Josh Greer is the co-founder and president of Real D, the leading 3D visual delivery system in the world. Greer is the epitome of an improvisational player in business, and Real D is proof that no successful improvisation happens solo. Greer had partners. For example…Real D owes its existence to Puff, the Magic Dragon. You know. Lived by the sea? Land of Hona-lee? That Puff.
Seems that Lenny Lipton, who wrote the song “Puff the Magic Dragon” back in the sixties (when urban myth held that the song was about smoking marijuana–it was not) with Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul and Mary fame, put his ‘Puff money’ into developing the stereoscopic vision system on which Real D is based. If you’re a cinema geek, you’ll want to read up on it.
Our interest here is how improvisation helped bring Real D from a notion in Josh Greer’s noggin to a company that next year will manufacture and sell 80 million pairs of 3D glasses, becoming the largest eyeglass distributor in the world, and over the next two years will project over a hundred feature films in 5,500 3D equipped theaters, including the first Pixar 3D film, and films in 3D by Henry Selick, Tim Burton, James Cameron, U2, Dreamworks, Disney and every major American film studio; which has clients in the biomedical, nuclear and defense industries; and which, over the next two years will move into television, videogames and concert delivery in 3D. You know. That company.
How Josh Greer and Real D Improvised the Third Dimension
1. He moved on passion. Greer had a stellar career going already. There was no intellectually sound reason why a guy with a great job as the Chief Convergence Officer at a groovy company like Walden Media, where he was much appreciated, would jump into the uncertainty and difficulty of reviving a film format that had been dormant for fifty years. But Greer, a fanboy and a geek at heart, loves working in emerging media — he was an early mover into the internet with his and Thomas Lakeman’s company, Digital Planet and did okay with that. He knew that with the advent of digital formats, the motion picture delivery game would soon be changing, and he wanted to play. He trusted his excitement. Improvisers are always informed by knowledge, and work at the height of their intelligence. Ultimately, though, it is their gut that guides them.
2. You don’t always have to change the game to be a GameChanger. More often that not, the game changes due to forces beyond your control, and your success or failure is determined by your ability to play the new game. Greer did not invent 3D movies, and Real D did not invent the technologies that made its system possible. It was Greer’s desire and ability to participate in the changing motion picture delivery game that marks him and his company as GameChangers.
3. Work at the height of your intelligence. Before initiating the Real D scene, Greer made it his job to learn everything he could about 3D technology–its history, its problems, current players, existing technologies, and most importantly the potential for new technoloogies to lick the 3D issues of the past, like the cheesy throwaway glasses and the headaches you got if you watched too much of the stuff.
4. Understand that the same players can play different roles. An improviser like Greer sees no anomaly whatsoever that the Puff the Magic Dragon dude invented a 3D movie projection system, or that he himself transitioned from a high technology wiz at Walden to someone mucking around in the trenches of an antiquated content delivery business. In the Networked World, we play many roles, always through the essential truth of who we are. Lenny Lipton creates things. Josh Greer builds new media companies. Within those contexts, they each play many different roles. Dealing with the demands of a perfectionist director like James Cameron is a completely different role from sitting on the SMPTE Advisory Committee on HDTV Delivery Standards. Greer does both. Same player. Different roles.
5. Everything old can be new again. An improviser uses all parts of the buffalo. Nothing is wasted. Just because something is old doesn’t mean it can’t be re-born when new information is added, and a new context created for it. One of the most powerful moves a player can make in improv theater is a ‘call-back’, when something is recalled from earlier in the performance. Something the audience might have forgotten, but will remember with appreciation. The same is true in business. Beat poetry came back as rap. Converse athletic shoes came back as part of Nike. Now 3D is back. And Real D is responsible.
6. Cast wisely. As mentioned earlier, improvisation is most powerful in a group performance. In addition to Puff and Lenny, Greer brought some powerful players onstage with him. Greer’s co-founder at Real D is Michael Lewis, who came from a company called L-Squared, which produced alternative format motion pictures, such as T-Rex, the most financially successful film every released on IMAX system. Lewis raised money for the new company, and he understood the business and cultural environment in which 3D would have to perform (film studios are notoriously resistant to change) as well as anyone in the entertainment business. Greer credits Dick Cook the Chairman of Walt Disney Motion Pictures, with giving Real D its first big opportunity when Cook hired them to deliver the 2005 animated feature, Chicken Little, in 3D. The 3D version did 2.5 times the business of the 2D version, and on fewer screens. With that, a technology was re-born, and the 3D game truly began to turn in Real D’s favor.
Tags: 3D Motion Pictures, Dick Cook, GameChangers, Intelligence, Josh Greer, Lenny Lipton, Michael Lewis, Puff the Magic Dragon, Real D