bob Furmanek]

Thanks Mike but let me add this: the clips in the Rarities program are not any rarer than most of the other shorts in the program. It was just a way to run all that stuff in one group.

As an example, shorts like "Nat King Cole with Russ Morgan" and "Carnival in April" have been seen less than some of the Rarities.

 

[Who's On First?]

Are there any plans for a World 3D Film Expo IV event? I read this entire thread to see if this has been discussed yet, but apparently I am the first to ask!

Some friends and I drove about an hour to see Hondo 3-D on opening day of Expo III, and, man, it was a blast. I sure hope there will be more to come

*Edit*
I should also like to also make known my appreciation to those who have made the 2003, 2006, and 2013 Expos possible. Thank you very next

 

[Mike Ballew]

Did anyone happen to take notes during Stefan Droessler's excellent lecture on the history of European 3-D cinema?

I sure would like a printed recap of all the material he covered that day. For some reason, I did not think to make notes.

 

[Keith Cobby]

I have just received The Maze DVD (sadly not in 3-D) from amazon.es. This has removable sub-titles and replaces an old copy of questionable pedigree.

 

[Mike Ballew]

Today I ran across that old, familiar photo of Arch Oboler on the set of Bwana Devil, perched on a camera mount and peering through the viewfinder in back of the NaturalVision camera rig. I say "old, familiar," but truth be told, I myself only first saw this photo not more than ten years ago. One reason I know this is because I still remember a conversation at the first World 3-D Expo, twelve years ago this month, that left me completely, unexpectedly flummoxed.


Let me set the stage. As happened to so many of us at all three Expos, I saw and spoke to a lot of celebrities in the world of 3-D, people like Dan Symmes, Lenny Lipton, and Ray Zone. But I also met a lot of wonderful, ordinary people who shared the same wild, slightly odd passion for 3-D movies. Some of the folks at the first Expo in particular remembered seeing the films in first run as children or young adults.


This one older fellow I met from Texas, Paul, fell into that category, and had nursed a profound passion for all things 3-D ever since. He and I struck up a conversation one day, and thereafter formed a kind of festival friendship. His own lifelong buddy, a fellow named Andy, couldn't be there for the start of the festival, but joined us a few days in. The three of us tended to sit together and shared a lot of laughs and good conversation. They were fun, friendly guys, Paul and Andy.


But one day, I casually mentioned to Paul that, even though I had never at that time seen a photo or schematic of the back of the NaturalVision rig, I was pretty sure it must have had some kind of viewfinder and a set of camera controls in back, because in plenty of stills I'd seen taken from the front, you could make out a pair of legs dangling behind it. In other words, there was an operator in back, and it made no sense for there to be an operator in back unless he could see what was going on up front.


Paul laughed in my face, and not a particularly friendly laugh. "Those weren't reflex cameras, Mike!"


I had made no such claim, and told him so.


Imagine my cringing horror when Paul boldly reached out to detain a passing Dan Symmes. "Dan, Dan, tell this guy, the cameras in NaturalVision were not reflex cameras."


I didn't really know Dan Symmes at that point, but I leapt right in. "I never said that. I never said a thing about reflex cameras. What I said is that I thought NaturalVision had some kind of viewfinder arrangement in back."


Dan Symmes, God rest him, looked at Paul and then looked at me and then looked back at Paul and just said, "No," then turned around and walked away.


Paul enrobed himself in an unearned triumphalism. "See? I told you the cameras weren't reflex."


"Which I did not say, and never even thought," I answered.


Thank heaven, Paul eventually turned loose of the subject.


When I finally saw the photo of Oboler—and later, at the third Expo, when I got my own stereo photos of the back of the rig—I was left to wonder why Dan Symmes didn't affirm the existence of the viewfinder. I mean no disrespect when I say Symmes gave the definite impression that he did not suffer fools gladly, and to this day, I still wonder if he made up his mind to be shed of me and Paul and our brief, furious verbal tempest as quickly as possible, facts be damned.