If Apple TV+ were to finance the production of a movie that was specifically formatted for VR, for total VR immersion, and had a major director attached to it, like James Cameron, Christopher Nolan or Stephen Spielberg, could that be enough to convince people to buy the Vision Pro?
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Vision Pro and the future of VR movies
- Thread starter wrcousert
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I don't think one movie would do much. A regular stream of specially formatted content would do more for Vision Pro sales. The WWDC keynote seemed to suggest that perhaps Disney might be interested in doing that.
Most movies are shot (or have been shot) in 2D and made into 3D movies in postprocessing.... and it shows -- at least to me... you literally see that the movie is layered like one of those storybooks that pop up 2D images into 3D
I can't stand sports. I'd rather use VR to watch half hour series on Disney+ and Netflix, in fully immersive VR mode.
Then be prepared for big ATV+ shows next year that will give you full 4K in 3D for both eyes, the ones you can not find anywhere else. I'd very surprised if The Foundation S3 wouldn't be filmed in 4K 3D.
I think VR is great for experiences, especially interactive. But I’m still not really sold on VR movies. To me, watching a movie is the same as being told a story. When I’m told a story I want to be passive and only be told what’s important for the story. I don’t want to waste time looking around at things that aren’t crucial to pushing forward the story.
3D on the other hand—if it’s as crazier of an experience with an XR headset than on a screen as I’m hearing—I might get into that. But I don’t think that wouldn’t get a the masses to buy a VP.
3D on the other hand—if it’s as crazier of an experience with an XR headset than on a screen as I’m hearing—I might get into that. But I don’t think that wouldn’t get a the masses to buy a VP.
Agreed. A VR movie could be tiring.
But I'd be down for a 180 degree VR movie if that's what Apple might be going for. I believe they demoed Immersive Videos that are 180 degrees at WWDC.
So TV shows or entire movies shot in that format would be neat.
Something like ScreenX, for example, but more polished:
I’m curious about a totally 360° VR movie like Star Wars. Be able to see all around you during a space battle or something
I'm super curious to see if we get content like that. Even a 30 minute show would have insane replay value because of all of the different areas you could look.
I don't think 3D flopped because people not wanting to wear glasses. It flopped because very few things were actually shot in 3D, most were post conversion. Also active 3D was terrible, caused so much fatigue. Very few TVs actually did 3D right. It was a massive difference seeing something like Avatar in 3D at a theater vs watching it at home with the terrible offerings at the time.
Although the glasses were a factor, I don't think 3D cinema would have been significantly more successful if it didn't require them. There are other aspects of it that lead to visual fatigue that are not directly related to the glasses.
There isn't the same visual fatigue from the 3D nature of VR, because it matches your natural perspective. When I'm using VR, I am not constantly thinking "this is 3D", because it just looks like my natural vision, but not as sharp. The main area of possible fatigue would be from the vergence/accommodation conflict, but that shouldn't be much of an issue if you are displaying mostly 2D windows at the distance that Apple showed.
I'm not sure what a movie formatted for VR actually means, unless it's realtime CG. Two camera stereo breaks down as it covers more of your FOV. It doesn't respond to lateral head movement. What would set it apart from traditional 3D cinema?
You don’t know that to be true. AR/VR tends to impact people’s sense of balance. Some reports already suggest AVP produces the same effect.
Don't know what to be true? I was describing my actual experience with 3D cinema and VR. Stereoscopic cinema is fundamentally different than 3D content that is rendered in real time to line up correctly with the realtime position of your head and eyes.
VR impacts my sense of balance if the movement of the virtual world doesn't line up with the movement of the real world. That depends on what software I'm using. But I've largely acclimated to motion mismatch if it doesn't involve rotation. But even most people new to VR should do fine if the virtual world stays steady around them, with no artificial locomotion. If they ride a VR rollercoaster, yeah, it'll throw them off balance.
You don’t know whether people will find AVP disorienting or not. In general AR/VR has been quite effective at making people feel like they want to throw up. Maybe AVP won’t suffer from the same effect but we can’t know for sure until lots of people are using it.
The glasses were on the bottom of the totem pole of home 3D problems. Cross talk, brightness, piss poor post production 3D (Marvel Disney for example), lack of real 3D movies and poor 3D tech in tv's, all would rate ahead of the glasses. I luv 3D movies when they are done right and have lots of 3D movies. They do look better using a good projector. If the glasses were the main barrier for 3D, heck it would be a hit for movies.
And it required additional equipment, like a blu-ray player compatible with 3D movies. And there was basically no streaming support... it looks like Netflix had sixteen 3D movies at one time, and I've only heard of one of them. I've never had cable TV, but I'm guessing content there was non-existent as well.
3D movies were a fad and people got bored of them after a while, its a simple as that. There's only so many times something jumping out at you is going to be something special.
The main thing about 3D movies was the depth not pop outs but a well placed pop out was a plus. We see in 3D not 2D. Meaning we see depth and not flat. Wether it's a trick our brain does and all the other explanations about our sight, we see in 3D/depth.
I think Vudu has a separate area for 3D films also. I seen it but never tried because I have most if not all the movies that I would care to see from them.
2 of the 3 highest grossing films of all time were primarily viewed in 3D. I'd hardly consider that a fail.