Tuesday, November 18, 2008

This Will Kick Start the Hand Drawn Franchise

Apparently the stereo viewing experience is really taking hold.

The Mouse House is adding "Beauty and the Beast" to its already packed dance card of 3-D pics it will unspool over the next two years ...

Pic's original team of filmmakers, including producer Don Hahn and co-directors Kirk Wise and Gary Trousdale will oversee the process, along with Sara Duran-Singer, senior VP of worldwide post production at Walt Disney Feature Animation.

... [W]e're able to come up with a fun and unique 3-D experience for existing and new fans of the film," [producer Don] Hahn said ...

It'll be intriguing to see what kind of audience is out there for a 3-D Beauty. (Bugs once went the stereo cartoon route, but the road petered out). If only half those existing fans show up, they'll have a winner.

Non-existing fans need not apply.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Do you mean stereo 2-D from the existing film art? I can't see how that would be possible beyond a superficial multiplane-like separation of levels. For the individual characters to be fully dimensional the way CG characters are, the whole movie would have to be completely re-drawn. Also, we are not talking about eight minutes of round and bouncy Bugs. These are complex, detailed humans. I can't see it. For CG, all you have to do is push a button and create a second virtual camera. This would be a whole different ballgame.

Anonymous said...

I think they're talking 3D rendering as in the kind you watch through 3D glasses. They did the same for The Nightmare Before Christmas. I don't think they're re-rendering the entire movie in 3D form, just bits and pieces to make it pop through your 3D glasses.

Justin said...

The only thing you need to do to make a stereo version of a movie is to define for each pixel what the separation is from right eye to left eye. There are lots of image processing techniques that can be used to determine this information.

It's nice to see the original producer and directors over seeing this.

Anonymous said...

Keep in mind that even in Beauty and the Beast, there were CG elements. Those can be 3-D.

Besides, there is a process to make 2D films 3-D. They can do the same for live action that was filmed with just 1 camera.

Like the six million dollar man, the technology exists. it just isn't as straightforward as it would be from a pure 3D CG source.

Steve Hulett said...

Casablanca!

In glorious 3-D!

Bob and Rob Professional American Writers said...

This gets a big "thumbs-up" from this side of the building.

Anonymous said...

ha ha, sorry to say but, I don't think this will be enough to resurect 2d animation.

No gimmick will do that. It's like wishing movies were done in b&w again...

Rufus.

Anonymous said...

I think it will be very cool. Just like a giant Viewmaster!

Awesome!!!!

Floyd Norman said...

Forget 3D!

How about a technology that will turn those bad Disney films into good ones.

Anonymous said...

Disney's "Melody" is, without a doubt, the best 3D animated film ever done.

I used to think of it as Toot-Whistle's lesser sister, but seeing it in 3D just opened my eyes to what is possible.

I don't think that anything's come close.

Yea for the old multi-plane!

Floyd Norman said...

You're right!

I remember our crew screening "Melody" back in the early sixties. Plus, we saw the film in 3D. Pretty cool stuff for a film made in the fifties.

Anonymous said...

What is "Melody" and how or where can I see it in 3-D?

To Robiscus: No, 2-D will not be saved by gimmicks. It will, however, be saved by high quality, imaginative, entertaining 2-D films. It can happen. For example; look at how exited people got about the opening of Kung Foo Panda.

For those of you who commented above who insist on believing that you can turn a 2-D film into a 3-D film just by pressing a button, you are dreaming. To perceive a character as fully dimensional, for every pose you need two drawings instead of one; a right eye drawing and a left eye drawing, otherwise it will look like a flat piece of paper in a diorama. That's twice as much work and twice as many man hours. Lately the studios aren't willing to pay for doing the work once, much less twice.

Anonymous said...

I sure hope they bring the films Art Director, Brian McEntee back to oversee the visuals.

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