3D Cinema could provide new market for practitioners

With a new generation of 3D films being screened across UK cinemas, the sale of polarised spectacles could provide a new market for opticians.

That is the prediction from RealD, which is converting 500 screens for 3D projection in Odeon cinemas across the UK.

Jeffrey Katzenberg, head of DreamWorks Animation also believes that soon cinemagoers will own designer-style polarised 3D spectacles that they will take to the cinema.

The new generation of 3D movies - far removed from the 3D filmmaking of the 1950s - includes last November's animated blockbuster, Beowulf. DreamWorks Animation has declared that from summer 2009 all its films will be produced in 3D.