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Topic: When will we see 4k dlp from TI?

Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

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

posted 11-01-2003 02:07 AM

Chris, the term "DP" would greatly depend on the context of subject matter of the show you are watching.

Naturally, if you are watching a mainstream movie and the commentary says something like, "Adam Greenberg did such a great job with the lighthing on this scene," then the term DP means Director of Photography.

If the commentary says something like, "there was a debate over what kind of lube to use for Briana Banks' DP scene," then the term "DP" means something else entirely.

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Carl Martin
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1424
From: Oakland, CA, USA
Registered: Feb 2002

posted 11-01-2003 03:10 AM

quote:
digital intermediates are being used more and more often as part of the production process. So film is being converted to digital for effects and color timing and then back to 35mm for presentation. I suspect I don't hear any complaints about that (and there shouldn't be because the resulting images are incredibly good) because you're usually not aware when it happens.

i wouldn't say they're incredibly good. they may look about as good as most of what's seen on screen, and i don't know how much that is due to the ubiquity of digital intermediates or generation loss. but almost always, whenever i'm floored by the crispness and clarity of an image, it's in a film that definitely had no digital work, and is very possibly struck off the negative as it never had a wide mainstream release. recently, for instance, i've seen such films by sarunas bartas (lithuanian) and heddy honigmann (dutch). i'd like to be floored like that more often.

carl

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Mattias Ohlson
Expert Film Handler

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

posted 11-01-2003 03:13 AM

I would like to ask something here. What makes 5-70 look so sharp and superior? With the bigger format the depth of focus is reduced so does that accentuate sharpness compared with 35mm?

Also how much of the sharpness of 70mm can be attributed to the projection of 70mm film. I have been told that 70mm is easier to get a good projected focus with and is more steady in the film projector.

With more efficent use of film like Maxivision48 the increase in film use is 50 percent and not 100 percent.

It might be true that 30fps is a noticable gain but I would rather take 48fps. With 30fps it is alright for US with ntsc and hdtv at 60Hz but in other parts of the world 50Hz is the norm and frame conversions from 30 to 50 would be terrible. The after market is growing every day. It is not uncommon for people to wait for the release on a medium like dvd.

Before digital displays has displaced scanning crt in the home 30 fps will be a problem. With a future non ntsc/pal digital distribution format 30fps will be perfectly acceptable, but today 30 fps would lead to problems in many parts of the world.

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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

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

posted 11-01-2003 08:23 AM

What makes 70mm so sharp? More information stored and projected. Furthermore, it is replaced at least 24 times per second with 100% refresh (no static pixels) and no perceivable grid.

The improvement is perceivable with every stage. That is shooting in 65mm will get you the best quality image. However, projecting in 70mm will allow a theatre to display that image (regardless of film source) as faithful as possible.

BTW how do you plan to get 48fps into 50Hz...with 30fps you have something to work with on repeating frames in a regular interval to make the dupe with a 2/3rds ratio. But a 24/25ths ratio...how is that to work or do you just run it off-speed? Lastly we Americans always plan on what works for us! [Wink]

Have you actually looked at 70mm at 30fps? Have you looked at 35mm at 30fps?

Steve

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Chris Hipp
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1462
From: Mesquite, Tx (east of Dallas)
Registered: Jul 2003

posted 11-01-2003 09:50 AM

Just out of curiosity, how many FPS is 15/70?

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Steve Kraus
Film God

Posts: 4094
From: Chicago, IL, USA
Registered: May 2000

posted 11-01-2003 10:30 AM

15/70 is normally 24 fps although there has been some limited use of faster rates. But the typical IMAX and similar film will be 24.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

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

posted 11-01-2003 11:46 AM

quote:
I would like to ask something here. What makes 5-70 look so sharp and superior? With the bigger format the depth of focus is reduced so does that accentuate sharpness compared with 35mm?

5/70 has 250% more film negative real estate and thus has lots more particles of film emulsion to resolve detail. A 15/70 IMAX frame is 3 times the size of a standard 5/70 theatrical film frame. It can capture well over 10 times the levels of detail over standard Super35 and Super1.85 35mm photography.

35mm is an okay format to use for motion picture film. But it is blurry and soft compared to the much more razor sharp levels of detail captured by 70mm. I kind of liken the effect to having perfect vision (70mm) versus needed glasses (35mm).

Video projection tries to claim it is sharp, but the level of sharpness is highly deceptive and relative only to its very limited number of pixels. For instance, a puny 14" computer monitor running at 640 X 480 pixels will have a very sharp image. But it doesn't show squat on actual detail.

With true 70mm movies like "Lawrence of Arabia" you could have a camera shot with two people riding camels across a sand dune, yet the image would be sharp enough for you to see the individual grains of sand blowing across the dune. There is no way 35mm can achieve that. And digital video cannot even match the limits of what 4/35 can capture. 70mm is the King of all theatrical production and presentation formats, even if the format is being ignored out of hype over "digital."

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Mattias Ohlson
Expert Film Handler

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

posted 11-01-2003 05:48 PM

What I have partly been trying to get an opinion or fact about is how much resolution there is in
1 35mm today
2 shooting 65mm many years ago, film emulsions not as good then

How much has film emulsion improved over time, not enough to overcome the surface area advantage of 65mm?

If you shoot more fps you will have a shorter time for expusore, must that not give you a sharper picture, perhaps more grain if you need a more sensitve film.

What would be the result of this.
Shoot a conversation scene, one displaying many objects moving fast a car chase and one scene with a panning camera
at
24fps
30fps
48fps
What would be the result?

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John Pytlak
Film God

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

posted 11-01-2003 06:24 PM

About 15 years ago, the SMPTE reevaluated 30fps vs. 24fps production. I believe Ed DiGiulio of Cinema Products Corporation (a camera manufacturer) led the committee activities. Several demos were shot and shown, both by projection and on television. 30fps had all of the advantages you would expect, along with the expected 25% increase in film/processing cost. I recall another issue was transferring 30fps to 50 Hz. PAL television, although transfers to NTSC were simplified frame-for-frame, rather than 3:2 pulldown. The work was published in the May 1988 SMPTE Journal.

As far as comparing formats, Rob Hummel coordinated a comprehensive set of demos comparing origination and presentation formats, which was presented and evaluated by hundreds of SMPTE members. Guess what the conclusions were? Bigger image formats had better image quality. [Smile]

Yes, film emulsion technology and lens technology has made tremendous strides in the last few decades. You can use those improvements to save money by using smaller or more convenient formats. Or you can improve the image quality on the screen. Both have been done, and will continue to be done.

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William Hooper
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1879
From: Mobile, AL USA
Registered: Jun 99

posted 11-03-2003 12:09 AM

quote:
Another thing that will prevent digital projection getting much higher in rez is self-imposed limits in film production. In spite of much more powerful computing technology and ever increasing storage capability, much of the film production end is still holding to the belief that 2K is good enough.

I've spent a week looking at a lot of shorts with & without digital intermediates, repeatedly, on 35mm 40' wide.

The digital intermediate artifacts are annoying & distracting; they're symptoms of the director using it as a "tool" for anything he wants not caring about its other effects. You want sharp, extraordinarily saturated or desaturated, or goofy computer screen saver effects? They are yours with a digital intermediate. What you get is sharp & unnaturally flat, saturated with less information & flat, & goofy computer screen saver images. Also, you may pay extra for title rollups that slowly jitter upwards for 20 feet.

It must all look very cool on a video monitor or 10' wide screen. They'll be considered a syndrome of stupid movie looks of the era & be considered grossly antique soon, like the annoying flashed look of so much embarassing 70's stuff.

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Chris Hipp
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1462
From: Mesquite, Tx (east of Dallas)
Registered: Jul 2003

posted 11-03-2003 12:33 AM

Please keep in mind that I am not an expert on these subjects like some of the other guys on here but this is my opinion:

Mattias, it doesn't seem that you fully understand the state that the movie industry is in right now. With the studios all bent out of shape over piracy and the rediculous measure that they are taking, check out this thread to see, Mpaa You suck

The last thing some big studio exec wants to do is spend more money to shoot a movie at 30 or 48fps regardless of how much better a presentation it would be. Plus, I hate to think what it would be like for everyone to change there equipment setup to be able to run films at that speed.

On top of that, some studios are already limiting the budgets even on big blockbusters because of the poor box office sales recently, which they say is piracy but I think it's just because the movies sucked. [Smile]

Long story short, the top concern of everyone calling the shots is not presentation quality, it's money.

Again, these are just my opinions.

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Mattias Ohlson
Expert Film Handler

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

posted 11-03-2003 02:57 AM

So if studios is concerned with money and the owners of theaters would like to offer the best PQ where does that leave us? This industry is strange, the actors get whatever they want. If they put 100 million dollars aside for one person for the Matrix movies this year something is skewed.

This might be controversial, but are there too many movie theaters? Perhaps going to see a movie needs to be given premium status. Increased price per ticket and increased PQ. All involved with projecting film here is dedicated so you might see incrased business in such a scenario. You would get less competition from exhibitors competing on price. How would this scenario come about. The studios will earn alot in the future from dvd and hd-dvd releases. To complement this they could create a certification to allow theaters to show their movies. This certification would imposes stringent quality control.
The certification should not cost too much. Only the studios can say we only want our products to look the best they can. They could still make the same money considering the increased importance of aftermarket sales. One big problem seems to be that the studios are too strong compared to the theater owners who make sure studios make their money.

Less theaters means lower distributino costs. Higher ticket price together with new deals could give theater owners a better profit margin. Perhaps such a scenario could give 5-70 at 30fps a chance. The movie industry is competing with video games and they get more impressive every day.

4k digital will come from TI if JVC/Kodak were to show a 4k digital cinema projector and that is not totally unlikely.

[ 11-03-2003, 06:01 AM: Message edited by: Mattias Ohlson ]

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Darryl Spicer
Film God

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

posted 11-03-2003 09:58 AM

ok, 48 frames per second is out of the question for film use. That is double the size of a 2 hour movie and I am not carting that thing around from house to house.

secondly, 4k chips are just not economically practical. Would take a very high amount of storage capacity and bandwith to move that much information with higher risk of errors in what ever system you use for sending the information. Just to expensive.

As far as ther being to many theaters. Yes there very well could be in certain markets. There very well might not be enough in other markets.

What one individual is getting 100 million dollars on the matrix movies. I dought it is a straight pay. Probably a percentage off what the movie makes.

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Greg Anderson
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 766
From: Ogden Valley, Utah
Registered: Nov 1999

posted 11-03-2003 10:42 AM

Raise ticket prices? I hope not. It would strike a deadly blow against an industry which is already in trouble. It would drive patrons away from theatres and straight towards the competition... meaning cheaper and, arguably, more convenience video rentals. As ticket prices go up, patrons will be even more convinced that the DVD format offers "good enough" quality. Plus, it's becoming less and less of a challenge to wait for something to become available on DVD. (Remember when it would take more than a year for something to become available on a home video format? It wasn't so long ago.)

Consider that the entire budget of the movie Top Gun was under $40 million. These days you couldn't ask Tom Cruise to get a hair cut for less than $25 million. Today's higher ticket prices which have led to lower attendance should indicate how much the average patron appreciates being asked to pay for these salary changes in the production side of the industry.

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Chris Hipp
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1462
From: Mesquite, Tx (east of Dallas)
Registered: Jul 2003

posted 11-03-2003 10:52 AM

I 100% agree. If ticket prices went up people would most likely just watch everything on DVD. Plus if there were fewer theaters the average joe is not going to drive all the way to see a movie.

It's not like an amusement park where you can charge $30-$100 a day. You can't do all the stuff at disney world at home, you can watch movies at home though. For that idea to work you would have to limit movies to one media, or two if it was on DLP. Otherwise everyone would say "I'll just get the DVD"

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