Originally published in MicroFilmmaker Magazine Jan 1, 2010
by A.J. Wedding
“Stereoscopic 3-D is the most exciting evolution in cinema presentation since color and widescreen. The question for film-makers is not ‘why 3D?,’ since the reasons are obvious, at least to audiences, and the negatives have all been removed. The question should be ‘how do I make 3D a part of my art?’”
-James Cameron (Avatar, Titanic, T2)
It’s not a decision you should make lightly, but having a 3D version of your film can add significantly to its hopes of distribution. Even the web is starting to embrace 3D films, with Youtube 3D and several other destinations popping up all over the ether. So how do you make your movie in 3D? Too complicated? Not anymore. Like the recent Red and Redrock revolution, even 3D tools are coming down within reach of us low-budget plebians. The best and most cost effective tool is Dashwood’s Stereo 3D Toolbox for FXFactory.
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| Stereo 3D automatically makes your main video track the left (dominant) eye. You can then put in your synced up second camera video, just by dragging and dropping. |
Ease Of Use
First of all, don’t think you’re just going to shoot your film and then make it 3D in post. It’s a decision you need to make in preproduction, which will allow you to plan your shots properly. If you think about what 3D actually is, it’s just like when you experience the world with both eyes open. The combination of your two eyes linking information gives your brain detailed info about depth, which keeps you from running into the car in front of you…hopefully. What I’m getting at is you need to shoot your project with two cameras. (At least, any of the 3D sequences.) There’s no big trick to it, just set them next to each other like a pair of eyes. When the new RED Epic and modular Scarlet come out, you will actually have the option to mount two of the camera bodies on the same frame, so it will be much simpler to shoot 3D.
Second, you need to get FXFactory. (Only available for Mac, sorry PC folks!) It’s a fantastic program, and has an open platform so that even you can create your own effects and transitions for FCP and AE. There are several great plugins that come with FXFactory, and free trials of others, including Stereo 3D Toolbox, which you’ll definitely want to purchase after you try if you’re doing true stereoscopic 3D work. (One brilliant cinematographer/stereographer, Tim Dashwood, has put in the gruntwork on this one.)
If you have footage you have shot in 3D, you will find this to be a remarkably simple process. The plugin works with the drag-and-drop principle, allowing you to sync up your Left Eye and Right Eye clips and easily make adjustments after that. Quite often you will find several little problems in post when you’ve shot in 3D. Sometimes the horizon lines don’t match…sometimes just converging the two images creates gaps or borders, things you just can’t have in 3D filmmaking. These things are easily adjusted in the effect controls.
Everything is very familiar and easy to operate, but you have to learn as you go, as far as what you are attempting to accomplish. With renders taking a good amount of time, it takes a while to get the hang of just what you are trying to accomplish. Luckily there are several well thought out video tutorials on Dashwood’s website.
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| You can easily adjust the convergence, and output to any of the available 3D modes. |
Depth Of Options
In addition to the variety of controls you can use to adjust each of your two layers separately, you also have many options when it’s time to output your creation. Virtually any type of 3D output…anaglyph, side by side, over/under, interlaced, or checkerboard. The best part about it is that you only need to apply the filter once in order to output to any of the aforementioned formats. The adjustments that you make can be keyframed all along the timeline, in case settings need to change over time.
Like every effect in FXFactory, you can use Stereo 3D Toolbox with a multitude of programs. Final Cut Studio, Motion, After Effects, and even Final Cut Express. In After Effects, you can even use Stereo 3D Toolbox with animations.
From what I can see on the support and blog pages, the designers are working on every possible output and input source, and are hoping to create the most complete 3D software plugin available. You can bet that if you have a question that they can’t answer, they are working on it. As an example, Dashwood Cinema Solutions has stayed up with the current updates from Youtube, and supports their output format for 3D videos.
Performance
I have to be honest, I didn’t have a ton of 3D footage to use as an example, because I never believed I could afford to do it! But as soon as I saw the output that this plug in could accomplish, the gears started turning. Now I want to build some type of dual fluid head mount so I can shoot in 3D all the time!
I will say that it does take forever to render, and I have a system with 8 Gigs of RAM. However, I find that this is true with almost any effect or plug-in that’s truly worth its salt. (As I learned through the course of this review, Stereo 3D Toolbox is optimized more efficiently for VRAM, as opposed to system RAM. As such, for faster rendering, a video card with more VRAM will improve its performance more than extra system RAM will.)
It’s hard to tell without a professional 3D viewing environment, but I would say that the work I’ve seen and done with Stereo 3D Toolbox could easily hold up to the work of Hollywood pros. It takes one element of difficulty away and levels the playing field once again, leaving it up to you to focus on the most important element of filmmaking…a great story.
Value
I’m actually quite surprised that Stereo 3D Toolbox is just a plug-in. They could easily have created an ‘all-in’ stand-alone software for creating 3D products, but the designers recognized the great efforts that other companies have gone through to create an easy-to-use interface. It also allows them to offer the plug in at a significantly low price. For what you get, the introductory price of $389 is practically nothing. Well worth the investment when you decide to make a 3D project. (Of course, with the increased competition of PC editing environments, the designers would do well to seriously consider creating a PC version. Hopefully that will be part of the new second version which they are planning to announce at NAB 2010.)
Final Comments
Several times in my life I have been enlightened by a product that raised the level of my creative possibilities. The digital video camera, Final Cut Pro, and the Redrock Micro to name a few. Each one raised the bar for me. Stereo 3D Toolbox has done it for me once again. 3D movies are now within our reach!
Overall Score: 9.0