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This topic comprises 5 pages: 1 2 3 4 5
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Author
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Topic: Other digital format recommendations
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Scott Norwood
Film God
Posts: 8146
From: Boston, MA. USA (1774.21 miles northeast of Dallas)
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 08-14-2009 01:14 PM
I don't believe that the solution to format proliferation is to develop another format that duplicates the function of existing formats.
At least the television formats (HDCAM, etc.) are already established at postproduction facilities, equipment is readily available for rent in major cities, and older material will only exist in these formats for the forseeable future. These formats also allow the "film"-makers to produce one final master for both theatrical and television use, rather than having to deal with multiple formats.
I agree that this is not an ideal situation for the exhibitor, but it is what it is. Like it or not, the art-house booth of the future will have 4-5 projectors (2x 35mm, 16mm, video, maybe D-cinema), and will have to accommodate several video formats and many different sound formats.
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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!
Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 08-14-2009 10:11 PM
Sorry Scott...I don't agree with you on that many projectors in a typical "art/revival" house.
First off...separate 16mm have already gone away for the most part...those that still fool with it as a projection format for a paying audience are typically in the Kinoton FP38E market. However, 16mm has been a very inconsistent format its whole life. Its quality can rival that of many 35mm prints to levels of mediocrity that make DVDs look good by comparison. In fact, you'll find most exhibitors if given the choice of DVD or 16mm will go for DVD. Both formats can be a crap shoot but the DVD will likely have better sound and isn't as likely to be dirty/scratched or hard to focus.
Mind you, 16mm can indeed look fantastic. Sound can be quite decent and with DTS 16mm is all that any other DTS digital film sound can be. Most installations...even those that still support it don't present it at its finest. At the AFI/Silver, they have shown 16mm and those that should be in the know thought it was 35mm it looked so good...16mm scope too. That is more of the exception than the rule though.
I do see a continuation of a dual projector 35mm system for archival presentations and also a video projector. I know we are designing all systems with 3 sets of ports. The question is...where the video is best suited to avoid as much keystone as possible for all formats. That is, one can put the film projectors on risers and have the video be below or have the video be above the film projectors or just set the booth up as a 3-projector system. The physicalities of the booth and the theatre sort of dictate what makes the most sense (including putting projectors on tracks). However, integrated film/video shows makes that solution less attractive.
As for type based video...I dunno...that certainly is not for me to decide...what I currently still see is a LOT of BetaSP, a Mountain of DigiBeta...Stacks of HDCAM and if it is a studio (Movie or even Cable)...HDCAM-SR. There is a distinct trend towards HDCAM-SR. I also see a fair amount of DVCAM.
XDCam, on the other hand...doesn't seem like it has taken off. The sites that have it, don't use it. The M2000 decks seem to get used non-stop though. If we go back 15 years or so...then open-reel decks ("C") were very popular still and 3/4 was definitely still in heavy use...There could certainly be a change out there that we are not seeing in 2009.
Then again, from an archival sense...tape is proving to be a good medium in many ways...just like film is.
I don't think a facility should have to support every format unless that is their mission. Always buying the latest/greatest format will drive one broke too. I think if you are in this market though...you should be DBeta/BetaSP capable by now (a J deck at the least...either the 2100 series or M2000 series would be nice but not essential...having multiple decks should be up there so one may cue up the next segment...especially if one needs to switch between different frequencies.
If you are trying to attract studio work, then having HDCAM-SR can be a plus...it is one less thing they have to rent, slam in and hope all works after set up. Just bringing the tape is much easier. I was within ear shot when a studio was doing a screening at the AFI/Silver...they were telling their studio..."And these guys have a D5, IN THE RACK!" They were notably impressed and HAVE returned for years since. Is isn't common for one to take their medium of choice and just plop it in the theatre's equipment and press play and whola...just like back at the studio.
Steve
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Martin McCaffery
Film God
Posts: 2481
From: Montgomery, AL
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 08-15-2009 09:12 AM
Alas, we can't all be the AFI, or even the Michigan Theatre. ![[Wink]](wink.gif)
As the art house business seems more and more to be non-profit based (like we are) the ability to keep up with the various digital formats gets more prohibitive. If there eventually is a massive conversion away from 35mm with no single standard for an alternative, that will be the death blow to the art house outside of cities with major funding sources. Admittedly, we're a pretty small population as it is and will not be missed by the industry. Nonetheless, it will be a major loss for those who want to see more than hollywood crap and want to see it in a theatre (again a small and aging population).
And, though Scott may work in places that you can rent HD decks, Montgomery is not one of those places, and only $350 is cost prohibitive for us.
Maybe Emerging pictures has the right idea with their e-cinema and we will just have to accept the lower standard. I don't know.
I do know we are showing Woodstock on DVD this weekend and it sucks. But I was advised by WB there are no good prints and DVD would look better, and I wouldn't have to pay the shipping(probably more than we'll make all weekend). So instead of a broken,scratched, dirty faded print, I get to run a skippy, freezy DVD. Yay for progress. And whose idiot idea was it to put the intermission ten minutes into side 2 of the disk?
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John Hawkinson
Film God
Posts: 2273
From: Cambridge, MA, USA
Registered: Feb 2002
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posted 08-15-2009 09:22 AM
Actuallly, Martin, everyone (at least domestically) has access to HD decks; there are plenty of national rental houses who will happily FedEx you an HDCAM or D5 deck for just their one-day rental charge plus shipping. Video Equipmental Rentals is one, but there are others. It's often cheaper than shipping two films cans around...
That doesn't help you with the cost. For advance screenings, typically the studio pays for all associated rentals, so you're golden. That just leaves filmmakers who use this stuff as an exhibition format; relatively rare, but it does happen.
(Our campus Arts office had us do a screening of something in HDCAM recently; they footed the bill for the deck rental, the tape rental, and fedexing the tape from France. I don't really know who negotiated the financials, but the tape rental cost more than the deck rental, and it turned out the tape had a glitch that killed ~5 seconds of audio and pixelated/blocked up the video for a bit. Sigh...)
If you're seriously stuck running DVDs, perhaps it's worth ripping them to a hard drive, potentially editing them to kill crap like an intermission (or whatever), and running them off the hard drive. Hopefully more reliable [though, well, maybe not.]
--jhawk
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James B Gardiner
Film Handler
Posts: 91
From: North Altona, Victoria, Ausrtalia
Registered: Feb 2009
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posted 08-15-2009 06:31 PM
My brother and I are the two developers behind the technology used by Emerging Pictures. This may explain my strong belief in the need in the future for ECinema technologies, however, I believe this as we are trying to build solutions to make a better and profitable future for the exhibitor. When DCI does not make sense. (Ie cost/profit wise.)
Emerging Pictures model should be successful for many reasons.
It may not be DCI, but it is designed to give as best a quality of presentation while reducing the cost of special retropy and alternative content to screen.
Yes it used MPG/WMV/MP4(h264) types files. But these files can be distributed over the internet while 250gig DCI movies will not. (Well maybe in the future of the US and their unlimited usage models, But the rest of the world. Not going to happen. And satellite will not work for this model.)
The idea behind Emerging, is to simply request a Movie.. It is automatically downloaded and ready to go. It is protected, encrypted, like DCI, but does not have the key costs as involved with DCI.
It has many of the features of DCI but without the politics and cost.
DCI was created to answer the secutiry needs of the distributors. This is its number one mandate, then comes the idea of reproducing film to screen digitally as best is possible. However, it is the security requirement that makes it as expensive as it is. (The new video format is also "currently" expensive and difficult to make) An expense that would make it impossible to bring some content to screen.
The right tool for the right job.
eCinema is a good tool suited to a niche but very important aspect of exhibition. I hope you will consider it as such.
Film-Tech, as predominantly a group of exhibitors looking at going DCI at some stage (As opposed to poorer countries just trying to build a film industry, a building client base for our technology), yes eCinema technologies is something in the background. Something we don't as a community, put a lot of thought into as yet. We developed the eCinema technology based on requests from the cinema community. Our product has all the features it has due to requests and ideas put forth my exhibitors mixed in without 15 years of owning a Post House. We, as a development company, believe that the products should stand by themselves. If technology proves them obsolete, so be it, or we improve it to keep it relevant/of benefit.
Right now we are working on many operational aspects of how digital is going to change the operational nature and costs of being an exhibitor. We have spent years on it. Analyzing what is done now and why. What might be done in the future. Australia is in a unique position as eCinema is so prominent in the non-chain cinema. We find those who have been running eCinema for the last few years are much happier about going DCI. They already understand many of the aspects of going to digital files. Tho eCinema is much simpler then DCI..
But still, when needing to "edit" a DVD down to a more reliable eCinema file. For easy distribution of Alternative content. For easy display of independent films. eCinema cam make profitable sense. That is why these products sell and are prolific in some areas of the world.
Adoption of a well documented and widely published eCinema file format that cinemas accept as a reasonable level of quality is of benefit to us all.
I have my ideas on this, but I would like to get this community to offer their opinion first.
James
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James B Gardiner
Film Handler
Posts: 91
From: North Altona, Victoria, Ausrtalia
Registered: Feb 2009
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posted 08-16-2009 03:57 AM
I'll be the first to say Emerging has issues. They use WMV due to historic reasons. They Go with 720 as most cinemas didn;t have anoything over 1.3 projectors when they started. They also use only 720 to keep the bit-rate down. (Smaller file sizes)
All these issues I have attempted to encourage them to move to other better quality formats. File size seems to be a reasonable issue still, even in the lang of the unlimited bandwidth of the US. But I imagine this will change, at the Quality could be steped up consierably.
Tho one issue, the quality of a lot of operas is very poor, and as we all know, shit in, shit out.
If you do have Emerging systems, I do encourage you to seek the latest CineX software versions. Due to the support of WMV, in early releases, we had a lot of issues with having to conform to some of the software requirments. (WMV, when used low level, Microsoft only lets you use a WMV direct show filters with a LOT of bugs. Thier own player appears to have most fixed, but as a third party developer, you cannot get access to the FIXED libaries. #%%$@ Microsoft)
I am personally a fan of 40mbit MPEG2 4:2:0 or 80mbit 4:2:2. (Being the initial format for DCI) The quality of that you would agree is acceptable, tho the file sizes start to get large and less effective to the advantages of the use of eCinema formats.
MP4/H264 is also quite interesting but usually to easy to get wrong. H.264 is a very problematic codec, but when it works, it works well.
We did a lot of work to be able to archive the remote administration capabilities as you wrote about. We think it key to cinema and the "what can happen, will happen", problems you get.
Sound wise, we think the use of the standard AC3 at peek bitrates are best. It is historically the most common used and as such tends to be more stable and reliable. The Quality of such a codec is much greater then a typical Film Dolby digital sound. And if you use the optical audio path, it sounds amazing.
I'll be the first to admint, eCinema, being the poor mans distribution format, is subject to content also made on the Cheap. And as such, usually looks the part. Get a well made move from a HDCAM/DHDCAM-SR master, convert to a eCinema codec at a bitrate as listed above, and it WILL look good, I assure you. Just no one uses it like that. (Well in the non-DCI countries, they do, India use 60mbit MPEG2 VBR (to 80) for example for the RealImage eCinema system, one of many eCinema networks and its 600 screens. (From memory)
In terms of the CineX player that Emerging uses, yes, its a nice looking unit but the non-rack mount aspect is a not so suitable to many Cinema installs. We actually have a new hardware set based on a 2RU rack server with an optional external Touch Screen. It can be completely controlled via WEB page too, but we feel, as a cinema operator, you need the touch screen so you have the tactile control when you need it.
There has also been numourous big fixes and small improvements.
We have actually been focusing on full Automation and TMS type features for integration with DCI systems.. The object here is that you have full control of all aspects of the auditorium via very fast end effective Web page allowing in auditorium control to the highest degree, plus for service agents doing remote diagnostics etc, we can see exactly what is going on. Helps a lot when your trying to help Candy Boy Projectionist call us and ask why X is not working...
We also have a lot of back end software to help support servicing. This is a service for those smaller Cinema support companies who are starting to understand the new requirements.. Realizing its not trivial and so purchases this type of capabilities as a service. Far more cost effective and keeps you in the game. That is the idea. We are still working on the processes and business models.
If you have noticed my Posts, I am often asking opinions and feed back. This all goes back to the design and development of technologies we are creating for Cinema.
James
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