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Comment by a_c | Hacker News Reader

I conjecture that 3D in movie is just an excuse to increase ticket price and lowering image quality at the same time

It could have also have been a ploy to get theaters to upgrade their projection equipment to the new DRM-ed digital projectors.

I happened to be working as a Projectionist around the time 3D and Digital Projection began to really take off, and yeah... pretty much this.

[EDIT] Damn those early digital projectors were cool, basically huge light-bulbs wired up to a Centos box with some weirdo DRM shit baked-in. We would receive movies on ordinary hard-drives and plug them in to a central server rack to be ingested and then distributed out to each of the projectors. Pretty often in those days it would simply take too long to ingest and transfer to a screen, so we'd have to cancel early showings of new movies.

I've certainly seen movies where that was the case, but The Martian in 3D was amazing. I also thoroughly enjoyed Doctor Strange 3D, though that was on IMAX laser projectors, which are amazing by themselves.

I saw Doctor Strange on IMAX 3D as well and I must say it was very impressive however there needs to be a good system for rating 3D movie experiences beforehand that way the consumer is not subject to wasting money on a horrible experience.

I've had luck with the "To 3D or Not To 3D" reviews at cinemablend.com.

Here's a recent example: http://www.cinemablend.com/news/1600740/to-3d-or-not-to-3d-b...

I find that I can often tell based on a baroque reading of the credits. Some of the 3D "upconversion" houses are better than others at their job. Some of the special effects houses have dedicated stereoscopic staff. Some of the studios themselves have dedicated stereoscopic departments. Obviously too, if there were stereoscopic cameras/film units involved in the main production crew of the film, that's usually a sign that the director cared about the stereoscopic output of the film.

I'm stereo-blind, so 3D movies annoy me more than anything. It always annoys me when people want to go see a movie in 3D and I have to decline since it will give me a headache 15 minutes in.

Hank Green, of vlogbrothers fame, came up with "2D" glasses. http://www.2d-glasses.com/

Instead of different polarisation in each lens, like normal 3D glasses, it just uses identical polarisation in both lenses.

I don't quite understand that argument. If people hadn't purchased enough of the higher prices 3D tickets, it wouldn't be profitable, and cinemas would have given up. If people "have no choice" because of a lack of sufficient competition, then the cinemas would have just raised the price without adding a new feature which costs them money.

I think it more-or-less (at least for me) comes down to...

Friend: "I can only make the movie after 8"

Me: "The 2D one is at 7:40, but there's a 3D showing at 8:10"

And thus, 8:10 it is. Then I have to stake the glasses off for 30 seconds every 5-10 minutes because the image makes me dizzy as all hell.

Yes, that. And selling you one more cheap piece of plastic each time you forget that thing at home.

Huh? Every cinema I've ever been to provides the 3d viewing glasses for free and collects them afterwards.

I've been to cinemas in several European countries and it varies between cinemas.

Looks like he is from Switzerland. Must be different there.

It depends; the cheaper ones have passive 3d glasses (polarisation filters), the cinema nearby then sells them for €1 apiece. I have two of them at home. The fancier cinema, brand new etc, has Dolby Atmos and active 3D glasses - they hand those out and collect them when you enter and leave the room. The ticket price of those is higher though (€15 ish).

Active 3D meaning they alternate flipping the lenses black? I think I'd throw up if I tried to sit through 2 hours of that.

It means that one eye is polarized one way and the other eye the opposite.

That's passive 3D

Misread the comment :)

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