my profile | my password | search | faq & rules | forum home

» Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE   » Operations   » Film Handlers' Forum   » Day and Date....for STREET COPIES??!! (Page 2)

This topic comprises 3 pages: 1  2  3

Author Topic: Day and Date....for STREET COPIES??!! John Pytlak Film God Posts: 9987 From: Rochester, NY 14650-1922 Registered: Jan 2000 posted 05-04-2006 03:00 PM                        quote: Louis Bornwasser It would encourage me to know if they have EVER nailed anyone. LOuis The MPAA website has had press releases detailing their bigger "busts" of pirate operations.  |  IP: Logged Frank Dubrois Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 896 From: Cleveland, OH Registered: Mar 2005 posted 05-04-2006 05:37 PM                    I don't know that I'd contact the authorites. You bought it being "curious" about the condition of the movie. That means you knew you were buying a bootleg movie. I think that would open yourself up to a lot of problems you dont need. Maybe mail it in annonymously telling them where you bought it....sell it to me, I havent seen it yet  |  IP: Logged Bill Gabel Film God Posts: 3873 From: Technicolor / Postworks NY, USA Registered: Jan 2002 posted 05-04-2006 06:53 PM                     The MPAA and all the other Anti-Piracy divisions all know about that you can get this weeks blockbuster on almost any street corner in NYC. They are looking for where these originals are coming from. They do check post houses in the city. The problem is that some film materials do not carry full ID's for tracking. The NYPD does go after many types of bootleg items like fashions , purses, watches, CDs and DVDs. And each week they do make bust around the city. The guys on the street are the little fishes. Frank enjoy your dinner at Peter Lugars.  |  IP: Logged Dennis Benjamin Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1445 From: Denton, MD Registered: Feb 2002 posted 05-04-2006 07:26 PM                        I turned someone in once through the hotline. It wasn't until, what, 6 months later that the guy got busted. Turns out that the MPAA did follow up on my call. The investigation on the piracy turned south when it was realized that the guy had a major drug operation going too. Again though, the guy was selling digital versions of movies that were not even in theatres. This Cap Code stuff, and the camcorder reward programs are a bunch of crap. 90 percent of these films on the street are from hard drives at the film companies. They are in denial about this. I have stopped calling the MPAA on the bootlegs - because the whole thing is a joke.  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 05-05-2006 07:46 AM                        Of [i]course[i/] there are no CAP codes on this copy; as most of us have concluded, films transferred at the theatre level are not the high quality stuff that overseas markets are interested in. That market of millions of foreigners that purportedly cause the industry to loose 6 BILLION dollars (you've got to sell a hellofa lot of DVDs at 10 pesos each to loose that kind of money), the bootleg product has to be as good as commercial DVDs. Come on, it's no secret....we all know where the "good stuff" comes from and it's not from the trenchcoat guy. The fact that when it comes from Academy screener copies, or from a post production house, THOSE are the copies that are the real danger. You don't see them busting any big wigs on the studio side of the industry, and even if they did, you sure won't hear them crowing about it on any website or doing a press release to the evening news. How do I know this DVD came from the post production lab level and that it wouldn't be too difficult with a little good sleuthing to figure out where it originated? Because when I posted here yesterday, I hadn't looked past the main titles and the opening exposition scenes which had no dialogue, low and behold, this is Spanish subtitled version. So it had to come from some lab where they do the subtitling....I am guessing this wasn't farmed out to very many post production houses to do this. As for turning it in and then somehow getting hassled legally about it, well, that would be the height of stupidity on their part and proof that these people are half-wits. John H., when you say they are trying to address the problem, My feeling about this is a bit more cynical. I think what is really going on is that they are trying to make themselves FEEL like they are doing something about it. I understand that it must be very frustrating and a slap in the face to head honcho studio execs to see their product being sold by someone else on a street corner or worse, knowing that in China they are running the studio's spanking new release in thousands of theatres on consumer grade DLP players and there is little to nothing they can do about it. Men who consider themselves privileged and powerful don't like to feel impotent and ineffectual. Sending out press releases and showing that they are DOING something, no matter how ineffectual and sometimes down right silly may not stop bootlegging -- don't these loss numbers they release every year keep going UP? How is that an indictation that ANYTHING they do is working? As for silly, I call your attention to that accusatory, mood-ruining There-Are-Copyright-Infringing-Pirates-Everywhere- Maybe-Even-In-This-Theatre-Sitting-Next-To-You- And-The-FBI-Is-Gonna-Throw-Them-In-Jail- And-You-Better-Cooperate-Or-Else trailer. As far as I am concerned, the crap code is the pinnacle of stupidity. It a kind of paranoia psychotic self-mutilation where they degrade the very product they want to protect, like an artist to slashes his canvas with a razor blade so that no one will steal it. Well, no matter how it gives them bragging rights at their brie and wine cocktail parties so they can pontificate about how piracy is such a tremendous problem but how they are taking heroic measures to thwart the bootlegging bad guys, the fact is that they need to look hard in places where the don't seem to be looking, i.e., in their own back yard.....or how bout in their own home screening rooms where they bring all their guests after dinner to surprise them with a screening of that yet-to-be-released film. With their love of digital, I bet they no longer even use answer prints for those private vanity screenings....no doubt they use DVD copies and project with the best video projectors available! And it doesn't take a brain surgern to know, once a single DVD is ripped for this kind of thing, the master is out of the bag so to speak. It's a lot harder to copy a 35mm print than it is a studio staff's screener DVD. Hey, they are the ones in love digital! [ 05-05-2006, 12:51 PM: Message edited by: Adam Martin ]  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 05-05-2006 12:47 PM                        I agree with everything you say, Frank, except quote: 6 BILLION dollars (you've got to sell a hellofa lot of DVDs at 10 pesos each to loose that kind of money), To be fair, they figure the "loss" at the suggested list price, which is also dumb but it makes for a bigger number. They figure that everyone who buys a bootleg DVD would have bought a movie ticket (or a genuine DVD) but there's no way to prove that. There's just no way to stop this problem as long as DVDs are made by the studios before the film's release date. And those pre-release DVDs are a valuable tool for them, so they might as well learn to live with the problem -- or do what really needs to be done, which is stop handing out DVDs to every Tom Dick and Harry.  |  IP: Logged Louis Bornwasser Film God Posts: 4441 From: prospect ky usa Registered: Mar 2005 posted 05-05-2006 02:24 PM                        Frank: no "wine & brie" try COKE! How's that for cynical. Louis  |  IP: Logged John Hawkinson Film God Posts: 2273 From: Cambridge, MA, USA Registered: Feb 2002 posted 05-06-2006 11:18 AM                     Frank, I think that the new highly-visible CAP code is not cheap. Somebody had to design this stuff and build printers and productionize it and get the labs and studios on board. And really, for all the negative reactions to it you've seen in our commnuity, of exhibition projectionists (plus Bill ), can you really imagine that the studio technical people and studio projectionists could possibly have liked what they're doing? Sure, be cynical. But I don't think the suggestion that CAP code was easy to pull off or done casually holds water. --jhawk  |  IP: Logged John Pytlak Film God Posts: 9987 From: Rochester, NY 14650-1922 Registered: Jan 2000 posted 05-06-2006 10:21 PM                        quote: John Hawkinson I think that the new highly-visible CAP code is not cheap. Somebody had to design this stuff and build printers and productionize it and get the labs and studios on board. And I'm sure the labs have invested quite a bit more to make it less visible than it was a few years ago. I know they have recently invented some really neat "tricks" to hide it better. Which I can appreciate, since I worked on the Kodak team that developed the first version in 1982 that almost no one noticed for twenty years, until "outed" on Film-Tech.  |  IP: Logged John T. Hendrickson, Jr Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 889 From: Freehold, NJ, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 05-07-2006 11:36 AM                     The DaVinci Code release is less than two weeks away, and I'm wondering...how will the release of prints be handled? For those of us with multiple screens, that means a ton of prints to build and get on screen in what I'm betting will be a very short period of time. Throw in the release of Over the Hedge and See No Evil, and the problem multiplies. The point being, who gets the bum's rush on all of this? Of course!! It's the people on the bottom of the industry food chain- the booth personnel. Consider what happens when you are faced with a large number of prints to get on screen in a very short period of time. It's not pretty. Yet, those of us who care will do our best to get the prints ready by showtime, and, barring any unforseen difficulties we probably will. But...is this going to happen everywhere? Consider the fact that you will have a great many people coming to see this film who have not been to a theater in years. This is a chance for the industry to put it's best foot foward and possibly get them to come back again. Now, weigh the potential problem of piracy and the steps being taken to prevent it at the exhibition level (where, most of us agree, it isn't happening anyway) against allowing the theaters the proper time to prepare the product. Is the industry going to come out ahead?  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 05-07-2006 02:00 PM                     Few, if any, of these pirated DVDs made in China have any CAP code in them. They're not mastered from any release prints. They are typically straight digital dubs from video masters used for screener discs for film critics and film industry insiders. CAP does little if any thing at all to combat movie piracy. It is laughably useless. It is similar to a fire department showing up to fight a house fire a month after the house burned down to its foundation. A very tiny percentage of film piracy occurs from people sneaking video cameras into theaters. The vast majority of all movie piracy is derived from those screener discs and other resources available in post production. CAP code is a failure in concept and only serves to harm presentation quality for paying customers. If the movie industry and MPAA is really serious about fighting movie piracy they'll clamp down on the loose distribution of screener discs or just ban the practice. Make the movie distributor executives, critics, movie stars and other insiders go watch the show at a regular movie theater. That might actually do something to shake up things to make some movie theaters improve their presentation quality. At the very least the movie industry folks should be watching the movie in a private screening room. I know it is far more convenient for those folks to get a DVD and watch it in any number of locations. But that convenience is exactly what is losing Hollywood many millions of dollars. In the end they have two choices: eliminate that convenience for all those VIPs and get serious about policing and protecting their data OR just stop bitching and accept the problem for what it is. Either way, they need to get rid of the CAP code. That stuff is simply irrelevant.  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 05-07-2006 08:52 PM                        quote: I know they have recently invented some really neat "tricks" to hide it [CAP code] better Apparently they aren't using those techniques on actual release prints yet, eh? If so, they are a complete failure.  |  IP: Logged Lyle Romer Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1400 From: Davie, FL, USA Registered: May 2002 posted 05-08-2006 08:24 AM                     On Mission: Impossible III, I saw a new (at least to me) version of CAP code. It was in very tightly packed blocks of dots. If it was supposed to be hidden, it wasn't. It seemed to always be on a bright object in a dark scene.  |  IP: Logged John Pytlak Film God Posts: 9987 From: Rochester, NY 14650-1922 Registered: Jan 2000 posted 05-08-2006 09:56 AM                        For every frame of the newer CAP codes you see on screen, I suspect there are many that you don't see, as the newer methods of hiding them become more effective.  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 05-08-2006 12:27 PM                        I am sure the ones we don't see are on the dark scenes. That only makes sense. But it doesn't make the ones on bright scenes any less bothersome.  |  IP: Logged

All times are Central (GMT -6:00)

This topic comprises 3 pages: 1  2  3

Printer-friendly view of this topic

Hop To: Select a Forum: Category: Operations -------------------- Digital Cinema Forum Film Handlers' Forum Large Format Forum Ground Level Feature Info, Trailer Attachments & REAL Credit Offsets Category: Community -------------------- Film-Yak Film Handlers' Movie Reviews The Afterlife Bob Maar's Joke-A-Thon Category: Classified -------------------- Equipment and Supplies Wanted/For Sale Help Wanted/Seeking Employment Category: System -------------------- Software Beta Testing Forum

The Film-Tech Forums are designed for various members related to the cinema industry to express their opinions, viewpoints and testimonials on various products, services and events based upon speculation, personal knowledge and factual information through use, therefore all views represented here allow no liability upon the publishers of this web site and the owners of said views assume no liability for any ill will resulting from these postings. The posts made here are for educational as well as entertainment purposes and as such anyone viewing this portion of the website must accept these views as statements of the author of that opinion and agrees to release the authors from any and all liability.