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Post #10. How to Train Your Dragon

The latest and greatest from DreamWorks has just emerged with the release of How to Train Your Dragon. The new 3D Animation How to Train Your Dragon was directed by Chris Sanders who was recently picked up by DreamWorks after being let go from Disney. Sanders is known for his work in Disney like The Lion King and The Beauty and the Beast. After leaving, Sanders took on the task of finishing a 3D film for DreamWorks in just a 14 month period, based on a child’s novel called How to Train Your Dragon. Even though How to Train Your Dragon is a great movie with its use of 3D animation and great story line, I feel that the story behind the movie is just as captivating.

Chris Sanders is known for his work in Lilo & Stitch and was recently dropped from Disney because of his style of animation in the preproduction of Bolt. But not to be dismayed Sanders was picked up for the final 14 months of production for the movie How to Train Your Dragon (the film had already been in production for 3 years) with well-known actors such as “McLovin” and Gerard Butler for characters. Sanders mentioned to the Washington Post that “The fun thing is, you’re working very hard for people not to notice the 3-D.” Sanders and others on the project closely looked at Coraline when finding the right time to place the 3D effects. He was also told that you could not have 3D scenes in the dark, which is something they experimented with.

When making 3D movies you use a special camera that records the images from two perspectives, then the special 3D glasses help provide the illusion of dimension. There are different techniques to making this effect, a couple of them; Anaglyph (red and blue glasses), polarization systems, and the Eclipse method. This movie is available in 3D or IMAX 3D. The difference between the two is that in the IMAX they corrected the mathematical 3D rendition which improved the eye fatigue and pain felt after the movie. How to Train Your Dragon was one of the first 3D movies to use the new Technicolor 35mm 3D system. More movies are using the 3D techniques causing theaters to try to convert to digital, increasing the ticket prices, while some theaters are getting low-cost adapter kits. Though I don’t know a lot about how 3D animation works I hope I provided some insight to what went on behind the scenes of How to Train Your Dragon. I would also like to say that I hope the future will still have a place for 2D animated movies.

I commented on Brittany Alberry’s post and Michael Griffith’s post

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