Stop being duped by the 3D scam
Takeaway: The entertainment and electronics industries keep trying to push 3D on consumers, even though a lot of smart people have caught on to the fact that it’s a scam. It’s time to stop the madness.
Last Friday, I departed from my normal business technology beat to talk about the geek entertainment event Game of Thrones. This week I’m going to plug into our Friday Geekend theme again, but this time the topic is something more nefarious — the entertainment industry’s misguided scam of the public.
The 3D gimmick has sadly infiltrated movies and television and is now threatening to infect video games and smartphones as well. There’s only one reason why the entertainment industry keeps relentlessly pushing this at consumers — it’s a transparent attempt to bleed more money out of people. And, while a lot of consumers have caught on to the scam, not everyone is doing enough to stop it.
3D is definitely NOT about innovation, as the industry would like you to believe. In fact, adding the current 3D effects to a movie or video of any kind subtracts from the picture. It muddies the colors and unsharpens the images, and it has to slow down the action shots because it makes people sick if things go too fast in 3D. In fact, optometrists estimate that up to 25% of people get headaches or nausea from simply watching 3D at all.
My first hint at the 3D scam was in October 2009 when Toy Story and Toy Story 2 were re-released in the theaters as 3D movies. My kids were excited to see Toy Story on the big screen for the first time so we gladly ponied up the extra money to see the 3D version of the double feature. We weren’t very far into the first movie before I realized that the quality of the colors and images were actually worse in 3D. That was a big disappointment. Even my kids said that the 3D wasn’t as exciting as they thought it would be. There went an extra $24 down the drain ($3 extra for 3D for four people for two movies).
Of course, the Toy Story movies were standard 2D movies that were converted to 3D (which is actually the way most “3D” movies are still handled). So, what about movies that are natively shot with special 3D cameras, such as Avatar? I’ll admit that when I first saw Avatar in the theaters I was impressed at how well it wove in the 3D effects. But, my admiration wore off once I saw it on Blu-ray on a 240Hz LED TV and quickly realized that all of the colors and action shots suddenly came to life and really popped off the screen. That’s when it fully dawned on me what a horrible scam 3D really is. They are making us pay more money for a gimmicky, inferior experience. Sure, there are a few neat moments in most 3D movies, but the novelty wears very off quickly and it’s certainly not worth the trade-off in picture quality or action sequences.
I had started to see this coming a little sooner, and I should have pounced on it. Back at the 2009 Consumer Electronics Show, I was dazzled by the new LED TVs that Samsung showed off at its big press conference. The images were so sharp and the colors were so bright that the picture almost felt three dimensional. Plus the TV themselves were amazingly thin.
The next year, at CES 2010...Read More...
http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/hiner/stop-being-duped-by-the-3d-scam/7983?tag=nl.e101
Also read
- 3D Images Make Millions Sick, Yet Tech Companies Push On (Fox News)
- Why Are 3-D Movies So Bad? (NPR)
- Movies that should’ve stayed in 2D (CNN)
- Effects Company Specializes In Giving Movies A 3D Makeover (NPR)
- Roger Ebert: Why I Hate 3D, And You Should Too (Newsweek)
- The Curse of 3D TV (Technologizer)
- Why 3D doesn’t work and never will. Case closed. (Chicago Sun-Times)
Interesting... I have Not seen a 3D Screen in Person as of yet. But I already knew that it would give my Eyes Fits and probably make me Nauseous too. So, I have no more interest in 3D than the initial Novelty of it being on a Small Screen in your Home, Rather than a Big Screen in a Theater. I was born in the 50's and was too young to see 3D Movies in the Theaters. But I grew up knowing about it and always wondered why it didn't catch on. I figured it was because it was not very realistic and because people had to wear the Cheap Paper 3D Glasses to see the Movies in 3D. I did have or actually still do have a Pair of those Paper 3D Glasses around here somewhere;) They came out with Serial to look at some Silly 3D Images on the Boxes years ago. I was thinking that it was when I was growing up. But now that I think of it... it may have been in the 80's when my Kids were growing up. Anyway... Ya, I think it is a Passing Fad and I never get into those. But, Yep, I hate they way Industry tries to Push Their Products on US... Like they thing we are all Mad of Money!:O So, good article! Glad someone out there see's through all of this Crap!
Don
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