What is going on with 3D Blu-ray movies?

[Gae43]

I am totally confused with the marketing and selling of 3D Blu-ray movies at the moment. I have looked at the ranking sales at Amazon and some 3D Blu-ray sales seem on a par with 2D Blu-ray and DVD equivalent with lots of reviewers owning 3D TVs.

Here's my question. Why are most 3D Blu-ray discs selling at £20+ then, as if they were rare to find items? Is it just the industry trying to milk the technology? Also, why are there so many rumours of certain films (e.g. Shark Night) not getting a 3D Blu-ray release and then it getting one? Is that just the nature of the internet and rumouring or is the marketing and selling of 3D Blu-ray just a total shambles?

The other question is...is the industry and/or the audience getting a bit fed up with 3D movies? Is it to die (or at least become a minority interest) after 2-3 years in a similar way that happened in the 50's and 80's? Personally, I hope not as I've just bought a 3D player and 3D monitor.

Gae43

[Likay]

It's just the industry trying to milk the technology and even finding out more clever (on consumerlevel idiotic) ways to earn money from 3d.

The other question is...is the industry and/or the audience getting a bit fed up with 3D movies? Is it to die (or at least become a minority interest) after 2-3 years in a similar way that happened in the 50's and 80's? Personally, I hope not as I've just bought a 3D player and 3D monitor.

Maybe. In my opinion 3d should have better conditions to survive "this time" than ever before. IMO 3d-gaming gives a superior experience compared to movies since the effect can be adjusted to each and their owns like. 3d-movies so far is mainly a huge disappointment, at least compared to gaming. To be honest there's sadly not too many movies where 3d actually adds to the immersion. I'm generalizing now but the best movies for the 3d-effect seems to be cgi-movies which is not only real stereoscopy but where 3d actually adds to the experience.

The industry tries to milk out everything that's possible, partly because of bad economy times. This leads to the really confusing 3d-market we have today where hardware, software, driverrevisions compability is a total mess. If something is able to "kill" the nowaday 3d then this is it...

In my ideal world software and hardware shouldn't matter as it does today.

[android78]

I think it's still too early to be concerned. Wait until The Hobbit is released and see if the format gains popularity again.
The problem is that I feel the wrong producers are making the 3D movies. This is resulting in less then ideal use of the technology which has made a lot of people (almost) give up on it.
On the plus side, I saw Puss in Boots on the weekend and thought this was done really well, and had a reasonable depth. Bit of a fun movie too. It's just a shame that producers/cinematographers of the more adult movies (no, I don't mean those kind of adult movies) don't seem able to get it right.
I just hope for a few more movies from Peter Jackson and James Cameron should be able to convince people and producers that the format is worth sticking with... and getting right.

[android78]

...
This leads to the really confusing 3d-market we have today where hardware, software, driverrevisions compability is a total mess. If something is able to "kill" the nowaday 3d then this is it...

In my ideal world software and hardware shouldn't matter as it does today.

I think this is getting a lot better. At least now we have some industry agreement about frame packing and interface (HDMI1.4) so we don't have to worry about all the different proprietary interfaces that every different 3D display technology used to use. Remember that we used to have:
- Line interlaced (field sequential)
- Side-by-side
- Over-Under
- Frame sequential (Blue Line)
- Frame sequential (DDC)

I'm sure there were probably more different interfaces, but I think you get the point. Now you get a HDMI 1.4 player, TV and surround from any manufacturer and you don't have to worry that one won't be compatible with another.

There are still troubles with PC and the drivers, but I think this will eventually be resolved once all the game engine manufacturers include 3D rendering.

[Fredz]

I don't think the situation has changed that much in terms of numbers of standards, and I don't see this as a problem anyway. HDMI 1.4a frame-packing is a nice thing but it can't handle all the cases. We'll still need the frame sequential format for dual-link DVI until HDMI 1.4a does support 1080p at 60Hz per eye. Also side-by-side is still needed for broadcasting and line interlaced is also useful for current passive displays since it's easy to implement without the need of HDMI 1.4a hardware. I prefer too much standards if they're free to implement than too little of them.

As for the current state of S3D, I think it's still going pretty well. S3D gaming has had good support on the PC platform for over 10 years now so I don't think it will vanish anytime soon. The fact that support has been added to the two most powerful consoles (PS3 and Xbox 360 very recently despite Microsoft doubts) also shows that the trend is still going strong.

For 3D movies, seeing directors I consider major in filmmaking such as James Cameron, Martin Scorsese, Peter Jackson or Baz Luhrmann embrace the medium with so much enthusiasm and not as an afterthougt is quite reassuring too. The fact that directors I personally consider minor (Michael Bay of Transformers: Dark of the Moon or Joseph Kosinski of Tron: Legacy) don't do justice to the 3D medium doesn't worry me in the least for its continuing success in the future.

[Gae43]

You know, I think it's going to take great "old school" visionary Director's like Ridley Scott (Prometheus), George Miller (Mad Max 4) Peter Jackson (The Hobbit) and the likes of Cameron, Scorsese and Spielberg to kick start the future success of 3D.

I agree that Gaming has been much more successful than movies with its 3D approach. 3D is definately here to stay in one form or another. I'm not really bothered about it going mainstream as I'd prefer it to be used in a limited way, with future movies, but done really well whenever it is utilized.

Gae43

[cybereality]

Its sad the way they are gouging on prices of 3D Blu-Ray. I have seen sets going for $50-60 which is ridiculous for a movie. Not to mention exclusive stuff like Avatar you can only get on eBay for $150+. Its really a shame what they are doing. I wanted to collect every single 3D Blu-Ray movie, but that is just not affordable when they are costing $40 even for a crappy movie. If they would charge something reasonable, like $20, then I would certainly buy every one. Right now its just a rip-off.

[android78]

Regarding the price of the 3D Blu-ray... I am amazed at what has happened here. In Australia, the prices were gradually decreasing, getting down to about $5 more then the regular, non-3D, version. Then about March this year, all of a sudden they jumped up. Now they are almost double that of a regular version.
Part of the justification, is that you usually get three disks with the 3D pack. You get the 3D Blu-ray, 2D Blu-ray and 2D DVD. So you can potentially on-sell the 2D version if you only ever watch the 3D version.
I'm leaving Avatar out of the equation since I'm boycotting that... Even when it is available for regular purchase, I'm going to leave it since I feel it's pretty disgusting the way they sold out to panasonic, to the detriment of the whole market segment.

[Gae43]

Their marketing is all wrong. When I buy a 3D Blu-ray movie thats all I want...the 3D movie. As the 3D movie has both 1080p sides in the encoding, there is no hassle to have the 2D version too. That happens in the hardware and can be obtained by just switching to 2D mode. So that's no extra expense for the industry. If I'm buying the 3D Blu-ray version, I'm not interested in a DVD. Why would I be? I can watch the Blu-ray. They can't justify these high costs because they include 3 versions. Just give us the 3D Blu-ray at about £15 ($20) and sales will go up no doubt.

I also think that you shouldn't just cater to the rich or early adopters. By keeping costs down as much as possible, I really believe that more, less well off people, will buy into it and profits will probably be better across the board.

Here's a simple calculation......


1) Lots of people buy at a reasonable price..........lots of goods sold


2) A few people buy at a high price.........few goods are sold

In the very simple equation above, I believe that in the long run 1) is more profitable than 2).

It probably involves a bit more effort though.....

Add to the above, the fact that the better the sales of 3D Blu-ray initially, the better the potential for 3D movies to be made and be seen as a profitable industry in the future.

So it begs the question....is greed by the industry killing 3D?


Gae43

[xhonzi]

Almost.

The extra data on the 3D disc means that there isn't as much room for special features, so the inclusion of a 2nd BD with at least special features is nice. Since some of those features (commentary, PIP, etc) go along with the movie, you have to have a 2D version of the movie there as well. And since some 3D movies (Disney) use the "floating windows" that probably would look really odd in 2D, it makes sense to release a 2D only version in the set.

The DVD in the set is really almost no cost to the producer. Sure, they use its presence to "justify" a higher cost to the consumer... But it has some value to me. My kids have watched the DVD of Tangled probably 50 times, the 2D BD once and the 3D BD twice.