Attack of the Killer 3-D Glasses. © 2005 Jerome Holst
 

Run for your lives! They're coming! We can't stop them. They're red and blue and Really, really stupid looking!

 

 

 

Once again, it's sweeps month, and this time around, the powers that be (namely, the NBC TV network) have decided that it's time for TV viewers to put on a pair of silly 3-D glasses.

Why? To watch their upcoming episode of MEDIUM on NBC, of course. The show stars Patricia Arquette as Allison Dubois, a married woman who can see and communicate with the dead. As Count Floyd of SCTV would say, "EEWW! That's Scary Stuff!"

Although I find the idea of 3-D glasses goofy to the max, I am a fan of the show MEDIUM and I will definitely be watching the program. Who knows. If peer pressure gets too heavy, I might commiserate and plop a pair of 3-D glasses on my nose just to fit in with everyone else. (Want to see me in 3-D glasses? Click Here ).

If you are entertaining the notion of wearing 3-D glasses, you can get a free pair inside TV GUIDE Magazine (on news stands November 17th). Of course, you may already have a pair of 3-D glasses sitting idle in one of your drawers from the past TV experiments with 3-D. What's that's? There have been other programs with 3-D. Well, sad to say, there have.

The idea of 3-D images have been floating around since the early 1900s. The Brothers Lumiére hosted the very first publicly shown 3-D short (about a minute) in 1903 entitled L'Arrivée du Train that featured the arrival of a train in a railway station. Great entertainment for its time.

A few years later, the first 3-D film to require the audience to wear 3D glasses (red/green anaglyphs) debuted with "The Penman" starring John Mason and Marie Doro which was shown on June 10th. 1915. at the Astor Theatre in New York.

The first 3-D feature film was Power of Love (1922), starring Terry O'Neil and Barbara Bedford about the adventures of a sea captain in 1840s California. Directed by Nat Deverich, the 5-reel melodrama premiered at the Ambassador Hotel Theater, Los Angeles on September 27, 1922.

I wasn't until the 1950s that the 3-D glasses craze began to boom with the release of Bwana Devil (1952) about two-man-eating lions gone amuck in Kenya (remade in 1996 as The Ghost and the Darkness with Val Kilmer).

As each visitor entered the theater, they received a disposable pair of cardboard glasses to view the movie produced by Sidney W. Pink - who produced over fifty 3-D movies.

The following year, Vincent Price starred in House of Wax (1953), the first full-color, stereophonic 3-D movie in which Price played a mad museum curator who liked to make statues out of real people.

The gimmick of the 3-D films is to have images pop out of the screen. So, for instance, if a native warrior in the film threw a spear in the direction of the audience, anyone wearing glasses would flinch or duck because the weapon "appeared" to flying out of the movie right in their faces. You can imagine what a wild lion jumping towards the audience would do.

Since the 1950s, however, films with 3-D formatting have not been able to sustain their initial craze, but, from time to time, the gimmicky genre is reintroduced for public consumption.

The 1980s and 90s produced such lack luster 3-D films as   Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare, Friday the 13th Part 3,  Amityville 3-D. and Jaws 3.

Now, before NBC airs its 3-D MEDIUM episode on November 21st, let's take a look at some other 3-D attempts to have hit the TV screen in previous years.

Oh, and you won't need a pair of 3-D glasses to read the list.

 

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• 1950s - In the early 1950s, ABC was granted permission by the Federal Communications Commission to explore the feasibility of 3-D TV. On April 29, 1953 the network ran a trial live broadcast of the series SPACE PATROL in Los Angeles at the National Association of Radio and Television Broadcasters 31st Annual gathering. The ABC affiliate station KECA-TV aired the show but it appeared as only a blur unless viewers had a pair of special Polaroid lenses.
  (Three-Dimensional television attempts to give the same depth of viewing as the human eye).

• The first "non experimental" 3-D TV broadcast was over SelecTV, a Los Angeles pay TV system in December 19, 1980. The program consisted of the 3-D feature film Miss Sadie Thompson (1953), starring Rita Hayworth, and Spooks (1953), a 3-D short starring the Three Stooges (Moe, Larry & Shemp).

• MOONLIGHTING: Episode "In God We Strongly Suspect" (February 1986). At the top of the show during a teaser for that night's program, characters Maddie Hayes (Cybill Shepherd) and David Addison (Bruce Willis) confess that the show was supposed to have 3-D elements in it, but because the post office never delivered the required 3-D glasses, the expected show was canceled. Note: Glenn Gordon Caron, the creator/writer on 'Moonlighting' had wanted to actually do a 3-D episode, but the technology didn't exist to produce a satisfactory project. Years later, Caron created the NBC series MEDIUM and finally had a chance to produce his 3-D event -  wherein "Allison encounters the work of one artist, disturbing, 3-dimensional images emerge that lead her to believe that the man behind these alarming canvasses may have a deadly secret."

• MARRIED WITH CHILDREN - The eighth season episode "Assault and Batteries" (May 8, 1994) was part of a FOX 3-D "FOX-o-rama" special. The end credits featured Al and Peg wearing 3-D glasses and looking at the names scrolling by on a screen. Peg said "I don't get it." Peggy's picture is actually seen on the box for her 3-D glasses.

• THIRD ROCK FROM THE SUN - 1996  season 2 finale.  The dream sequences for this episode were filmed in 3D.  Anchor Bay Entertainment and Carsey-Werner later released the "Behind the Scenes - 3D Episodes" which included bloopers, a never-before-seen ending, a free pair of 3D glasses and a 4 minute, 35 second feature which shows some of the film techniques used in making the 3D episodes as well as commentary from creator Bonnie Turner and the cast. 

• HOME IMPROVEMENT - "The Feminine Mistake" (May 6, 1997) Tool Time gets the go-ahead to create a special 3-D effects show, featuring in-your-face antics from Tim, Al and Heidi. Portions of this episode were filmed in 3-D. The ABC project evolved into nine shows: FAMILY MATTERS, COACH, THE DREW CAREY SHOW (TDCS was the first "three" camera 3D TV production in history),  SABRINA THE TEENAGE WITCH, STEP BY STEP, HOME IMPROVEMENT, ELLEN, SPIN CITY, and AMERICA'S FUNNIEST HOME VIDEOS.

• RUGRATS "Dust Bunnies" (September 27, 1997) This episode was part of a special week of 3-D programming called "Nogglevision" which was also featured on such shows as Kablam!, Hey Arnold, Alex Mack & Shelby Woo. Sponsored by Nick and Kraft Foods, this special event introduced, for the first time, "Chroma-DepthTM" (by Chromatek), the only technology compatible for print, TV and online. The shows could be viewed successfully without the "Noggle-Goggles."

• SHARK WEEK (Summer 2000) LensCrafters distributed 6.4 million Pulfrich glasses produced by America Paper Optics with a special patented 3D viewing system for an in-depth broadcast of Discovery Channel's Shark Week in 3D. 
  
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For a more in depth look at the 3-D film process and the different type of glasses used to view the movie screens, or a list of more 3-D movies, check out these sites of interest below:

• How Things Work

• Paper Optics

• Bad Fads Museum

• Illustrated 3-D Movie List

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NOTE: This article may be linked or copied for distribution to other Internet publications with the agreement that you will credit the article to the author, Jerome A. Holst and mention its URL -  http://www.tvacres.com/archives_3D.htm