Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Day and Date....for STREET COPIES??!!

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

»	Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE » Operations » Film Handlers' Forum » Day and Date....for STREET COPIES??!! (Page 3)

This topic comprises 3 pages: 1 2 3

Author

Topic: Day and Date....for STREET COPIES??!!

Jean-Pierre Van Hoof
Film Handler

Posts: 21
From: Enschede, Ov, Netherlands
Registered: Dec 2003

posted 05-08-2006 12:49 PM

I really hope CineFence, the technology Philips has developed, will contribute to find out where the "screeners" originated from that are responsible for, I guess, more than 75% of the iligal copy's floating around.
Cinefence by Philips

quote:
Being part of Philips Technology Incubator, we position ourselves as a technology provider of both audio and video identification solutions. Our current list of technologies includes: video and audio watermarking, and video fingerprinting. In August 2005, our leading audio fingerprinting technology was transferred to Gracenote.

By the way it seems to work.

quote:
Acting Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI's Los Angeles Field Office James Sheehan announced today the arrest of William Sprague, a resident of Homewood, Illinois (a suburb of Chicago) on charges of criminal copyright infringement and illegal interception of a satellite signal. The arrest was made in connection with a Los Angeles-based investigation into the compromise of a multitude of major motion pictures that surfaced on the Internet, many prior to their theatrical and/or DVD release.

Caught redhanded

| IP: Logged

Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 05-08-2006 02:13 PM

I'm all for digitally watermarking screener discs -if not eliminating them completely.

As for CAP code being more difficult to spot, I really must disagree. I can't remember the last time I have watched a movie in a theater without noticing chicken pox red dots pop up on screen at some point in the movie.

Very often I see those red marks spattered across an image with a very bright background, like a white painted wall or a bright sunlight sky. The CAP code folks really seem to enjoy sticking the red dots all over action sequences with radid fire edits. CAP code was horribly bad on the print I saw of LOTR: The Return of the King.

Perhaps I just need to watch "survival horror" genre movies where many walls are often splattered with blood and other goo. In that circumstance the CAP code might be hard to spot. Oh wait. I forgot that I usually hate "survival horror" movies because they're not scary and only accomplish being gross.

| IP: Logged

Ian Bailey
Master Film Handler

Posts: 317
From: Nambucca Heads, Australia
Registered: Jun 2003

posted 05-08-2006 07:30 PM

If you find a bootlegger and you do nothing about it then you have no reason to complain about this happening to our industry.I know it takes a lot of effort on your part to contact the authorities and to make sure they do something about it but it is the only way that we can have any effect on this activity.Being complacent and thinking it is all too hard just allows this to thrive!!

| IP: Logged

Frank Angel
Film God

Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 05-09-2006 06:16 PM

quote:
the FBI's Los Angeles Field Office James Sheehan announced today the arrest of William Sprague, a resident of Homewood, Illinois (a suburb of Chicago)

My point exactly. Yah, they might grab and idiot here and there, but has anyone EVER seen the name of a studio executive or a big star or producer or director or DP being dragged off by the FBI?

quote: John Hawkinson
Sure, be cynical. But I don't think the suggestion that CAP code was easy to pull off or done casually holds water.

jh...I never said it was EASY....just that it was stupid. In fact, I am sure John P and Kodak and all the other scientists and technicians that did R&D on the CAP codes came up with a system that took into consideration how to impact the image the least. Point is, it is not the technical guys who are at any fault, it's the people who thought up the concept to begin with.

Like I mentioned elsewhere, MI-3 is already out on the street. Anyone who looks at this problem objectively would be able to see that bootleg copies are not coming from the END of the chain but from the beginning.

Bobby was right on the money...

quote: Bobby Henderson
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.

Seems to be if I were loosing SIX BILLION dollars every year I sure as hell wouldn't give a rats ass how inconvenient it is for all the voting members of the Academy or how perturbed the big wigs get because they can't show a title while it is still being edited. These people would have to watch the movie on film or not at all...period! They were able to do it BV (before video); it won't kill them to do it again. In fact, maybe the MPAA should produce one of those "informational" trailers they are so adept at, taking aim at the top end of the industry, admonishing them to sacrifice a little comfort for the good of their own industry....tell them to turn in to the FBI anyone of their friends who has a home theatre where they are showing DVDs of current releases. The trailer would show a 35mm projector with a voice-over saying the use of DVDs rather than film for VIP private screening parties is a cancer in the belly of the industry. [Wink]

| IP: Logged

Jean-Pierre Van Hoof
Film Handler

Posts: 21
From: Enschede, Ov, Netherlands
Registered: Dec 2003

posted 05-13-2006 07:00 AM

quote: Frank Angel
My point exactly. Yah, they might grab and idiot here and there, but has anyone EVER seen the name of a studio executive or a big star or producer or director or DP being dragged off by the FBI?

Sounds to me they got a least one.......

quote:
Most of the compromised movies listed above had been provided to Carmine Caridi, a veteran actor of film and television, and a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for approximately 22 years. Investigation of Caridi revealed that for at least the last three years, he had supplied Russell William Sprague with virtually every Academy screener (approximately 60 movies per year). A search warrant at the Sprague residence in Illinois was executed with the assistance of the FBI's Chicago Division today. Hundreds of Academy screeners were seized, many of which had been converted to DVD, along with an array of duplication equipment. A quantity of illegal satellite television interception equipment was also seized during the search.

| IP: Logged

Peter Castle
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 220
From: Wollongong University, NSW ,Australia
Registered: Oct 2003

posted 05-13-2006 08:34 AM

Following on this thread, Sprague died in jail waiting for sentencing after pleading guilty. Caridi was expelled from the Academy and was sued resulting in him requiring to pay $600,000. He said he couldn't afford it, and he had been penalised by the Academy.

| IP: Logged

All times are Central (GMT -6:00)

This topic comprises 3 pages: 1 2 3

Printer-friendly view of this topic

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.