The 3D TV experience: Now being discussed in 2D!!

[MartyS (Gromit)]

 Voyage Of The Dawn Trader looks really nice in 3D, nothing done as a gimmick, just nice realistic depth to the scenes.  Some of the scenes with the green smoke do look more creepy in 3D.

This one might replace Despicable Me as the runner up to Avatar for the best 3D disc I have.

Also picked up Drive Angry but haven't watched it yet.

[MartyS (Gromit)]

The latest Pirates of the Caribbean works well in 3D at home, as does Thor.

Drive Angry has loads of 3D gimmicks that add to the insanity of that movie.

So, summing up 3D Blu-Rays I've seen so far rated solely for 3D quality and NOT movie quality:

Tangled : meh
Tron Legacy : meh
Wild Ocean : meh
7 wonders of the solar system : OK
Grand Canyon Adventure : OK
Secrets of the Pharaohs : OK
Coraline : OK
Despicable Me : good
Drive Angry : good
Pirates of the Caribbean : Good
Thor : Good
Voyage of the Dawn Trader : good
Avatar : great

[stansimpson]

I find a lot of that surprising actually.  The reviews for the 3D in Pirates and Thor have been average at best. What I've read, they're both darker films that don't really lend themselves to 3D a lot.  The day stuff in Thor I imagine is pretty nifty tho.

Have you seen The Ultimate Wave: Tahiti? I caught some of it on the 3D Discovery Channel.  Some great stuff there. It's no Avatar, Transformers 3, but still pretty neat.  I may have a predilection for underwater 3D stuff tho.  In any case, you should be able to find it for around $20.  Worth a shot imo.

Also, I hear the IMAX Hubble one is the best IMAX 3D blu-ray.  Any plans on getting that one?

[MartyS (Gromit)]

I find a lot of that surprising actually.  The reviews for the 3D in Pirates and Thor have been average at best. What I've read, they're both darker films that don't really lend themselves to 3D a lot.  The day stuff in Thor I imagine is pretty nifty tho.

Have you seen The Ultimate Wave: Tahiti? I caught some of it on the 3D Discovery Channel.  Some great stuff there. It's no Avatar, Transformers 3, but still pretty neat.  I may have a predilection for underwater 3D stuff tho.  In any case, you should be able to find it for around $20.  Worth a shot imo.

Also, I hear the IMAX Hubble one is the best IMAX 3D blu-ray.  Any plans on getting that one?

If the reviews are based on the theater experience I can belive that, since the polarized glasses cut down the light so much darker scenes end up too dark, this isn't a problem at home with the less dark shutter glasses and a nice bright TV.  So there's no problem with dark scenes having good 3D effects, scenes in caves and dark rooms have just as much depth as when out in daylight.  I find those dark scenes are sometimes better for 3D since you get added depth perception from lighting and fog effects, must help trick your brain into adding extra depth.

I think that ultimate wave one is one of the ones streaming on the Samsung Explore 3D app, I'll have to check it out.  I watched part of the Legends of Flight one and that was pretty cool.

I would like that Hubble 3D blu-ray but it's way too expensive, it's like $60...

[stansimpson]

I would like that Hubble 3D blu-ray but it's way too expensive, it's like $60...

Where are you seeing it at that price?  Best Buy has it for like $30.  I think it might be a BB exclusive.

[MartyS (Gromit)]

I would like that Hubble 3D blu-ray but it's way too expensive, it's like $60...

Where are you seeing it at that price?  Best Buy has it for like $30.  I think it might be a BB exclusive.

Most places online it's that high, I guess if it's a BB exclusive that would make sence.  The BB near me is a pain to get into (have to turn left accross 2 lanes), has a terrible parking lot, and the people working there are usually grumpy, so I hardly ever go there... 

[MartyS (Gromit)]

 The Imax Hubble 3D is now more reasonably priced on Amazon.

Update on good and bad 3D I've seen since my last list:

Arabia 3D, not that good, mostly just a personal documentary, very little worth seeing in 3D.

Monster House:  pretty good 3D, pretty good movie.

Imax Hubble 3D:  nice documentary, some good 3D, but lots of 2D and badly converted 2Dto3D make it kind of a waste of 3D.

Legend of the Guardians: The Owls Of Gahoole:  OK movie, OK 3D, nothing spectacular.

Puss in Boots:  good movie, OK to good 3D, on my setup it has the same problem as Tangled where when stuff trys to project out of the screen I see strong ghosting.

Cave of Forgotten Dreams:  Stunning views of the most ancient cave drawings yet discovered, the 3D really lets you experience how the drawings use the shape of the rock.  The Narration gets a bit strange in places but you'd expect that from Hertzog.

Hugo:  Wonderful movie, fantastic use of 3D.   I'm now putting this above Avatar for best 3D.  In Avatar the 3D being so good distracts you from the 2D characters and story, where in Hugo the great 3D enriches and pulls you into an already great story becoming part of it.

[stansimpson]

Hugo:  Wonderful movie, fantastic use of 3D.   I'm now putting this above Avatar for best 3D.  In Avatar the 3D being so good distracts you from the 2D characters and story, where in Hugo the great 3D enriches and pulls you into an already great story becoming part of it.

Dang it. I still need to see "Hugo". Now this makes me wanna see it in 3D all the more! I guess I kinda already figured that much when James Cameron hinted that it may have done a better job at 3D than "Avatar". I'm thinking the "standards" at this point have got to be "Avatar", "Hugo", and "Transformers 3".

[MartyS (Gromit)]

Just watched The Adventures Of Tintin in 3D.

Pretty good 3D.  They added nice depth in a lot of scenes, overall it adds a layer of realism to the animation.  I'd say it replaces Despicable Me as the best animated 3D movie I've seen.  And I'd probably put it 3rd overall behind Hugo and Avatar as far as 3D goes.

As for the movie, I liked it, but it seemed a bit too long.  Could have been better with fewer crazy chase scenes, or maybe just by making some of the longer ones shorter.

[MartyS (Gromit)]

Got 2 more 3D blu-rays.

How To Train Your Dragon, I missed this coming off exclusive deals a while back, I really like this movie and the 3D is very good, most of the flying scenes are spectacular, as well as the big battle at the end.

Dolphin Tale If you overlook the bits of clunky dialog and massive coincidences there's a pretty good movie in there.  3D is occasionally gimmicky, having seen it in 2D a few times I now see why they put the RC helicopter in there, for the one scene where it goes "out of control" and the camera follows it around.   The scene where they are designing the tail is pretty cool, the animated designs look really good in 3D.  Overall the 3D is pretty good and helps the movie.

The 3D and Blu-Ray resolution make it pretty easy to tell when it's a real or CGI dolphin, or CGI boy, especially the scene at the end where they push her into the water for the race, it's like she vaporizes as she hits the water.

Rant about the helicopter:  I've flown those things and the instant you lose control they crash, and you would never, ever, stand 3 feet away from one that size, or fly it anywhere there were people or animals around.  Those blades are spinning very fast.  That size heli would have sliced them up pretty badly and possibly killed them if it hit the kids.  They used some fancy camera work, editing, and CGI to make it look like the kids were flying it, but it's a bad example of RC heli safety.

[MrTorso]

Finally decided to grab a pair of 3D glasses for our new Sony Bravia we got for Christmas. It is not bad. Looks better at night when I can turn off all the lights and can't really see the edges of the TV. Haven't grabbed a blu ray yet as there really isn't any out there I want to spend the money on. I have downloaded a few SBS mkvs and they look pretty good.

[Space version 2.0]

Got myself a Samsung 51 inch plasma 3d Smart TV, which is actually my second 3d TV. So far the only movies I've watched are Thor and Nightmare Before Christmas. The 3d is nice in all the scenes not on Earth, but otherwise seems unnecessary. Nightmare, however, looks impressive the entire time. They did an incredible job converting it, especially the snow in the final scene.

Most of my 3d experience is gaming though (suck it Xboxers!). The HD version of Shadow of the Colossus is absolutely beautiful. Resistance 3, however, isn't great. Pretty blurry at times and just hard to focus in general. Might just need to turn down the depth though. Once the GOTY version of Arkham City is released I'll be playing that in 3d as well.

[MrTorso]

I tried watching the new 3D Jet Li flick and while it looked pretty good, it was hard to read subtitles. They were just hard coded on the video and it gave me a headache.

[MartyS (Gromit)]

 Just watched the John Carter 3D Blu-Ray.

Another meh 3D experience, seems like they could have done more with it, especially with all the jumping and stuff flying around.  If the 3D during the movie was as good as the end credits it would have been great.

I'll have to watch again to really decide what I think of the movie itself, there were moments I thought it was crap, moments when I thought it was good, and lots of time in between.

[MrTorso]

Have any of the 2D converted to 3D flicks been more than "meh"?