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I think the CGI stuff would have been much more seamless against the live action video plates had both been shot/rendered at the same resolution. Basically the thing making the live action plates appear being cut out of cardboard is a difference in depth of field between CGI plate and live action plate. That's essentially what makes the image look fake. Identical resolutions would have solved much of that. Most computer graphics animation work is rendered in the same RGB color model that video uses. Because of that the color was pretty consistent. Focus/depth of field, however, was not.

All of the 24p post processing where various amounts of dither, blur and grain were added to hide the pixels also added to the overhead for video compression. That's why I was able to see "mosquito noise" blocking in some backgrounds. Some borders, such as the hair on a person's head was pretty fuzzy instead of defined --even when the person was standing on a set and not in front a blue screen.

If video cameras are going to be used more often on movie production, the resolution specs have to be improved. 1440 X 800 certainly is not good enough. Even the 2160 X 1440 captured by my Kodak DC4800 still camera isn't good enough (not to mention the CCD is waaaay too slow). We need better-than-HD quality video cameras with native resolutions in the 3640 X 2048 area. I believe home video formats and monitor displays will eventually outpace HD quality standards. So something like 3640 X 2048 (a 16:9 ratio) should be a goal. Such a standard would be better than the 2K format used for most CGI renderings and nearly as good as a 4K rendering. Electronics companies are working like crazy to come up with smaller, faster and more higher res CCDs. There's already a number of CCDs being made with higher res than 3640 X 2048, but they are too slow to capture full motion video (much less video at high rates of speed --this is one area where film has a BIG advantage).

i saw it today on a 3DLP ( older generation, nothing like Nec or Panasonic latest "true black" super high contrast ratio of 1000:1+ unfortunately ). many scenes lacked serious background details, sometimes it was terribly fuzzy. blacks were poor (cantina scene for instance ). too big a screen too, 18meters +/- . very bright however.

it will most probably look much better on dvd with high end home cinema systems

I miss a good fresh Panavision 2.39:1 print , shot In Panavision that is

maybe they will correct it for the dvd ?

poor contrast, burned white, poor blacks were reocurring problems indeed. it felt like video on many occasions.

I know that, I put my earlier comments in the film reviews section.

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QUESTION: There has been a lot of discussion about what resolution is 'good enough' for theatrical digital projection. Do you have a standard for that?

KENNEL: We believe you need to project at least 2K resolution to create natural looking images that don't block up or have jagged edges. With film, you begin with a negative that can capture at least 4K resolution. This resolution is reduced somewhat by the analog film duplication and projection process. However, there are other crucial factors including retaining the contrast, color gamut, and tonality captured on the original negative. It is important to retain subtle details. Maybe it's a slight blush in someone's cheek when another character enters a scene that gives the audience a powerful visual clue that is a key story point. From our perspective, that's one of the big limitations imposed by the new generation of HD cameras. Resolution is about 1.5K and the dynamic range falls far short of film. We are determined to preserve those cinematic qualities of film with both film and digital projection.

QUESTION: How does the prototype Kodak Digital Cinema projector compare to other projectors that we have seen demonstrated?

KENNEL: We are capable of putting more pixels (resolution) on the screen, if that's what you are asking. The current digital cinema benchmark is the DLP chips that are 1280 by 1024 pixels. That's about 1.2 million pixels. The next generation JVC (2K) D-ILA chips we are using in our prototype projector have an on-screen resolution of 2048 by 1536, which is about three million pixels. When you combine that advantage in resolution with our color management technology, you begin to get a more cinematic look.

--- Glenn Kennel, Kodak Digital Cinema Program Manager

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John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7525A
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: +1 585 477 5325 Cell: +1 585 781 4036 Fax: +1 585 722 7243
e-mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com
Web site: http://www.kodak.com/go/motion

very interesting info!! seems Kodak is not willing to get bypassed by TI and they are right to do so. till now, JVC's proprietary technology indeed surpass TI. no wonder JVC is going to the high end home theater niche market with the D-THEATER digital tapes either.

I've said it many times before so I will say it yet again...I don't think the 35mm quality is good enough and it should not be a benchmark, 70mm should be...that looks good on all but the largest of screens.

Steve

"I don't think the 35mm quality is good enough and it should not be a benchmark, 70mm should be...that looks good on all but the largest of screens."

Digital Cinema is an evolving technology. 2K resolution is not an endpoint, but a starting point. I agree that the BEST today is 65mm origination and 70mm prints, but almost everyone shows 35mm prints. Matching 35mm is the starting point, and you have to start somewhere.

hi. agree with you. super 35 does not look good compare to 70mm (or even Panavision shot 35mm movie). grainier, less depth, noisier.
it fits better tvs later (yuck !):

Super35 has become a very popular format for creating 2.39:1 "scope" prints for theatres. Super35 movies can usually be translated into a television version with less image loss than anamorphic scope movies. Other than this advantage, Super35 is not really "super" at all.

The "Super35" technique is simply the use of the silent aperture for filming while recording the sound external to the film. The soundtrack area is used for image, which increases the resolution available to that available back in silent film days.

Super35 is a combination of the flat and anamorphic formats. Super35 movies are shot flat using the silent aperture, with an aspect ratio of 1.33:1. Theatrical prints are made by extracting a 2.39:1 slice of the image and printing it "scope" style for theatrical release (requiring the 2:1 unsqueeze during projection). Although the entire image area is used on the theatrical prints, nearly half of the image area of the source is wasted, which often results in theatrical prints that have a much grainier look than movies shot in true anamorphic.
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two of the best presentations I saw over the last 12months was PEARL HARBOR (PANAVISION 35mm, one copy in 70mm) and CAPTAIN CORELLI'S MANDOLIN (PANAVISION 35mm). superb !

From what I could tell, there is little to no EX-channel information in the surround track... Lots of LS and RS but I just couldn't hear any EX...

The emphasis has to get back onto giving theater customers the best possible presentation instead of just pulling some wool over their eyes using the "digital" buzzword.

I'm hopeful video camera and projection systems can hit much higher resolutions than the current 1280 X 1024 standards or ones that simply mimic the HDTV 1080i/1080p standard. However, the electronics companies have to have a bigger market than just commercial theaters to justify developing the CCDs and display chips that can address those resolutions. Commercial theaters alone are not enough to justify the cost of R&D on new chip sets.

The digital still camera craze, along with the need of making more and more digital cameras perform both still and motion functions might drive CCD development well past the 10 megapixel level. As chip fab processes make those chips smaller and faster, the theoretical sharpness of video camera imagery will get much better. But someone has to develop video carrying formats to hold all that res. Tape driven formats are pretty well fixed on the pixel layouts they commonly hold. Computers and formats like QuickTime right now seem to offer the only flexibility on resolution and image aspect ratio.

Digital projector imagers will be locked into what is available for flat panel TV screens and computer projection systems. This is why Texas Instruments DLP chip is still at a very puny 1280 X 1024 spec. The micromirror chip process is very expensive and they cannot seem to get chips with more appropriate resolutions made. While flat screen TVs are locked into native resolutions of only 1280 X 1024 (or even less) they are a horrible waste of money. But that's where things are stuck for now.

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