The thing about being in an inflection point is you won’t see it unless you’re truly looking ahead — or so far back that you can’t see the present any more.
Most people, most of the time, assume the future will be like the present. Until it’s not.
As I wrote here, our shift towards more and more “spectacular” computers (googles, headsets, glasses) means that we’re going to see much more stereoscopic media.
While it may seem like switching between shooting with one eye (lens) and shooting with two eyes (lenses) will be just a matter of 2x more resolution, I think we now have enough evidence to conclude that it will be something altogether different.
You can draw a sculpture but a sculpture seldom describes a drawing. It’s another thing.
Of course, it’s hard to look into the unknown.
Our brains are wired for familiar narratives – for guessing how a sentence will end based on what’s come before it. (It’s how Language Models work, right?)
We also have material incentives for assuming that new technologies will best serve existing businesses.
Movies are a well known business; they have prestige and a strong possibility of profits. So why not use stereoscopic capture and playback as part of the movie business?
But focusing on the present – or even the recent past – may miss the opportunity of what’s ahead altogether by insisting the new thing look like the old.
If anything what stereoscopic already looks like, more than anything else, is theater.
The surreal experience of people who are right in front of you pretending that they’re somewhere else, etc.