The Mad Magician 3D (1954)

[Indicator]

Originally Posted by GlacierTuba

I don't understand the connection, but you also get two short films featuring The Three Stooges on this disc, and BOTH are in 3D!

The connection is that they were made at the same time by the same studio in the same 3D process, and were available for licensing from the same rightsholder in the same format. So including them was a bit of a no-brainer.

This one was a fascinating technical challenge to work on, because none of us had had any experience with 3D projects, and neither had David Mackenzie, which is why this is the only Indicator release not to be authored by him. There were all sorts of unexpected challenges, notably the fact that the hard-of-hearing subtitles had to be positioned on the Z axis as well as the usual X and Y ones, and positioned appropriately to avoid causing eyestrain. (This also required specialist assistance.)

Aardman were incredibly helpful behind the scenes to an extent over and above their participation in the new documentary - it's thanks to them that producer Anthony Nield was able to QC the disc in 3D, because he (not unreasonably) didn't have the right equipment himself and lives close enough to Aardman for that to be feasible. Meanwhile, the disc's technical producer Michael Brooke had to pick up a second-hand 3D monitor on eBay, although thankfully there was one going for just £75 that did the job to perfection, and happily his Blu-ray player turned out to be 3D-compatible.

Oh, and the commentary's huge fun, but should ideally be watched in tandem with the film. Jonathan Rigby and Kevin Lyons' stuff tends to be extremely shot-specific, and this is no exception - and you're not going to get the same pleasure out of, say, things like them highlighting a glaring onscreen mistake if you can't actually see it at the same time.