For over a year now, I’ve been referring to one quote from James Cameron over and over in the many articles I’ve written about 3D. Cameron stated way back in 2008 at the 3D Entertainment Summit, while talking about Alice in Wonderland (which is incidentally due out in a few weeks), that it “doesn’t make any sense to shoot in 2D and convert to 3D.” In another new interview segment at MTV, Cameron talks about how 3D is still being used improperly in Hollywood. “But it’s typical of Hollywood getting it wrong, right?” he asks. Indeed it is. But his new quotes from this are some of the best I’ve heard. You tell ‘em Cameron!

They start by referencing the red and blue 3D from the Grammys and how big of a trend 3D has become.

“So there is an evolution, people are now starting to not accept inferior forms [of 3D], which is good. But it’s typical of Hollywood getting it wrong, right? We do a film that’s natively authored in 3D, shot in 3D, so they assume from the success of that, that they can just turn movies into 3D in 8 weeks… and that’s going to work somehow.”

Cameron was then asked if he’s optimistic about Clash of the Titans and goes on to say that he has no hope.

“But it’s just not the way to do it, if you want to make a movie in 3D, make the movie in 3D! And by the way, it should be a filmmaker driven process, not a studio driven process. I’ve been telling filmmakers for the last five years, [there's] this whole new way to paint, a whole new set of colors, and they’ve all kind of hung back. Now it’s getting crammed down from above, and people are getting told to make movies in 3D, and it should’ve been the other way around, they should’ve been banging on the doors of the studio saying, ‘I want to make a movie in 3D, let me do it!’ And it didn’t happen.”

This is why I love James Cameron. Everything this guy says is just solid gold. I love it, this is exactly what I believe about 3D, too. If only Hollywood (and filmmakers) would’ve been smarter from the start about 3D, it wouldn’t have been ruined by this point, and we could still be appreciating it in proper doses. Not to say we can’t appreciate great 3D movies like Avatar and Coraline, but it’s now become this annoying trend in Hollywood to convert everything to 3D. But the problem is really what Cameron is saying – they’re all trying to convert it to 3D after the fact. Why don’t they shoot in 3D from the start? That’s how it should be done.

If you’ve been reading this site since we published that quote back in 2008, you’ve probably heard me gripe about 3D more than enough over the last few years. But every time I see a new quote like this, I just have to feature it, because it’ll help everyone understand what needs to be done for 3D to get on the right track. We got a taste of how great 3D can be with Avatar, but Hollywood and the studios need to learn that converting movies like Clash of the Titans and Robin Hood to 3D in post-production doesn’t mean it’ll look any good. As Cameron says, “people are now starting to not accept inferior forms [of 3D].” When will they learn?

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