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Topic: MI:3 170 Digital Cinema Screens DCDM by Kodak

Michael Schaffer
"Where is the
Boardwalk Hotel?"

Posts: 4143
From: Boston, MA
Registered: Apr 2002

posted 05-11-2006 11:27 AM

Yes, Acess bought the whole package when Boeing bailed out of the digital cinema project.
We demoed NEC projectors (the 2k generation) on several occasions. That was before our present Access project happened. The decision to go with Christie was made by them because they offer the whole package.

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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 05-11-2006 03:42 PM

The Barco DP50 will indeed take a 1920 file though DCinema content was always formated 1280x1024 so that it was exactly the imager. The inputs that worked on the DP50 are the two HDSDI ports and the DVI port. Note, the DP50 wanted to see progressive signals so if you fed it interlaced signals, there was significant "jutter" in the image.

At the AFI/Silver, they bought their DP50s (all there was at the time) and they are used daily. They mostly feed them standard HD and SD video from as low a source as VHS and as high as HDCAM and D5. These go through Barco's ACSAR which is a switcher/scaler that outputs on the DVI port. The results are quite good. The DP50, having both anamorphic lenses can disply 16:9 and 2.35 content just fine. Mind you it doesn't compare to a 2K native machine very well but it does do well.

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Tim Reed
Better Projection Pays

Posts: 5246
From: Northampton, PA
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 05-12-2006 04:14 AM

quote: John Pytlak
If there are pirated copies on the street, I doubt they came directly from an encrypted file loaded onto a theatre server. More likely from an unencrypted file, or a camcorder copy.

Or a screener.

(John, you shoulda known you'd be opening a can of worms with this post.) [Wink]

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John Pytlak
Film God

Posts: 9987
From: Rochester, NY 14650-1922
Registered: Jan 2000

posted 05-12-2006 08:20 AM

quote: Tim Reed
(John, you shoulda known you'd be opening a can of worms with this post.)

Just keeping people informed of Kodak's role in providing the best of both FILM and Digital Cinema. Anyone keeping track of the progress in Digital Cinema knows the earlier 1280 x 1024 systems fell short of what was required for widescale industry acceptance. The SMPTE Digital Cinema standards are finally coming into place, 2K systems are common, and 4K are on the way. Today, the issues are mostly around the cost and the business case, rather than the technology. 35mm release prints are still a very cost-effective distribution and presentation method, and larger film formats still offer superior image quality by any measure.

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Tim Reed
Better Projection Pays

Posts: 5246
From: Northampton, PA
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 05-12-2006 09:08 AM

quote: John Pytlak
Just keeping people informed of Kodak's role

Yes, it certainly is something to boast about. Rightfully so. But I also cringed a little when I saw the title of the thread, bracing for the inevitable. [Smile]

To dive headfirst into the fray, I am making a little history in Digital Cinema as we speak... although it's killing me that I'm not at liberty to say anything about it until after it happens. When it does, though, you can bet I'll be boasting about it. [Wink]

Way to go on MI3! [thumbsup]

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Lyle Romer
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1400
From: Davie, FL, USA
Registered: May 2002

posted 05-12-2006 09:48 AM

quote: John Pytlak
2K systems are common, and 4K are on the way

Aside from Sony, are there any other 4k projectors in development? Nobody in going to buy cinema products from sony (except maybe crazy Mark Cuban) after the SDDS fiasco. Maybe one of the projector manufacturers can buy Sony's 4k sxrd chips the same way they buy DLP chips from TI.

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David Stambaugh
Film God

Posts: 4021
From: Eugene, Oregon
Registered: Jan 2002

posted 05-12-2006 11:25 AM

quote: Lyle Romer
Maybe one of the projector manufacturers can buy Sony's 4k sxrd chips the same way they buy DLP chips from TI.

That makes too much sense. Sony should sell the chips to Christie (or whoever) and make sure a short SXRD promotional snipe is played before each feature. Their goal should be to promote SXRD to millions of TV consumers, not to sell a relatively small number of projectors to cinemas who understandably don't want to touch a Sony-built cinema product with the proverbial 10-foot pole.

Sony doesn't play well with others. [Wink]

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

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

posted 05-13-2006 12:38 AM

The "consumer" angle is the only way how 4K will reach widespread acceptance. There's only so many commercial movie theater screens. There's a much bigger market in terms of consumer product sales and an easier way to amortize out that cost of development.

However, another alternative is the "professional" business market.

I think "2K" levels of resolution will reign supreme for HDTV for a long long time. However, there will be a growing demand for ever improving resolutions for enthusiast and professional uses. People who spend UnGodly amounts of money on gaming computers and computer graphic artists who need to display more and more native pixels on the monitor will always have a need for something better. I think that's the area where Sony, Intel and other companies pursuing LCOS imagers can make serious money off creating better quality imaging chips for large ultra high resolution monitors.

I have a feeling Texas Instruments' DLP technology will reach a glass ceiling at far lower resolutions than other competing technologies by nature of the huge complexity involved in making a DLP chip with millions of spinning mirror parts. I'm not even going to expect to ever see a 4K DLP chip since I'm not sure it's possible to even make one. We had a 6 year lag between the 1.2K and 2K DLP chips. I think other technologies are going to supercede DLP in the long run.

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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 05-13-2006 08:09 AM

I think Bobby is very correct on this one.

The big pot of gold for most any manufacturer is the consumer market, not cinema...the consumer market is going to stop at 2K for the forseeable future, thus TI has reached that goal. The DLP division is still in the RED as for as R&D that has been put into the product versus total sales. The only way to recoup that is for it to hit it big in the home market.

Their problem remains though that other technologies are far cheaper to make, thus TI is trying to pawn off single-chip DLP when other technologies can do 3-chip for less money. As LCOS improves (and even LCD) the edge that DLP holds will continue to diminish. It should be quite interesting to see how this unfolds over the next 10-years or so.

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Peter Castle
Expert Film Handler

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

posted 05-13-2006 08:37 AM

JVC, the major developer of LCOS chips, have given up on high output projectors, and are concentrating on the home market.
We've got one of their 1.3K projectors (5000 lumens) and they're very good - just not compliant.

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Richard Fowler
Film God

Posts: 2392
From: Ft. Lauderdale, FL, USA
Registered: Jun 2001

posted 05-13-2006 10:26 AM

Sony has done the opposite regarding their chip fab operations; they closed OEM client accounts two years before the 4K SXRD projector introduction...probably they forsee HD for home and 4K for cinema will keep this division busy.

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Martin Brooks
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 900
From: Forest Hills, NY, USA
Registered: May 2002

posted 05-13-2006 11:26 AM

While I agree that the industry is handling this badly and that varying standards of quality in theaters is problematic, the fact is that we've always had varying standards of quality in theaters in both picture and sound (but perhaps especially sound.) Even the quality of 70mm presentations varied and there were a number of 70mm sites in NYC in which one could barely tell the presentation was in 70mm mag. Just because a film was playing in Dolby, whether A, SR or SR-D was absolutely no guarantee of quality and two screens playing a digital track in the same format (let's say DTS), can sound unbelievably different, due to acoustics and B-chain, among other factors.

Meanwhile, I saw MiIII at the Ziegfeld in Digital and even though I really, really wanted to hate the way it looked, I have to admit that it really did look damned good. Even the blacks were good.

One thing I noticed during the preshow is that the trailers, to my surprise, were played off a different digital projector and there was a lot of quick (but very smooth) switching between the film projector and the digital. In other digital presentations I've been to, the trailers played off the same projector as the feature.

The trailers didn't look that great and I thought the feature was therefore going to look like crap, but as soon as the feature came on, it was much higher quality than the trailers and I turned my head to look back at the booth and noticed they had switched projectors.

IMHO, any owner who went out and outright purchased a digital projector is nuts. It was always obvious that this technology was going to rapidly evolve regardless of whether SMPTE standards had been established or not. If one bothers at all, equipment like this should always be leased. Then you simply exchange old for new, just like a car lease - a new car every two years or so.

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David Stambaugh
Film God

Posts: 4021
From: Eugene, Oregon
Registered: Jan 2002

posted 05-13-2006 11:46 AM

quote: Martin Brooks
I saw MiIII at the Ziegfeld in Digital and even though I really, really wanted to hate the way it looked, I have to admit that it really did look damned good. Even the blacks were good.

Yet another favorable eyewitness report contradicting all the negative nabobs. [Wink]

I mean honestly, has anyone here posted a flat-out negative review of any d-cinema presentation? I don't think so. Maybe they did and I missed it. Most of the negativity seems to come purely from looking at the specs and concluding "This can't be as good as, let alone better, than 35mm film". Eyewitnesses continue to say otherwise though.

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Kris Dirix
Film Handler

Posts: 54
From: Antwerp / Belguim
Registered: Feb 2005

posted 05-13-2006 12:14 PM

Yes David, It is not bad, sometimes it looks good. But, did you ever see a digital show which was better than film????????????

The "arrogant" commercial boys say they did.

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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 05-13-2006 12:16 PM

David,

It all depends on what one is looking for...The digital image has a steadiness about it that the 35mm film lacks. It is less subject to the particulars of the duplication process. I, however, hate the very flat appearing image of it, it is unnatural. Film clearly wins in that. 70mm film stands toe-to-toe on image steadiness yet adds depth and looks notably better.

I'll tell you this...even the 1.3K projector had a lot of heads turning when they just looked at the image and not the technology. Depending on how close you are to the screen it was not bad but clearly about 1/3 as good as a current 2K.

If you do get an EK print, the 35mm will beat the digital version every time but that is not a fair comparison since only a select few ever get to view those. That is probably the biggest advantage that digital has...the public gets to see a non-duplicated film. Imagine if everything you read in a book came from a 4th generation photocopy...and then you looked at a computer screen...WOW the screen would take on a clarity that really is not inherently better.

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