Digital 3D and the contemporary soundtrack: Competing cinema spaces

3D film allows filmmakers to create visual imagery that is no longer bound to the single plane of the screen. Often occupying the z-space, 3D imagery provides a suture beyond the narrative, by placing the audience within the frame. Although surround sound has been described as being 3D, and new immersive sound technologies are marketing themselves as being 3D, is the contemporary cinema soundtrack homogenous with the 3D imagery? As the image and the sound occupy two individual volumes within the cinematic z-space, the relationship between image and sound is fracturing, highlighting a dislocation. The relationship between the imagery and the soundtrack is being challenged with the added dimension of the visuals. This paper investigates