BACK in the 1950s, we put on cardboard glasses with different coloured lenses, and went to the cinema to watch awful 3D monster movies. It proved a short-lived gimmick.
But 3D is back in a new hi-tech system and movie-makers like George Lucas have already started pre-production on three-dimensional films.
A handful of films have already been released in the new format and yesterday Liverpool finally got its first digital 3D cinema.
At the Picturehouse Cinema at FACT, general manager Guillaume Silvy-Leligois proudly showed to a select audience just what 3D cinema can do.
The first difference is that the entire film arrives inside a box about the same size as an old LP carrying case and the film itself is a box-like computer placed directly into the projector. For cinema-goers, there are plastic glasses looking rather like sunglasses. The effects can be quite astonishing, particularly with animated films.
Impressive, too, were various animated advertisements and a 3D version of Tim Burton’s animated comedy-horror Nightmare Before Christmas.
Less successful was coverage of an American football game in which the 3D was rather distracting. Films pass through a projector at 48 frames a second, so the flicker that used to cause eye problems has been eliminated, explained Silvy-Leligois.
The first 3D presentation will be for a week from Friday with showings all day from 11am of the Disney concert film, Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert
