Sir Peter Jackson has already revealed he's using a revolutionary new visual format to film his Hobbit movies, now he's considering adopting a new sound format.
Last Tuesday he showed a Las Vegas cinema convention 10 minutes of assorted clips previewing The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey in 3D at 48 frames per second, rather than the Hollywood standard 24fps.
"Three dimensional sound" through Dolby Atmos could be next on his agenda.
"Dolby are coming down to New Zealand to give us a demonstration," Sir Peter told The Hollywood Reporter.
"Our particular post-production schedule is reasonably tight (but) three dimensional sound would be fantastic. If we can do it I would be pretty keen."
Dolby says on its website that Atmos gives film makers unprecedented control of the placement and movement of sound within a cinema.
It says it integrates easily into existing audio post-production work flows, creates 128 "simultaneous and lossless" audio channels and allows for 64 discrete speaker feeds.
While The Hobbit will be the first major movie to use the new high-speed 3D visual technology, the Hollywood Reporter says Disney/Pixar's Brave will be the first film to test the Atmos format, and Dolby aims to install the sound system in 10-15 theatres worldwide for a trial run.
