3D ‘Not the Solution’ for All That ‘Ails’ Entertainment Industry,’ IMAX CEO Says

3D is “not the solution for everything that ails the entertainment industry,” and not every movie should be made in 3D, IMAX CEO Richard Gelfond said Friday at a conference that kicked off the three-day 3D Experience: 3D Entertainment & Technology Festival in New York. CE and technology company executives, meanwhile, cited challenges to 3D’s gaining mainstream adoption in homes.

Gelfond singled out the comedy My Dinner With Andre as an example of a movie that shouldn’t be in 3D, but he probably meant Eating Raoul, because he called it a film about cannibalism. “After the success of Avatar, everybody surely thought” that every movie would be in 3D, Gelfond said. But in Hollywood, if a movie about a tornado is a hit, “you can be sure that there’s going to be three tornado movies the next year, and when the third one isn’t successful, you can be sure there'll be no tornado movies the next year,” he said. Sure enough, many movies have arrived in theaters in 3D since Avatar -- including Clash of the Titans and others converted into 3D -- and not all were successful, Gelfond said. So some industry observers predictably declared 3D “dead,” he said.

The truth is that “3D isn’t changing the world, and it isn’t disappearing,” Gelfond said. “It’s somewhere in the middle, and 3D is going to be part of the entertainment landscape … but it’s not going to be the whole technology landscape.” The recent 2D movie Inception was a big hit at the box office, making more money than most 3D films, he said. And a bad movie can’t be made good with the addition of 3D, he said. But 3D is “going to be important,” he said. The technology has come a long way from where it was when IMAX started using 3D about 20 years ago, Gelfond said. “It had been a very lonely place” for many years, he said.

There’s long been skepticism about the potential of new technologies, said David Naranjo, director of product development at Mitsubishi Digital Electronics America. He pointed to Warner Bros. head Harry Warner’s comment in 1927, “Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?” Naranjo offered an upbeat forecast for 3D’s acceptance in the home, which he predicted will be driven in part by the videogame market. Seven stereoscopic 3D games will join the two already available -- Ubisoft’s Avatar: The Game and Namco Bandai’s Invincible Tiger: The Legend of Han Tao -- this summer and 15-20 more will follow this year for consoles, he projected. Eric Anderson, vice president of content and product solution at Samsung Electronics America, estimated that 75 stereoscopic 3D console games will be released before 2012.

Naranjo said challenges at retail include a lack of compelling content being demonstrated, problems with the reliability and functionality of 3D glasses, theft of the eyewear, and a need to educate consumers. The glasses used at retail often get damaged and won’t work when customers try to use them, said Pierre Routhier, vice president of 3D strategy and business development at Technicolor. Many stores aren’t equipped to maintain and repair the glasses, he said.

The lack of compatibility between the glasses from different manufacturers is “a big obstacle for consumers going forward,” Naranjo said. Like other speakers, he stressed the importance of creating a universal standard for active-shutter 3D glasses. They said CEA is working to establish a standard. That’s a concern that everybody in the CE industry shares, Peter Fannon, vice president of technology policy at Panasonic, told Consumer Electronics Daily. Like Naranjo, he underscored the importance of retailers assisting consumers with 3D demos.

Fannon and Naranjo said some consumers steal 3D glasses from stores, although Fallon said Panasonic “really hasn’t had too much trouble” with that. Stolen active-shutter eyewear from stores stands to confuse some consumers further, because some will try to use them in movie theaters, which tend to use passive, polarized glasses, so they won’t work there, Naranjo said. Similarly, some consumers will take to stores passive glasses they received at theaters and try to use them on TVs that use active-shutter glasses, he said.

Active-shutter glasses generally cost $100-$150 a pair. That’s a major obstacle to mass consumer adoption, said Technicolor’s Routhier. It could cost more than $800 for a group of people to watch a 3D movie in a home, he said. But Fannon predicted that pricing “will come down over time,” without saying how long it will take. What should “open up the floodgates” for 3D sales will be the introduction of universal glasses, followed by the availability of personalized 3D eyewear, he said. He predicted that the 3D eyewear business could become significant, although not necessarily for Panasonic or other TV makers.

Naranjo predicted that 3D “will simply” be seen as one of many features for TVs in 2011. He said the challenge for retailers is to communicate that to consumers, many of whom are confused about the technology. Many consumers won’t want to watch news or other programs on their TVs in 3D and they need to be told they won’t have to wear 3D glasses many hours a day, he said. “3D is a periodic, event-based experience,” and most consumers will have no problem wearing the glasses two hours at a time, he said. Mitsubishi doesn’t think “3D below 40 inches makes a whole lot of sense,” he said.

Autostereoscopic 3D won’t be coming to large-screen TVs any time soon, Naranjo and other executives said. Naranjo predicted it will be at least a “3-5 year cycle” before the technology is workable. Fannon agreed: “I think it’s a good way off.” Only very small screens can effectively deliver stereoscopic 3D today, and that will remain true awhile, he said. “The answer is nobody really knows” when a glasses-free solution will work for home TVs, said RealD CE President Robert Mayson. He predicted that advanced passive glasses offering full-resolution 3D will come before that and make inroads in the TV market. Passive glasses cost less than active-shutter ones, but current passive technology provides TVs only with half-resolution 3D, in which HD content is reduced to DVD-level performance, he said.

Panasonic hasn’t announced plans for 3D LCD TVs, and Fannon told us the company remains entirely convinced that plasma TVs offer the best 3D performance in TVs now. The company makes LCD TVs but decided to hold off on 3D LCD models until the technology improves, he said. Plasma sets are better at handling refresh rates, angle of viewing and motion rendition on screens, among other things, he said. Plasma TV sales have paled in comparison to LCD sets overall awhile, but he said plasma sales have been growing in double-digit increments recently. U.S. shipments of plasma TVs grew 35 percent in the first seven months of 2010 compared to the same period a year ago, Panasonic said, citing CEA data.

Challenges also remain on the 3D production side, Technicolor’s Routhier said. Among them are a lack of experienced 3D producers and stereographers, gear limitations, high production costs, and needs beyond the program content including ads, he said.