Predicting the Rise and Rise of 3-D

Despite a recent downturn in popularity, 3-D movies aren’t just going to prosper, according to one of their most vocal proponents. They are going to change the way stories are told, and may even change the structure of the art form.

“Slowly but surely, it is regaining the regard it was first held in,” Jeffrey Katzenberg, the chief executive of DreamWorks Animation said in an interview. “Internationally, it continues to explode.”

The reason, he says, is a better sensory experience. “It amplifies all of the feelings,” he said. “There is better engagement and involvement with all of the characters.” That, he thinks, translates to more people in the seats.

On Friday, Mr. Katzenberg’s company is releasing “Madagascar 3,” a computer-generated animated comedy. Since 2009, DreamWorks Animation has released nothing but 3-D movies, each of which carries computing loads that cost the company an extraordinary amount of time and money.

“You’re making a separate movie for each eye” with 3-D, he said. It typically takes four years, and three billion computer renderings to make an animated feature with good visual quality. There are six terabytes of data in 150 seconds of animation. Each character consists of thousands of points and hundreds of layers of color and shape. “A world-class animator can render three seconds a week,” he said. Backgrounds are a whole other series of points and layers.

No wonder he keeps his technology suppliers close. Earlier this week, Mr. Katzenberg spoke at a Hewlett-Packard event in Las Vegas, endorsing both a new generation of computers that he said would speed up the work and Meg Whitman, H.P.’s chief executive and a member of DreamWorks’ board. (He has offered similar endorsements for H.P. since the days of Carly Fiorina.)

Mr. Katzenberg has been a proponent of 3-D since “The Polar Express” came out in 2004, he said. “It amplifies all of the feelings, your engagement and involvement in all of the characters,” he said.

The costs of 3-D are not the only challenge. After a rush of enthusiasm for 3-D in hits like “Avatar,” 3-D sometimes seems more like a money-losing gimmick. Mr. Katzenberg, however, maintains it is finding its way.

“There was some crummy stuff put out there for a while,” he said. “People only like it when it’s really good.” While he didn’t name any movies, many of the about 125 3-D movies released in modern times have been panned. The clunkers include not just well-known movies like “The Last Airbender,” but the inglorious “ Evil Bong 3-D: The Wrath of Bong.”

The problem with such movies may be more than high costs and bad scripts. Mr. Katzenberg said his staff had learned that different styles of editing and storytelling were needed in 3-D. “You don’t edit as quick,” he said. With a higher sensory intake, it is often necessary to cut scenes less abruptly, and linger somewhat longer in scenes. Otherwise, viewers are jarred.

Another hurdle, those special glasses you have to wear in the theater, will be overcome, he said. “When science delivers, it will be ubiquitous,” he predicted.