P3D Re: 3D and anamorphosis

[Marvin Jones <Campfire@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

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>A friend who is working on a 3D film has encountered the phrase 
"flat over/under". The person she was talking with gave the impression
that there were two types of over under, one being the aforementioned
"flat" kind...Could this possibly refer to anamorphic and non-anamorphic?<

I've only heard of one kind of "over/under", which is non-anamorphic. The
non-3D releases of these films (like the Warhol Frankenstein) ARE usually
anamorphic, since the image is closer to the standard anamorphic ratio than
the normal "flat" 1.85 image. (I believe that some were released
non-anamorphic, however, with the sides cropped slightly.)

As for your non-3D presentation of Frankenstein, it is possible that they
were simply not running a 3D print, but it's also possible that they were
running it in "pseudo" 3D, with the depth reversed, which some people don't
register as well as true 3D. The one major problem with over/under films is
that if, through bad splices or bad projector threading, they are being run
just two perforations out of register, you are getting the left eye image
from one pair to your right eye and the right eye image from the NEXT pair
to your left eye, which screws things up considerably. I once saw most of a
presentation of APE projected this way while the audience howled and
screamed in protest. I tried for a while to describe the problem and the
solution, as patiently as I could, to a pimply-faced adolescent at the
snack bar, who kept calmly telling me that I didn't know what I was talking
about--it was just FILMED this way! And they wonder why 3D didn't last!


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