How Does Screen X Work?

"What could persuade a potential movie-goer to pay (much) more to abandon the couch and go to the cinema again? The general idea is to provide experiences we could not have at home. One such experience is 3D. Another is what has been labeled 4D: Your seats move, there is artificial wind in your hair, and so on. But there is a relatively old technique that has made a surprising comeback in recent years and it is known as Screen X."

"One important reason for this comeback is the increasing ability of AI to create the side projections. Shooting with three cameras-one for the main screen and one for each side wall-is expensive. It's also somewhat wasteful, given that in the human visual system the periphery of the visual field is represented in a very indeterminate manner. So a crisp high-resolution technicolor projection and a blurry low-tech one would not actually be distinguishable."

Cinemas face steep competition from streaming services and lost habitual attendance after pandemic closures. Operators seek in-theater experiences unavailable at home, such as 3D and 4D, to justify higher ticket prices. Screen X expands the main screen onto side walls, creating immersive panoramic displays. The format spread beyond South Korean blockbusters to Hollywood releases. Advances in AI allow studios to extrapolate side-wall footage from the main-screen image, avoiding costly three-camera shoots. Human peripheral vision tolerates lower-resolution side projections, so AI-generated extrapolations can be convincing. Some visual oddities may still occur.

Read at Psychology Today