IF Magazine asked Rick McCallum about the Star Wars 3D versions rumored to be in the pipeline for 2007 . . .

3D we’re working on, and it’s just a question of how many theatres are out there. Hopefully by the end of this year there will be about fifteen hundred theatres. We need about two or three thousand before it makes it viable for any of us to go forward with 3D. That looks like it’s going to happen sometime in the year 2007, so I am unbelievably happy about that. The 3D is something I’m really happy with. We’re not sure when the technology will be totally there. I think there are a lot of major filmmakers interested. [James] Cameron is interested in re-doing TITANIC and TERMINATOR 2. Peter [Jackson] wants to do all of the LORD OF THE RINGS movies. We want to do all six STAR WARS, and we know there is hunger out there. There is a dimensionalization process by a company called M3 that we’re all working with. They have proprietary software that creates a double image that produces a 3D effecting post-production after you’ve filmed a 2D film. It’s amazing. You use wonderful glasses that are flicker free, they are hooked up to a wireless transmitter in the theatre. It has to be digital cinema, that’s our problem. That’s what makes it great, and it makes it a problem because there aren’t enough theatres out there to make fiscal sense.

All those films would kick in 3D. Doesn’t actually have to be digital, the process works for polarized as well (my good friend at Anachrome already has a non-digital kit that will convert film theatres cheaply to good solid 3D projection capability with much more light than traditional polarized systems (one of the big problems with polarized systems is the light loss). That would make the new wave of 3D films accessible to many more theatres rather than the proprietary digital 3D system Lucas is riding on partly due to the desire to push the digital transition and partly due to licensing and server controls among other reasons.

We still don’t have any digital 3D theatres in Taiwan, let alone my neck of the woods . . . so . . . while this is all exciting stuff to me as I LOVE 3D cinema, it is all hypothetical as the expense of converting as well as this particular licensing strategy is out of the ballpark here . . . for now. I imagine someone will eventually put one in but studios need to guarantee more than one lousy kiddie 3D film per year (last year Chicken Little and this year Monster Houst) to draw exhibitors into the expensive gamble especially since a number of chains already bought into the previous digital system Lucas and friends pushed only to now be told they have to upgrade to another system in order to jump on the 3D bandwagon.