Comprehensive Broadway Recordings Site – Sony Masterworks has just launched MasterworksBroadway.com – “Where Show Tunes Take Center Stage.” The site is celebration and testament to America’s unique art form of Broadway musicals and documents the history of the cast album from 1947’s Finian’s Rainbow to last year’s acclaimed Grammy and Tony-winning revival of West Side Story. The site will include a catalog of over 400 Broadway cast recordings and hundreds of never-before-seen recording session photos, a weekly blog by theater journalist/author Peter Filichia, a streaming library of cast recordings, and podcasts with notables including Stephen Sondheim, Angela Lansbury, Bernadette Peters and others. The site launch is being observed with prizes offered all this month as part of their “You Gotta Get a Gimmick” sweepstakes, and membership is free. Masterworks Broadway, Masterworks Jazz, Sony Classical, RCA Red Seal and Deutsche Harmonia mundi are all participating labels.
Some Directors Wary of Conversion of 2D Films to 3D – Clash of the Titans, which opened last Friday, was only shot in 2D and then later computer-converted to 3D, as was Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland. Many moviegoers don’t notice any difference in what some are calling “3D Lite.” (3D conversion can suffer from blurriness, ghosting, and flat backgrounds.) James Cameron, director of Avatar, cried sacrilege at the so-called “fake 3D” conversions. At least 70 movies are now in the 3D pipeline, so this is an important consideration. Shawn Levy, director of Night at the Museum, says “Filmmakers have to resist the current frenzy for all things 3D…to assess whether the movie’s tone and subject matter organically benefit from it.”
The 3D conversion process is complex and proprietary – the software determines which objects are in front of others, then the image in front is digitally brought even farther forward. An expert on the subject feels the quickie conversion of Clash was a mistake, but says that if the right money is spent and time taken, both native 3D and converted 3D can be exceptional, and even when not very well done most consumers will find it passable. The new 3D projector technology is greatly improved: digital projectors deliver precision images, eliminating most headaches and nausea, and plastic glasses have replaced cardboard ones (though you may want to take soft glass wipes with you since often the glasses are not cleaned between shows). And the movies are designed from the ground up for 3D, not just based on a few visual spears-in-the-eye effects.
Growth of Internet-TV Marriage – According to research company Park Associates’ report: Digital Lifestyles: 2010 Outlook, many households are making their own connections via their PCs and game consoles for web-on-TV. Those who connected a PC to their TV increased from 2008 to 2009 by 36% and those who used web-connected game consoles increased by 64%. Over three-fourths of U.S. households with PC-to-TV connections and one-third of Xbox 360 owners are using these connections to stream online video. An analyst observed that this lays the foundation for a strong future demand for connected TVs, Net-enabled Blu-ray players (not just BD-Live), and networked digital media players such as Apple TV and Roku.
