A fun new movie I recently went to see was Monsters vs. Aliens. It started just before a wedding with a bride growing (not glowing) from meteorite exposure, to enormous height and strength. Reese Witherspoon supplies the voice. Not a great movie but it is fun and the technology is fascinating. Monsters vs. Aliens was released on almost every 3-D screen avaible today with a count over 2000 and growing.Projections are for 40 new 3-D films within the next three years. RealD technology utilizes circular polarization, a technique with the polarization varying in a clockwise or counterclockwise direction. In Optometrists offices, polarized lenses and images are utilized in one constant plane tests for lazy eye (amblyopia) or crossed eyes (strabismus). Eye Doctors also use polarized equipment when treating binocular dysfunction for eyestrain, double vision, and convergence insufficiency causing vision related reading problems. Quality sunglasses enhance vision by using a fixed plane polarization to block reflections that occur most frequently from the surface of water. The RealD technology is comes with a high price tag costing theatres $50,000 to $70,000 per screen for the digital projection equipment and additional licensing fees. That’s why there is a nice little surcharge ($2.50 in Fort Collins) for the special eyeglasses needed. The neat thing is the circular polarization helps you maintain binocular vision and lessens eyestrain when you tilt your head, unlike older technologies. Less squinting and your eyes won’t leave the theatre with dry eyes from staring throughout the film trying not to see double. The first 3-D film shown to a paying audience was The Power of Love in Los Angeles in 1922. It was projected with anaglyphs, which involves showing a green image to one eye and a red image to the other which are shown from slightly different view points. Anaglyphs are still used by Optometrist in vision therapy for problems like Computer Vision Syndrome. Looking to the future, Steven Spielberg started work on a 3-D system in 2005 using plasma screens that is supposed to work without any special glasses! Coming to a TV near you some day.