ABSTRACT
The perception of stereoscopic images is linked to a certain number of objective and quantifiable stimuli, which are translated by the viewer’s body into a range of sensations. A number of examples from 3D films 1 enable these subjective sensations, physically experienced although rarely verbalized, to be distinguished and described. They are also linked with the stereoscopic techniques that allow the body to experience them, confirming their objective character. Haptic sensation is perhaps the most interesting of the bodily effects resulting from the basic apparatus of 3D cinema, recalling Wheatstone’s original aim of simulating the actual presence of an object. Examples of ignoring what is normally considered “good practice” in modern stereoscopy, to produce the sensations of “Liliputism” or “Gigantism,” are explored; as well as the stimulation of such visceral sensations as vertigo, acceleration and displacement in films as varied as Gravity, Maleficent, and The Walk, leading to the conclusion that 3D cinema can now offer fundamentally new bodily experiences, potentially leading to the creation of new meanings.
