_Avatar_, directed by James Cameron

nrq upthread:

the 3-d is annoying and distracting. would probably need to know about perceptual psychology to say why, but imo in most instances it does nothing interesting and draws attention to irrelevant things. more damagingly it splits the image, quite brutally, into separate panes. why do this? it also dulls the colours.

wtf? what does "splits the image into separate panes" even mean?

fwiw i'm ambivalent about the 3d. It makes shit look real, totally real! I felt I could just reach out and touch things in the film. But movies don't need to look totally real to be good, so it's still a gimmick, albeit a great one.

― CATBEAST 7777 (ledge), Thursday, January 7, 2010 10:50 AM (36 minutes ago) Bookmark

say there are three people in the shot, one closest to us, one behind, one further back. shoot this in 2d and (i reckon) yer brain will basically see this as it would irl, i.e. in 3d. in 'avatar', though, i felt that the effect of the 3-d technology was to put three people in three definite planes, in a weird way flattening them out. it felt abstract and jarring to me but ymmv.

still read that as a latin 'yummy'

i felt that the effect of the 3-d technology was to put three people in three definite planes, in a weird way flattening them out. it felt abstract and jarring to me but ymmv.

Yes, I found this quite distracting - bit of a dime-store* stereoscopic effect.

(* obviously I don't really know what I mean by dime-store)

right-wing cunt who dines out on having gone to university with boris johnson and david cameron defends it from his awful friends:

http://www.spectator.co.uk/columnists/all/5686568/if-were-going-to-rage-against-cultural-atrocities-lets-make-sure-we-target-the-right-ones.thtml

I can't believe I read the whole thing. BARF.

This stands out: the irritation of seeing their kids drip-fed Mary-Seacole-global-warming-and-Eid studies. Christ on fire.

bit of a dime-store* stereoscopic effect.

it's the same effect you get with binoculars, isn't it? each object looks flattened out like the scene is made of cardboard cutouts positioned at different distances. don't understand the optics of it: assume w/ binoculars it's because telephoto lenses flatten perspective - is it just cos they film mostly w/ telephotos?

you do get it to an extent with other visual media, and the jarringness is, im sure, partly the shock of the new.

just not clear what the 3d adds to the experience of a simple three-shot. there were some shots, like the first of the long chamber full of sleeping marines, that i thought were superb.

but all in all this was basically the abyss + strange days + aliens divided by shit.

Is shit a negative number or a fraction?

partly the shock of the new

Could be. The perspective-flattening thing with long lenses is something everyone is now used to in still photography and 2D film/video but perhaps it wasn't always the case. The 3D depth of field stuff was often so jarring that it made me think that some shots (like in the helicopter with two chars + background) were composed, not with a long lens and a wide aperture, but with some sort of Photoshop blur mask, hence the sharp edges to the foreground characters. I don't know really. The cryosleep chambers were well done though.

http://m.assetbar.com/achewood/autaux?b=M%5ea11f09b8576e606bcb5038dfdb92fb821&u=http%3A%2F%2Fachewood.com%2Fcomic.php%3Fdate%3D01072010

roflofloflmao

just not clear what the 3d adds to the experience of a simple three-shot. there were some shots, like the first of the long chamber full of sleeping marines, that i thought were superb.

yeah i'm kinda with you there. but it's all or nothing.

i kinda agree about the depth of field thing, it makes it look like some sort of paper puppet theater and really pulls me out of it

i'm kind of glad 3D doesn't work for me. the only scene it worked in was when there was some ash falling after a battle, and i found it extremely jarring and distrcting. my gf loved the 3D, though.

titanic was a boat

― meryl streep post-brazilian (s1ocki), Wednesday, January 6, 2010 6:35 PM

a pred boat?

does the 3D have a different effect than the 3D Imax? (it really shouldn't i'd imagine) wasn't really distracted by the 3D...

They should glue, like, four Imax screens together and make a Super Imax screen, then charge $100 a ticket. That would be very awesome, or, barring that, at least very big.

otm it would be huge

this was the first 'narrative' film i've seen in IMAX, and the first time i've been to an IMAX in basically a decade, i'd forgotten how lol hueg they are

(i don't get the predator boats/ships jokes. it seems to be a zing directed at a certain kind of hater?)

http://boards.ign.com/Sci-Fi___Fantasy_Flicks/b5083/47582986/p3

it's a long running nerd debate as to whether or not the ship in alien was a predator ship

referred to at LONG LENGTH in an ilx thread i'm too lazy to find

so iow yes

the Most hilarious fanboy message board debate of all time

woah that was a long time ago.

(was it a pred boat, in the end?)

^ For your sake and the sake of the people you are exposed to every day, I hope that post was a joke, because if it wasn't, the astonishing ignorance of that post says something really scary about you.

And if it was a joke, it wasn't funny, not even accidentally.

Now, pay attention, and tell me if you can understand this (I'll use smaller words if you need me to) -- there was no such thing as "Predator" back in 1979 when Ridley Scott made ALIEN. So, no, it is not a Predator ship.

LeBrainBoy, ladies and gentlemen.

But what if the Predators had time travel abilities? Ever think about that!?

every single day of my life

I would call the sequel "Time Predators."

"This time ... they're hunting through time!"

tbh predators taking on t-rexes would be pretty fun

charlamagne vs predator

ghenghis khan vs predator vs beethoven vs freud vs joan of arc vs napolean vs socrates

san dimas high school football rules

no bill and ted = no credibility

i don't want them to get hurt

WHO WOULD WIN IN A FIGHT

ghenghis khan vs predator vs beethoven vs freud vs joan of arc vs napolean vs socrates

My first thought was Beethoven the movie dog.

haha well certainly he's invited if he wants to join the carnage

My friend (a chef who works nights and has days off) posted on FB that all daytime showings of Avatar 3D IMAX in his area are sold out until next Tuesday... yes 5 days sold out in advance.

ya but even u admit he's a chef

his post was illustrating his frustration about going to the theater today and not being able to get tix to the film even outside of peak hours on not just on a random weekday (which is usually not a problem for people who work nights)... but at a 5 day leadtime! my point in posting that is to suggest that the film may be gaining box office momentum which is pretty frightening.

Yeah I want to see it at Imax but I'm waiting until there's actually empty seats in the theater. Sheesh.

Too good to sit in a stranger's lap, are you?

BTW it's now the 2nd highest grossing film of all time. And it's only been out for 20 days. Jesus.

xpost - I prefer to provide the lap, thank you very much.

best get there early then

I am not going to see this film.

The only Sam Worthington you ever need to see in your life btw was his performance in a rubbish Australian reimagating of Macbeth. Specifically his whispery delivery of "is that a dagger I see before me...(lengthy pause)...or a dagger of the mind?"

IMAX show I went to was hell of sold out, on the way out i saw them turning away actual dozens of ppl

I had to sit on the far left/up front for my IMAX viewing :|