“I had the chance to meet Ray at the Stereo Club, and that’s when I started talking about making a film in 3D. At the same time I was developing a film to star in and direct, and the two ideas just merged. I thought, this would be fantastic to make as a 3D film because it’s a road picture – it takes place in a car, and you could really feel like you’re in the back seat of the car in 3D.”
Ray Zone was subsequently invited to be 3D consultant on Dark Country. An acknowledged guru of stereoscopic imaging, he has produced 3D books, magazines, movies and a 3D IMAX short called The Better Mouse Trap. He has also produced 3D murals, T-shirts and underwear for a range of international clients. “Dark Country is an exciting story,” he says. “It has many references to classic films, but it is completely original in the way the 3D storytelling is being done.”
He is sitting outside the diner where the interiors are being shot for the opening sequence of the movie. “Basically, 3D images require a left image and a right image,” he says. “Movies are the most challenging form of 3D to produce because you have to control both the left and right eye images. You are making two movies in effect, and it’s an art form that is just starting to come into its own through the use of digital capture.
“One of the important elements creatively on Dark Country is the use of the interaxial – that is, the distance between the left eye camera lens and the right eye lens – and the way it conveys subliminal psychological effects by using the look and feel of what you are seeing on screen. No film until Dark Country has manipulated the creative use of the interaxial – that is, varying the interocular distance between the lenses – to this extent.
“3D movies were at one time produced with two cameras, then projected with two projectors. This is the classic format that was used in the 1950s. But for over 100 years, 3D filmmakers have tried to find simpler ways to create the left and right eye images. In the 80s, the left and right eye images were put side by side on a single film frame and anamorphically squeezed to fit on the film, before being unsqueezed in projection. With digital and dual digital capture, such as we’re using on Dark Country, there is great flexibility in terms of how you manipulate and take them into post. It’s a great blessing for 3D, and now with 3D digital cinema there is a wonderful new technology where a single projector can project the left and right eye movies, using what is called the dual stream technique with polarizing filters and a single screen. So, 3D movies are now about to enter a golden age, to become a regular part of the entertainment paradigm and not just a gimmick. This means 3D filmmakers are going to have to learn how to tell stories in depth; how to make the depth a part of the narrative, and to use that in a creative way.
“There are a lot of visual cheats that filmmakers have used for over a century to convey depth on a flat screen,” he explains. “Moving the camera has been one of them from the earliest days, as has using different focal lengths to compress images to make you think an object is closer to another object than it really is. A lot of these cheats won’t work in stereoscopic imaging, so filmmakers have to find another way to tell the story and use the depth effect not just to create gimmicks that are exciting moments, but to elaborate the story and tell the narrative in a way that’s new. The audience experiences the story as a big window, in which things happen not only behind that window but also coming through it and out into the audience space. Psychologically, this can be very interesting, because part of the excitement of a 3D moment is that your personal space is invaded by the imagery – and that needs to be used in a subtle and sophisticated manner to create something that is complex, both on a psychological and a narrative level.”
Good and bad shots
“There are good and bad shots in 3D. The primary factor in making a 3D film is not to put the audience in pain when they’re watching. So you want to make a movie that has strong 3D effects, but is easy to view, and there are several things you have to pay attention to: one of the most important is the distance between the two eyes – the interocular or interaxial, as it’s called – and then how close objects are to these two lenses. The film frame itself is very important – storytelling may get away from excessive use of extreme close-ups and fast-cutting, shaky handheld camera movements, because when you look at a complex 3D image, you need time to look around it and through it. This implies a different pace for storytelling and different composition for the 3D narrative.”
Thomas shares Ray’s enthusiasm for using 3D subtly. “When you’re working in 3D,” he explains, “it’s my personal theory – backed up by Ray Zone – that like a suspense film, like a Hitchcock film, you want to build suspense and then release it; then build it back up and release it again. The same applies with 3D: you want to slowly usher your audience into a 3D world, hit them with some fantastic 3D shots and then back off, leaving them wanting more. It also allows the eye to relax, so that when the 3D hits you again, you’re surprised all over again. If we were to keep it full-bore 3D the whole film, then about 20 minutes in, not only would you forget that you were watching a 3D film, you’d also have a massive headache.”
Storyboarding
“Dave Allcock is a storyboard artist who worked with me and Geoff Boyle on Mutant Chronicles,” adds Thomas. “He is a fantastic visionary guy, and he came up with some really wonderful shots. So I stole him and brought him over to America and locked him in my house for two weeks. I could only afford him for two weeks, so I storyboarded the entire film in two weeks. Then for additional shots and developments in the script, I convinced Dave to continue to deliver storyboards for a ridiculously low sum of money, and we were able to pull together something that was great.”
“Thomas initially approached me about Dark Country while we were both working on Mutant Chronicles,” says David Allcock. “I know he’s been a life-long fan of 3D and wanted to capitalize on the major developments in the technology. I guess he liked the visuals on MC and wanted people who had a strong grasp of the new digital realm and multimedia approach. ‘A film noir/horror crossover? In 3D? I’m in!”. He said he liked my work, we talked about the project over a few whiskeys and before I knew it I was over at his house in LA scribbling away.
“Before I went to Thomas, he gave me a list of noir movies to watch for reference and inspiration. I’m not talking about a lot of the modern crap. I was watching the real stuff – hardcore noir classics such as Nightmare Alley, The Hitcher and Thomas’s favorite, Detour. I also threw my own favorite into the pot, Kiss Me Deadly, a stunning film. There is so much attitude and energy in that movie. You can’t beat a bit of Mickey Spillane/Mike Hammer. Ralph Meeker and Cloris Leachman just sizzle, and it has the best opening and closing sequences of any film I know. I looked at all this stuff in detail, studied the lighting and composition and started a sketchbook which I took over to Tom.
“I really liked the Dark Country script. It had great characters, loads of suspense and captured this Hitchcock vibe crossed with a wicked old piece from EC comics, like something straight out of Tales From The Crypt or Shock SuspenStories.
“In those two weeks we worked our way through the script. We’d sit at this big oak table with little action figures and a toy car and block it all out, scene by scene. Occasionally, I’d get Tom to pose and take snaps of him in certain positions or weird angles to get reference. We wanted to get some unique angles, and sometimes we let the camera go where it wouldn’t normally go. Most of the movie is set inside a car, so we had to make it interesting. I think they have about three versions of the hero car, one of which comes apart like a jigsaw puzzle, and one which probably looks like swiss cheese because of all the holes cut out for the camera to get in.
“After two weeks, I took the rough thumbnails with me back to London and spent about two months drawing it all up and emailing them to Tom as jpegs. The most fun was coming up with a car crash for a particular sequence. Tom told me he wouldn’t be shooting it practically because of time and money, so he was going to create a CG car which he could do whatever he wanted with. He just said, ‘go nuts Dave, thrill me..!’, so I came up with this crazy set piece and did a little animatic to fully demonstrate it. Tom loved it, but we’ll see how it ends up on screen – after all, my job is to make suggestions. There has to be room for maneuver on the day.”
Once Dave Allcock had drawn the storyboards, they were handed over to Ray Zone to convert them to a 3D color depth chart. “There are special techniques for storyboarding a stereoscopic screenplay,” explains Ray. “The storyboards themselves were quite detailed, and even had schematics for camera movements, ‘all-in-one’ shots and shooting ‘in the round’ on certain pages. They lent themselves quite nicely to encoding for depth.
“I proposed a schematic where the color red would designate imagery coming off the screen (negative parallax) furthest out into the audience. Orange depicted elements coming slightly off the screen and yellow indicated the stereo window – all those visual elements at screen plane. Elements just behind the screen were colored green and behind that blue. Distant visual elements at infinity were indicated with purple.”
A 3D future
Thomas pauses to reflect on his filmmaking future. “I don’t think I’m going to make a film that’s not in 3D,” he says at length. “It’s my feeling – now that we’ve proved we can put digital cameras where no 3D rig has been before – that probably more than 50 per cent of movies released in the next 10 years, starting in probably two, three or five years, are going to be in 3D. And, of course, you will always have your 2D version of the film.
“3D is so dynamic and it’s much easier on the eye now that we can move the interocular during a shot, to vary the extent of the 3D. We used to have to set a shot, set the interocular, shoot the shot and then choose a new set up, choose a new interocular, and shoot that shot, then edit those together. Now we can move our interocular during a shot and create a very pleasing experience.
“To me 3D’s like 5.1 surround sound, or cinemascope – or 70mm. If I did a film in Dolby Surround and every other shot I had someone talking from over here,” he gestures behind him, “and then from over there, and I was constantly whipping the sound around the theater, it would get pretty darn old after a very short period of time, but you can use Dolby to incredible effect, and I’m hoping the same thing happens with 3D. That’s why I’m making the film as subdued as I am – not trying to make a flashy 3D movie; I’m using it to tell the story. In this way, filmmakers will realize that 3D isn’t just a gimmick, isn’t something that only kids will watch, but something that enhances the theater-going experience.”
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Steve ParkerSteve Parker is editor of the Reel Show. His degree course in linguistics and ergonomics was completely wasted on him. He stood for election for the position of President of the Students Union (and won) so that he could spend a year organizing parties and drinking cheap alcohol. He became a journalist while at university and has been a slacker ever since. |