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Topic: More d-cinema morons

Phil Hill
I love my cootie bug

Posts: 7595
From: Hollywood, CA USA
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 02-26-2004 03:24 AM

Mattias: Thanks for the tip on the JVC whitepaper...I was not aware of it and I'll look for it.

>>> Phil

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Daryl C. W. O'Shea
Film God

Posts: 3977
From: Midland Ontario Canada (where Panavision & IMAX lenses come from)
Registered: Jun 2002

posted 02-26-2004 03:45 AM

quote:
Do you know that dlp mirrors can not be made smaller? ... If the xhd3 has 1920x1080 mirrors at 0.9 inches smaller mirrors are indeed possible. Who really knows how small these mirrors can be made.

Really. "Can not" is a ballsie statement to make when referring to microchips, especially when you state other chips are achieving exactly what you say isn't possible.

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Phil Hill
I love my cootie bug

Posts: 7595
From: Hollywood, CA USA
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 02-26-2004 06:37 AM

I'm not sure about that, Daryl. I think the smallest mirror they can make is a size 7-1/2.

>>> Phil

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Scott Jentsch
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1061
From: New Berlin, WI, USA
Registered: Apr 2003

posted 02-26-2004 08:22 AM

Phil Hill wrote:

quote:
I agree the 2k chips are a big improvement over the 1.3K ones, but I still think in the long run Mr. Joe Blow Theatre Guy really doesn't care.

I agree that the average person may not discern the difference between 1.3k and 2k, although that's almost a doubling of performance, which is usually a noticeable improvement of any characteristic.

What they could discern immediately is pixelation and other artifacts. I would consider this to be the most important thing for D-Cinema to get right, and in the few presentations I've attended, there haven't been any such problems.

The biggest problem plaguing film presentations, in my experience, are jump, weave, and focus issues. The latter is going to happen with either technology, but the most pleasing thing about the D-Cinema presentations I've seen is a complete lack of jump and weave.

When the picture is rock-steady, and your eyes aren't trying to keep up with the images jumping around on the screen, it's a much better experience. Watching the end credits on most movies can make a person seasick!

You would be amazed at what Joe Sixpack can appreciate if given the chance. After all, DTS and Dolby Digital were regarded as unnecessary expenses, only to be used in premier theaters (esp. in the case of DD). Now, I don't know of many self-respecting first-run theaters that aren't equipped with at least one kind of digital sound system.

Mr. Sixpack got a taste of the good life, and now won't accept crappy analong sound presentations. Similarly, they don't like digital sound presentations that drop out or otherwise glitch during the movie.

It's possible that the transition to D-Cinema would at first be welcomed by the masses because it would be an improvement over the traditional film presentations they're used to. But then, when their expectations have been raised, they may notice more of the issues that seem to slap many here in the face so easily.

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Brian Guckian
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 594
From: Dublin, Ireland
Registered: Apr 2003

posted 02-26-2004 09:11 AM

Is there a danger of becoming sidetracked in the pursuit of ever-increasing display resolutions?

Is there a point at which the combination of high contrast and native resolution yields a perceived resolution that is almost too high, too real?

Seems also that going beyond 4K is beyond the visual acuity of the eye - c.f. Film resolution vs. HDTV

From a demo I saw recently my concerns would still be around colour management and consistency between different types of material. In the clips I saw, for example, there was significant variation in flesh tones - greater than the variation would would see between reel changes in a print.

It's this potential variation in the mastering and in the characteristics of different display technologies that must be taking up a lot of time in the different d-cinema groups at the moment, on top of the delivery issues.

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Darryl Spicer
Film God

Posts: 3250
From: Lexington, KY, USA
Registered: Dec 2000

posted 02-26-2004 10:24 AM

quote:
After all, DTS and Dolby Digital were regarded as unnecessary expenses, only to be used in premier theaters (esp. in the case of DD). Now, I don't know of many self-respecting first-run theaters that aren't equipped with at least one kind of digital sound system.

DTS really can't be included in reguards to only to be used in premier theaters. This system caught on very quickly and is I believe one of the reasons the Dolby Digital lowered their prices on digital units at the time. People were investing in DTS not Dolby.

It was the cost factor when it came to Dolby Digital. With that said you can talk all you want about resolutions and chips but when it all boils down the final result will always be the cost of the system and who is going to pay for it. The distributors, the exhibitors, the patrons, or all of the above.

quote:
Seems also that going beyond 4K is beyond the visual acuity of the eye

One thing you have to remember is eyes like hearing can be affected by different things for many different reasons. They are just not perfect. I have a condition were my eyes continually move slightly left to right. There is a name for it and it slips my mind at this time. Anyway I was born with it. I can not perceive weave in a picture. My eyes do not pick it up. I have to turn my head sideways so I can pereive it as a jump in the picture.

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John Pytlak
Film God

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

posted 02-26-2004 11:15 AM

The perception of sharpness or the visibility of artifacts in a picture are very dependent on the viewing distance (magnification), usually expressed in how many "picture heights" distance from the screen the audience is seated.

Standard SMPTE 196M specifies a viewing distance of 2 to 4 times the picture height for "Review Room Viewing Conditions". Modern theatre design often puts seating much closer, so sharpness and visibility of artifacts becomes more critical. Larger formats (i.e., 65mm/70mm) are used when "immersive" viewing at very close distances is desired.

The visual acuity of the viewer is also a factor. Low screen luminance reduces visual acuity.

Kodak has published much good work on "acutance" metrics that quantify image quality based on a full system analysis, rather than just a single "resolution" number.

Here are some references and tutorials:

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/support/h1/structureP.shtml#p

http://www.stanford.edu/class/ee392b/handouts/mtf.pdf

http://www.normankoren.com/Tutorials/MTF.html

Also, MANY references in the chapter "Image Structure" in the book "The Theory of the Photographic Process" by T.H. James, especially the work by Schade, Lamberts, Kriss, Nelson, etc. At least four recent SMPTE papers have been presented by Kodak's Dr. Roger Morton and his team.

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Mattias Ohlson
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 180
From: Falun, Sweden
Registered: Mar 2003

posted 02-26-2004 12:13 PM

Mr Pytlak
Do you have any numbers for the average picture height distance from screens to first row for theaters in use today. Is it the cost of bigger rooms that lead to installs with first few rows to close to let film work its magic.

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Aaron Sisemore
Flaming Ribs beat Reeses Peanut Butter Cups any day!

Posts: 3061
From: Rockwall TX USA
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 02-26-2004 12:21 PM

quote:
The biggest problem plaguing film presentations, in my experience, are jump, weave, and focus issues.

Which are 98% of the time caused by crappy lab work. Cure that problem at the lab level and image quality improves significantly.

quote:
You would be amazed at what Joe Sixpack can appreciate if given the chance... Mr. Sixpack got a taste of the good life, and now won't accept crappy analong sound presentations.

Mr. Sixpack would feel exactly the same way about 'awesome 70mm' vs 'crappy 35mm'.

-Aaron

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Manny Knowles
"What are these things and WHY are they BLUE???"

Posts: 4247
From: Bloomington, IN, USA
Registered: Feb 2002

posted 02-26-2004 02:29 PM

Nobody is expected to ever occupy those front row seats. My understanding is that theatres get a "house allowance" based on the number of seats in an auditorium. Those useless seats are the result of a shameless workaround.

As for "awesome 70mm" vs. "crappy 35mm" I feel we are comparing apples with oranges -- or is there no such thing as "awesome 35mm" ?

And what about "crappy 70mm" ? I can tell you first-hand that there is such a thing because -- almost without exception -- the 70mm presentations I have seen (including IMAX) had their fair share of glitches.

Most common with 5/70 was loss of mag sound and IMAX had damaged/missing footage or sound that was out of sync.

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John Pytlak
Film God

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

posted 02-26-2004 02:36 PM

Certainly, neck-craning front row "booker seats" are an unfortunate reality. But many modern theatres are selling out seats in the range of 1 to 2 screen heights, especially for busy nights. I personally most prefer sitting about 2 image heights from the screen, and there's usually a dozen or so rows in front of me.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

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

posted 02-26-2004 05:32 PM

My judgments on micromirror technology, and how far it can be miniaturized, is simply based on the very slow product development cycle. TI has been making those chips for nearly a decade. Lots of promises in the technology have not been delivered, at least not yet and certainly years overdue.

When the micromirror process was first announced there were all kinds of big predictions, with the most far fetched being everyone would be using a large, lightweight high resolution computer monitor based on this process before the end of the 1990s.

Price points have not dropped into even remotely affordable levels for the consumer electronics industry. If you want to buy a computer projector using DLP, you will shell out lots of money to get to that 1280 X 1024 level.

A spinning mirror is a lot more complex of an item to produce at a microscopic scale. The DLP process demands larger chip sizes and higher cost.

Certainly TI may be able to further miniaturize DLP chips to fit more on silicon wafter and/or to improve resolution. But I just don't think their pace of improvement is going to keep pace with other different processes, such as DILA or Intel's LCOS. I think they will leapfrog DLP both in terms of cost cuts and resolution improvement.

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Aaron Sisemore
Flaming Ribs beat Reeses Peanut Butter Cups any day!

Posts: 3061
From: Rockwall TX USA
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 02-26-2004 07:15 PM

quote:
As for "awesome 70mm" vs. "crappy 35mm" I feel we are comparing apples with oranges -- or is there no such thing as "awesome 35mm" ?

Of course there is such a thing as 'awesome 35mm'! I was pointing out that Joe Six-Pack would have the same opinion with 70mm vs 35mm as he would with DLP vs 35mm.

-Aaron

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Mattias Ohlson
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 180
From: Falun, Sweden
Registered: Mar 2003

posted 03-11-2004 10:56 AM

Did you read about Quvis launching servers storing, recording and playing files at 2k and 4k.

With the launch of the 4k Cinema player does this mean a demonstration of a 4k digital projector is imminent?

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John Pytlak
Film God

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

posted 03-11-2004 11:33 AM

4K Projector??? Kodak's partner JVC has been there, done that...(in October 2002): [Cool]

http://tig.colorist.org/pipermail/tig/2002-October/001934.html

quote:
To Those Who Make a Difference in Colors;

I would like to inform you that Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp.
(NTT) will have a demonstration using the JVC's SHD (3840 * 2048)
D-ILA projector and their decoder. NTT is one of the leading
telecommunication companies in Japan.

The first-generation negative of 35mm and 65mm was scanned in
Cineon 10bit log with IMAGICA scanners and processed it to be
appropriate for their SHD D-ILA projector with our color management
system "Galette" and then encoded these into JPEG2000.

This will be the first time that you can experience 4K data with
a 4K projector. Date and place is as follows;

Date: Oct. 31st, 14:00- 17:00
Place: Pacific Theater (ETC), 6433 Hollywood Blvd.

Registration is not required and you can drop in whenever your
schedule permits.

I'm looking forward to seeing you on Thursday.

Kind regards,
Noriyuki Mibuchi
tel 310-306-4180 fax 310-306-2334
E-mail:nori at imagica-la.com
http://www.imagica-la.com/

It was also shown in the UK:

http://www.bfi.org.uk/features/dtb/docs/image-tech-july-2003.pdf

http://www.kodak.com/go/dcinema

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