CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

[Mark_A_W]

[Mark_A_W]

Oh, and I quite liked the movie too.

It's well worth seeing, not just for the 3D. It's not Aliens, but it's not bad. Put it this way, I'll be buying the bluray on release day even if it is 2D only (which my display will be for certain).

[incova]

I agree with Mark on most points for me the thing that clinched it was the immersion, I dont think the 3d was a gimmick at all it was a totally different experience a level up from 1080p. We always talk about the black level and the contrast and the way we get a 3d effect with our crts. Well the 3d effect in the movie was amazing, as Mark stated sit in the middle and a fair distance from the screen. See the movie and make your own judgements for me this was a sesmic shift in Cinema its just on another level. The one thing bothering me was the edges of the screen which seemed darker but all in all a incredible achievement. Will it be suitable for all types of movies, probably not, would it be my format of choice, yes.

[VideoGrabber]

Mark,

thanks for the additional thoughts, and for the seating tips. That helps put things in perspective a bit.

[Spanky Ham]

Interesting take, Mark.

I tried to go see it at the Imax in So ATL. I couldn't find the theater in time and decided to skip it. I will try to see it next week. I called my best friend on the way home to voice my displeasure on looking for the theater and probably to vent about Avatar. His response was classic as he hasn't seen it. He said he will probably think it was a good and exciting movie as he walks out. A couple of weeks later, he will think it was ok and the experience was good. After a couple of months, he will think the plot was crap and the movie was average. From all the hype, this is what I fear. The last great movie I have seen is No Country For Old Men. For my friend it was Up. I know the 3D is supposed to be ground breaking, but only the Panny demo at Cedia gave me any sort of a decent experience. I should stop and respond when I see it. I just hope for everybodies sake that it is as good as all of the reviews.

[Spanky Ham]

It looks like HTPC users will have another 3D option. From Toms:

[ecrabb]

Spanky, even people who have an HTPC's still have the problem of how to display two stereo images at high resolution. How many CRT projectors will handle 1080p @ 96hz so you can display each eye at at least 48hz? I guess we could drop back to 720p at 96hz, maybe.

A passive stereo stack would probably be the most effective, since you could run say, 1080p/48 on each projector... But, unless you already have a stack, you'd have to REALLY want to do 3D to go to the trouble of stacking. You'd need a non-de-polarizing screen, too.

Actually, the guys with cheap low-end DLP's may be at a slight advantage, here... They could just pick up another just like their existing machine, throw it on another shelf directly above or below their existing machines, throw a polarizer on each machine, put on some cheap passive glasses, and go to town if they already have an HTPC with a dual-head card.

Hell, at the price some of the old 720p digitals are blowing out these days, *I* could pick up two of them just for 3D.

It'll be fun to see how all this shakes out when the content, players, and software/hardware start showing up.

SC

[Mark_A_W]

We are already playing with stuff here - using active shutter glasses rather than polarised glasses. Dokworm is rendering 3D files for testing.

Then you don't need polarisers or a silver screen.

I'm hoping 1080i 96hz doesn't ruin it on one projector, but it may be the green tube lag that ruins it.

We are also thinking about a stack. You render the image double width, each eye side by side, alternating image and a black field. Then span the image over two monitors and use the shutter glass to block each eye in turn.

Two of us here have a pair of projectors, I'm just not sure I want the hassle and power usage of a stack. It really could be digital time..

[Bert Randolph]

[VideoGrabber]

ecrabb commented:
> It'll be fun to see how all this shakes out when the content, players, and software/hardware start showing up <

One potentially promising thing to me is that with the limited amount of 3D available, a recent report from Alfred Poor at CES indicates that the 2D-to-3D real-time conversion processors in the new Toshiba and Samsung sets does a very good job of producing a compelling 3D image.

Some of his observations:

- "my skepticism was erased by what I saw",
- "it made a noticeable difference on the 2D source content",
- "resulted in a very attractive and watchable image",
- "...looked really good",
- "I would prefer to watch the content in the “simulated” 3D than in the original 2D",
- "it looked more natural".

We just need that electronics in a Black box that has HDMI inputs and outputs, and does the +1D conversion to a desired 3D format. Then all your current 2D HD content becomes available for an enhanced viewing experience.

[incova]

That Toshiba Cell Tv has a box of tricks that has :

"Eight of these processors live inside the Cell TV, and each of them is a superfast 3.2-Ghz chip.
So what does all that processing power mean to the person on the couch? The biggest thing, perhaps, is 2D to 3D conversion. The TV takes everything from 2D gaming and home video, processes it, fills in missing pixels, and turns it into video that looks like 3D. "

http://www.techworld.com.au/article/331556/toshiba_announces_cell_tv_hdtv_set-top_box

I was thinking we could upgrade out HTPCS to process the 2d into 3d as Tochiba has done but the processing power is insane, the upconversion would probably take up one chip if the source was not blu ray hd dvd etc which means the processing takes about 5 or 6 other chips, 7 in all leaving one for other matters. Maybe a high end quad core PC could hack it, guess Tomshardware will have a ru down of this in days to come.

[mhalsan]

Just saw Avatar in Real-D, at the Bridgeport 18 theater in Tigard.

I think we've seen the storyline before, but the craftsmanship that went into the images....and the 3D was almost flawless, no ghosting or headaches.

I won't presume to speak for anyone else, but would I want 3D of this quality at home? Without question. Will our CRT projectors be able to deliver it? I highly doubt it, but please.................prove me wrong!

Thanks, Mark

[cmjohnson]

If the framerate is 24 frames per channel, which I believe is the case, then most CRT projectors will be capable of handling it.

But I haven't actually been able to read the 3D blu-ray specs yet. I haven't found them but I've been looking.


CJ

[Mr. Green]

Hey guys, a friend just sent me this link. Haven't read through it all yet, but should answer some questions you have (at least from earlier in the posts...).

http://www.letsgodigital.org/en/24286/blu-ray-3d/

[VideoGrabber]

incova commented:
> That Toshiba Cell Tv has a box of tricks that has.. <

Yeah, the Cell TV has a lot of horsepower. Far more than anything we have at home currently. However, from what I've read, it would be a mistake to think that this is a requirement for real-time 2D-3D conversion. That task will be handled with far less CPU guzzling (and much cheaper than the Cell TV) by sets from both Samsung and Toshiba, already announced. I really don't think the process is beyond the capabilities of current gen GPUs.

[Spanky Ham]

Let me start by saying I went into this movie somewhat biased with preconceived notions about what to expect. That being said, I was really wanting to have my mind changed. I saw the movie on a digital Imax, which has two pjs projecting on the screen. I walked in late, but had my choice of seats and sat dead center halfway back. Being late, I was subjected to only two previews which looked like crap.

For the technical aspects, I disagree with Mark. For 3D, this is probably as big a moment for this technology as Jurassic Park was for digital animation. That being said, I thought it was ok. It is better than what I saw at Cedia, but still didn't win me over to "I have to have this". The best things I can say about the 3D are I did not get dizzy (the Panny was the only other one that achieved this) and during the movie I forgot about the 3D. The latter was more important and I did check myself several times during the movie thinking "I am not distracted by the 3D". The bad part was the loss of resolution. As my best friend put it, gaussian blurred to the nth degree. There were a lot of foreground and background shots that a 20k Jpeg would have went man that is soft. I remember one shot walking threw the forest and the leaves looked worse than you would have seen from a video game ten years ago. In the end, I think it is impressive for what it was trying to achieve.

For the movie itself, this was the biggest piece of liberal trash I have seen in years. I don't consider myself conservative, but give me a break. Evil corporation, evil Marines trying to take over this utopia inhabited by better beings. Hell, Cameron could have done a better job hiding the fact that he was talking about Native Americans and the evil white man. Of course, Cameron is now going to have to deal with a lawsuit from Disney.
http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowlla/studio_film/pocahontas_avatar_147931.asp

[ecrabb]

I went last weekend, and just haven't had time to do my own write-up. You basically just wrote it for me, Spanky!

The visual effects were what made the movie... Absolutely stunning. The way it was lit/shot/composed/composited was what it made it gorgeous... The 3D was just icing on the cake. Several times I forgot I was watching 3D, too - so, the subtlety was nice. But, I kept flipping my glasses down so I could see the screen, and I couldn't believe how much brighter and more colorful it was. The image really popped. If I had to put in HT/CRT terms, it was like the difference between 8 or 9ftL and 12 or 13ftL. I MUCH preferred the brightness and color of the image without the glasses. Maybe a brighter projector would have helped.

Speaking of the projector, that reminds me... DLP still sucks ass. OK, it's not that bad, but it still pisses me off that I can spot that it's DLP right away. WTF? Why hasn't TI fixed the low-IRE dithering? Where it really sticks out is on dark scenes that then fade to black - like between scenes in trailers. It shows up as almost like a "dancing curtain" effect in parts of scene - especially during fades. It wasn't as noticeable during the movie, but there aren't as many scenes like that.

As for the political statement... Avatar is just another in a long line of "good natives raped and pillaged by white man, so white man and corporations are bad" type stories and movies. What do you expect?

That Pocahontas mark-up is hilarious, though. "Formulaic" is an understatement, but then if you start down that road, there are a whole lot of similar movies/stories.

In summary, the 3D was cool, but I certainly didn't have the "Oh, man - I gotta have this at home" reaction. Not even close. I'd certainly take 3D for games, though... Something like Call of Duty on my projector in my HT with the simplicity and controls of a console would be way cool. Movies... Not so much. If I had to sum up the RealD 3D on DLP experience in one word: Whatever.

SC

[deronmoped]

The only really good 3D I ever saw was at the Luxor in Las Vegas. They only played one short movie made just for this screen and PJ. The experience was excellent. The image looked very natural and added a lot to the movie. I even made it a point to see the movie several times over the years it was there.

I went to CES this past week and 3D was everywhere. I checked out quite a few screens and the image pretty much sucked. I could not believe how many companies where pushing 3D. I bet it will not be accepted by the public in a big way though. Quadraphonic sound anyone?

I saw the 105" 4K display, that was amazing, someone said it weighed as much as a car. The dealer said it was just for promotion of factory capabilities in building smaller displays, not something they had any interest in producing for the consumer market. You could watch the image from a few feet away and it looked really well defined.

Deron.

[mhalsan]

The 3D Vision kit from nvidia is $200, assuming you're running Vista or Windows 7. Anyone out there had a chance to try this with a CRT projector? Their literature states support for CRTs running a minimum of 100Hz.

Thanks, Mark

[Spanky Ham]

I was at might sister's house the other night and my ten year old nephew asked if I had seen it. I said I had and asked him what he thought. He said he liked it, which I expected. I then asked him what he thought of the 3-D. I started laughing when he said he didn't see it in 3D, because it makes him dizzy. I realize it wasn't Avatar, but it was still funny nonetheless.