'The Polar Express' is bound for release in 3D IMAX format

Yes, Virginia, there really is a Santa Claus. And if you put on these glasses, it will look like he's sitting in your lap.

In addition to its much ballyhooed performance-capture animation, "The Polar Express" will have the distinction of being the first major studio motion picture to be released in 3D IMAX the same day the film hits multiplexes in its traditional 35mm format.

More than 70 theaters nationwide will show the film several times daily, and IMAX administrators are anticipating "The Polar Express" to be a holiday season "evergreen," both now and in years to come.

For the Mississauga, Ontario-based IMAX Corp., IMAX-ing "The Polar Express" meant converting existing footage to IMAX format via a process called digital remastering.

And for audiences, DMR means experiencing snowfall in the theater (without the need to bundle up!), taking a stomach-churning ride on roller-coaster-like train tracks and having the train screech just inches from your face.

"3D IMAX has a tendency to immerse you in the movie, to make it more emotional and more exciting," says IMAX president Greg Foster. "This will enhance what is already an incredible movie."

This is not, of course, the first time a major motion picture has been released in IMAX format. "Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones," "Spider-Man 2," the two "Matrix" sequels and "Apollo 13" have all been projected on the format's eight-story-high screens. None of those, however, have been digitally remastered for 3D capability.

There will be more, predicts Harry Murray, IMAX technical director and vice president of technology, although IMAX figures to choose its DMR conversion projects carefully.

"The IMAX market is a little different than the 35mm market," says Murray. "This is not the kind of place to put a double R-rated slasher movie."

In a 3D movie, two strips of film are projected onto the screen simultaneously to capture the perspective of the left and right eye. Special 3D glasses permit the left eye to see only the left image and the right eye to see the right image while the brain fuses the two images to create the feeling of three-dimensional "depth."

"The Polar Express" was constructed with 3D computer-generated modeling, but it is projected in two dimensions on traditional movie screens. For the 3D version, the left- and right-eye images are digitally remastered into IMAX DMR technology and recorded onto separate prints for 3D IMAX projections.