TRON and Voyage of the Dawn Treadera

Jay Young · January 3, 2011

I LOVE Narrative Drama. I like the TRON story, world, feel and emotion it brings. I have always liked the Narnian stories. I recently saw both of these films in 3D, only because I had no choice.

Mind you, I HATE 3D, and feel it should be dis-invented.

Now TRON takes place in the real world, and inside a computer. At the beginning of the film, they even TELL you that some scenes are going to be in 2D because that's the way they were shot. I don't know what the primary acquisition format was, but apparently 40 minutes of the film were shot in IMAX. It looked like film, it felt like film, even tho I watched it in a Digital projection. The 2D scenes look good, of course. I feel that 3D makes them far darker than they would be sans 3D. Also, for this film only, 3D actually seems to make sense. It's not like they took a film, made a poor 3D conversion, slapped a 3D label on it and called it a day. I was actually OK with the 3D inside the computer scenes, but only just. It works for TRON.

Voyage of the Dawn Treader is a completely different story. Sources say it was shot digitally, which shows at times, bringing my mind out of focus and loosing my complete immersion in the story. The 3D conversion was horrible. It is sadly the WORST 3D FILM I have ever watched. The Story was great, and I feel this film has merit, but I simply can not, ever, watch another 3D film, if this is the the direction the industry is headed.

Slap a 3D label on it, do a quick conversion, and make MORE MONEY! I paid $25 for us two to see this film. I normally pay $14 for two people.

I feel this is just the industry's way of getting more money for shitty work.

Shame on you.

Adrian Sierkowski · January 3, 2011

Tron:Legacy was shot on the Sony F35 as well as the Phantom (select h/s shots) with Arri Master Prime lenses, according to AC Magazine, Jan '11.

Antti Näyhä · January 3, 2011

I don't know what the primary acquisition format was, but apparently 40 minutes of the film were shot in IMAX.

As Adrian noted, Tron Legacy was completely shot with digital cameras. In IMAX theatres, around 40 minutes of the film is just presented in the full IMAX aspect ratio (close to 1.37:1), while the rest of the film is shown in letterboxed 1.85:1 (?). So it's no wonder you got confused.

This is similar to what The Dark Knight and Transformers 2 did, except they only used the full IMAX ratio for scenes shot in IMAX, which kind of made sense. In Tron's case, however, it seems they're actually using less resolution for the "enhanced" scenes – unless the F35 can somehow shoot native 4:3?

Whatever the case, the trailer looked very digital to me, although the look seemed to suit the virtual reality scenes. Hoping to catch a 2K 3D screening this week.

Adrian Sierkowski · January 3, 2011

See I opted for the 2D and for me it was 2.40:1 which was nice and it stayed that way! I agree, it felt digital, but at the same time, it like District 9 and Cloverfield felt "right," being digital.

KH Martin · January 5, 2011

As Adrian noted, Tron Legacy was completely shot with digital cameras.

Actually there are a few shots on film. They didn't want to risk damaging the 3D rig for some kind of bike jump (haven't seen the movie, don't know the circumstance, except I guess it is in the realworld seegment.)

I've got a piece in HD VIDEO PRO magazine about the film that just went on the site at: http://www.hdvideopro.com/display/features/technologic.html

I'm guessing the reason another poster further up mentioned that it looked or felt like film is because the DP did his best to introduce film-like depth of field, even though that kinda breaks the rules for 3d shooting.

Edited January 5, 2011 by KH Martin