Hollywood's New Lens

Monday, May. 10, 2010

 

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1986006,00.html#ixzz0mzzLExCv

 

The 3-D hit Avatar did more than break box-office records. It altered the film industry's business model. TIME's Steven James Snyder recently connected with DreamWorks' Jeffrey Katzenberg to talk about how 3-D will change movies, television and advertising as we know it.

 

At what point did you realize that 3-D was the direction the industry had to go?

 

It will be five years ago this fall that I went to the Imax megascreen here in L.A., and I saw Robert Zemeckis' The Polar Express, which I really credit as being the first film to show what a superhigh-end digital 3-D experience could be. I remember watching that film and having a sense of exhilaration that was unlike anything I'd ever experienced before.

 

Hollywood can charge a premium for 3-D tickets. How does that change the equation?

 

It's clear that people value 3-D and see it as a premium experience that has reignited their imagination of what is possible in a movie theater. We're not forcing them to pay a premium for something they don't want. So our job now is not to abuse our customers but to take the high road and give them that experience. And if we do, this will be the greatest transformation that has occurred in the movie business in 70 years. We'll look back at the leap from silent films to sound, from black and white to color and from 2-D to 3-D as the transformative moments for film.

 

How did Digital Cinema Implementation Partners, a theater consortium, line up $660 million to convert 14,000 screens to 3-D?

 

When you talk about theaters 18 months ago, it wasn't that they didn't have the will. They just didn't have the way. Like anyone looking for capital, it just wasn't there, and once the financial markets opened up, it was clear that this was a fantastic investment to make. It was literally one of the very first things that got funded. And by the way, there's well over $1 billion outside that consortium being invested in 3-D projection.

 

You've suggested 3-D could revive stagnating DVD sales and change television as well. How will that work?

 

Another report just came out that during the first quarter of this year, the DVD business is down another serious notch--at the same time that people are going back to movie theaters in droves. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to draw a map on this one. The audience has spoken, and it's our job now to give our customers the home-viewing experience they're looking for. Our partners at Samsung are estimating that in North America in 2010, there will be 35 million television sets sold, and of that, 10% will be 3-D capable. That number will increase tenfold in 2011. So as a rate of adoption of a new platform, that will be as fast as anything that has ever happened.

 

 

People have a hard time envisioning themselves with 3-D glasses on all the time.

 

Well, in the short term, I think this is more appointment television. We're talking primarily sports and video gaming. But in less than a year's time, people are going to be owning their own pairs of 3-D glasses. Almost all the eyeglass companies are gearing up to make 3-D glasses that will be more comfortable and fashionable and unique to whatever style you prefer. So the idea will be that when you go play golf, you take your golf clubs. When you go to the beach, you take your swimsuit. When you go to the movies, you take your glasses.

 

Is it safe to say that you see a world in which every surface could be a 3-D experience?

 

Yes. I imagine the iPad 3.0 is going to be 3-D-capable. It's going to become the standard. This is in the realm of science that exists today, so it's not really science fiction so much as science speculation. Almost any place where there are digital images, it will be [three] dimensional. And I think this will all seem totally natural. It's how you see the world naturally. That billboard that you look up at now that has no dimensionality--that's the thing that's pulling tricks on your mind.