That begs the question, will distributors and theatres invest in "digital projection done right" any more than they try to "do film right" today? Sadly, I doubt it.

The real danger to theatres is that they will lose audiences to high quality "home theatres" that will use the same digital technology being developed for "Digital Cinema":

For example, from a TI press release 4/27/1999:

____________________________________________

"Signing this agreement with Hitachi is an extremely exciting
milestone in the development of DLP technology," said Bob
England, Senior Vice President and Manager of TI’s Digital
Imaging division. "Hitachi’s choice of DLP for this new High
Definition product speaks volumes about not only how much the
technology has progressed, but also its extraordinary potential for
the future. We’re excited that DLP technology will deliver the
first-ever all-digital display to the home entertainment market."

And from

5/25/1999

Texas Instruments And Mitsubishi Digital Electronics America,
Inc. Announce Agreement To Jointly Develop High Definition
Home Entertainment Display

Digital Light Processing™ technology chosen as basis for new all-digital
rear projection display system

Dallas, Texas - Texas Instruments (TI) announced today the signing of
an agreement under the terms of which Mitsubishi Digital Electronics
America Inc. (MDEA) will use Digital Light Processing™ (DLP™)
technology to develop an all-digital, large screen, high definition (HD)
rear projection television.

"We have been watching the development of DLP technology for many
years and have been impressed with the dramatic performance
improvements that have been made," explained Yoji Otani, president
and CEO of Mitsubishi Digital Electronics America, Inc. "Instrumental
to our continued leadership of digital television is the incorporation of a
digital light engine. We are very excited to have reached this agreement
with Texas Instruments."

____________________________________________

Whether it's film or digital ten years from now, I hope theatres "Do it right" and present the best possible image and sound quality. But today, it's much easier and cost-effective to "Do Film Right". If we don't, the "couch potatoes" win and theatre audiences lose.

------------------
John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Eastman Kodak Company
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7419
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: 716-477-5325 Fax: 716-722-7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com

And, it's even worse than that. High quality sets give people a reason to stay home. But, poor projection, high ticket prices, stupid ads and high candy stand prices give them a reason *not* to go to theaters.

We are at $8.50 now, which, if the show is put on correctly, is worth the money. But, if it's a poor presentation, is not.

I truly feel that allowing ads in theaters is a short term gain, that will also spell the end for most theaters. People will always want to get out of the house and see a movie on a big screen. But, I think, it will be a special-type event (like seeing a play) and not done very often.

"Film Done Right" will make audiences seek out your theatre for the best in picture and sound. "Film Done Wrong" sends them to the competition, or Blockbuster.

I'll echo what I think is the bottom line put forward by John and others on this thread, and that is concern about the level of "good enough". Where is it, and how is it established? What is "good enough"?

We've seen this in theatres for years. Film projection is capabale of being much better than what is seen too often in cinemas. The places that do it right -- or very nearly so -- are virtually ignored for whatever reasons, but everyone likes to point out the theatre tests where 4 fL of light were on screen. Pro Digital folks talk as if they will correct such deficiencies in exhibition.

At some stage, digital may well have the capability of being as good as or better than film. It will have the same capacity of screen brightness, for instance. But does that mean that's the way things will be?

That's a little harder call. We have those capabilities now, to do "film right", in just about every instance.

Unfortunately, "good enough" sometimes wins out. I don't exactly know how digital projection will fix such things. The same exhibitor that undersizes lamps with film will probably undersize with digital. It would certainly be a change if digital projector manufacturers somehow had the influence to specify what should be used for the appropriate screen application.

Again, I don't want to take away from the may exhibitors, projectionists and dealers that do "film right". There has been a lot more emphasis on doing it right the last few years, to the point where I really think poor projection is the exception rather than the rule.

Well, it really makes me think about theatre sound quality when my friends (mostly technical engineering and computer science types) come over and tell me that my sound system is better than they've heard in any theatre, especially after watching an action or science fiction movie with a lot of surround effects. I've had many different friends tell me that.

Let's see -- I spent a little over $5500 for the specific parts of my system that make the DVD experience work (not counting other components). The $5500 includes:

32" Sony XBR TV (1993)
Yamaha DSP-A1 DTS/DD receiver (1998)
2 JPL HP520 speakers for mains (1994)
Infinity CC3 center speaker (1998)
2 Infinity RS5 speakers for surrounds (1998)
Toshiba 3109 DVD Player (1999)

I only included the most recent components.

As you can see, my system is better than the average Joe's home setup, but is far from perfect. The reason I haven't bought a bigger screen TV is I'm waiting for larger better screens to become available for a more reasonable price. It's not a good time to buy a TV right now. There are some fairly good projection sets out, but a CRT is better for my living room because the projection TVs typically only look good when viewed straight-on.

I guess my point is, if I can spend $5500 for a set of components that will make my friends tell me that my sound beats and theatre they've heard, something is wrong.

I think theatres are really going to be in trouble when large screens become available that are 8 to 12 feet wide that are affordable. Even though DVD is only 720x480 resolution, when displayed in a progressive manner (if the conversion to progressive is done right) rather than interlaced, it is impressive. When people are able to afford systems that will give them a large screen and 5.1 digital sound and the movies in the proper aspect ratio (something I can't even get a lot of the time in the Huntsville Regal theatres), I think theatres are going to see ticket sales drop significantly.

As far as theatres in my area and the "film done right" discussion:

There is one theatre in my area that I consider to have consistent professional-quality projection. The manager of that particular location seems to go all out to keep everything in good working order. I make this statement based on 46 visits there over the past 3.5 years, and many conversations with the management and staff. There are other theatres that have excellent presentation, but they tend to let some of the auditoriums get in disrepair for unacceptable periods of time or have audioriums with 1.85:1-only screens.

For those of you that have been around here a long time, you know about my rating system for local theatres. For those of you who haven't seen them, go to my site at
http://home.hiwaay.net/~criswell/theatre/

and go down to the ratings table. (Many people have seen my site and are not aware that the detailed ratings are there!) The site needs a redesign to make that more obvious. Clicking the theatre name in the table gives a listing of all movies seen, with notes on presentation flaws and a "grade" is assigned to each showing, and the ratings are based on a weighted average of these grades. (I explained this again mainly for people who have only been in the forums for the past 6 months). It will be obvious which theatre I was complimenting earlier. I'm sure any skilled booth person or manager would sincerely appreciate the list of compliments I listed on that particular theatre's description page, expecially since many of the compliments can only be made for that location in my area.

I think the coming of HDTV (if it happens as planned) is going to be very interesting. If those prices come down and screens get bigger, and people at home can get access to movies when they want, I think theatres may be in trouble in a few years.

Evans

I don't watch much TV. The reason for this has very little to do with image quality and very much to do with the fact that most TV programming is of little interest to me. Even though I care a great deal about picture quality, I'd rather have better programming than the same old junk repackaged at higher resolution...

I suspect that others probably agree with me, and I believe that I read recently that the amount of HDTV programming in the US is actually lower this year than it was last year, since the TV set manufacturers were willing to subsidize less of it.

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Ya know, I've been wondering why you haven't been complaining about the fixed masking on your Sony 32" set...

I know that a sound system placed in a very small area does not have to be as good as one designed to fill a much larger area. For example, the 5-speaker surround system around my bed (roughly 6ft by 6ft) often "sounds better" to me than my living room system for music, since it is overkill for the 36 sq. ft. that it is filling. I've got my old living room system in there with 5 identical Yamaha speakers. The speakers are far inferior to my main speakers in the living room, but they're playing at a much lower level and sound great. That's why people can duplicate the theatre sound experience in their living rooms without too great an expense. At this time, duplicating the screen is the problem.

To Jerry: Although any TV I ever have in my home will probably have a fixed-sized screen, at least the movies are letterboxed to the correct ratio so I'm not seeing movies chopped to whatever size my screen is, like the Huntsville Regal theatres do. You'd think they could just use a longer throw lens and "letterbox" scope. I'd prefer that to magnifying it more and chopping it. I admit that my TV is by far the weakest link in my system right now, and would love to have a 16:9 set, but it isn't a good time to buy. Prices will come down, technology and standards will improve, and product reliability is not yet known.

Ideally, I'd love to have a 12-foot screen with adjustable curtains (even if I had to move them by hand) across my front wall with a projector with adjustable magnification so I could make the movie image fit regardless of format. With a front-projection system, it would definitely be possible to implement, but now, it would be far too expensive to do so. Brighter, less expensive projectors are needed.

Evans

I recently had a chance to see a "guy's" home theatre set up and it was pertty nice. After that we went to the theatre and went into one of the houses. There was some comment about the difference in the sound.... "Why doesn't this sound as good as it does at home?" I didn't want to get into it with him. He wouldn't understand & I wasn't in the mood...

Upstairs I went, with "tweeker" and Dolby tone in hand... On the next show we went back to the theatre. He liked the sound this time.

Just goes to show that it doesn't take thousands of dollars worth of equipment to keep people from staying at home... just about $4.50 worth of green film and a plastic stick!