Sandy Climan, Hollywood's 3D Man

As head of 3ality, he's helping to bring a new generation of 3D to the big screen and, perhaps soon, to TV, too

By Ronald Grover

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Sanford R. "Sandy" Climan spent more than a decade as one of Hollywood's most powerful dealmakers. A top lieutenant to superagent Michael Ovitz, Climan represented such stars as Robert De Niro, Robert Redford, and Kevin Costner while brokering deals for Sony (SNE), Mastushita, and Seagram to buy Hollywood studios. These days he has a new role: bringing 3D movies, television shows, and live events to the masses on movie screens and, perhaps soon, on TV sets from which characters will seemingly pop off the screen and into your living room.

Older readers might recall 3D from the 1950s, when moviegoers donned dorky green-and-red cardboard specs for a Saturday matinee. And younger readers undoubtedly know 3D from IMAX theaters. Climan hopes to go further. The 52-year-old chief executive of 3ality Digital and his crew of 40 or so employees have developed a patent-pending system of turning films shot on two-dimensional cameras into 3D flicks using equipment including a rig that puts two cameras together—one to shoot for each eye—and then synchronizes them perfectly so their images appear to come off the screen.

So far, 3ality has produced a 3D concert movie by the band U2 and in early January shot a 3D college football game, the FedEx (FDX) BCS National Championship, that partner Cindedigm Digital Cinema (CIDM) beamed to more than 80 theaters.

By this time next year theaters will be cluttered with 3D flicks. Movie houses are hustling to install new digital projectors so they can boost revenue by charging the higher ticket prices that 3D features command. Film studios, which get about half of what theaters collect from showing their productions, see larger dollar signs, too, from 3D. Among the coming attractions: DreamWorks Animation's (DWA) Monsters vs. Aliens and Avatar, a sci-fi flick from Titanic director James Cameron. Meantime, Walt Disney (DIS) and DreamWorks have committed to making all their animated flicks in 3D, while Steven Spielberg and Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson are collaborating on a 3D Tintin.

Climan figures 3D won't be limited to theaters. His Burbank (Calif.) company has filmed a 60-second 3D commercial for PepsiCo's (PEP) SoBe Lifewater that will appear during the Feb. 1 Super Bowl. They've also used 3ality's technology to convert an episode of the NBC show Chuck into 3D, which will air the next day. In both cases, folks at home will need special cardboard blue-and-amber 3D glasses that are being made available at Kmart (S), Target (TGT) and several grocery chains. DreamWorks is also showing a 3D trailer of its Monsters vs. Aliens during the NFL championship. "Once you see a picture in 3D, you never want to go back," says Climan, "whether it's in a movie theater or your home theater."

Although 3D goes back to the early years of film, 3ality's movies and video employ technology that might finally bring 3D into the mainstream.

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