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Author Topic: What process does a movie go through? Mark Gulbrandsen Resident Trollmaster Posts: 16657 From: Music City Registered: Jun 99 posted 06-20-2007 02:48 PM                     quote: Steve Guttag I don't think ANYONE can afford it Steve, I'm thinking in terms of if today you had to convert that its better than shutting your buisness down... and lets face it, with this gear projector, optical, and lamp technology is being driven to improve so it can become more affordable and even more reliable but the latter would be hard to improve upon except from a software viewpoint. D-Cinema gear is already ultra reliable. Everyone here is assuming the worst and that they're going to have to buy this stuff tommrrow at 120K for a system and yes... if you want a good system right now thats what you're going to be paying... but that won't be true in a few years as technology in D.C. advances. You may even see the server completely disappear as it is now and the decrypter/decoder end of the server be put into the projector. That makes the servers very simple, much smaller and very affordable. I think the first improvements you will see is in the lamp end of things. These companys know that no one can go on buying $2100.00 lamps that only last 750 to 1200 hours if you push em. They either have to last longer or cost less. Many projectors now afford the opportunity to use standard cinema type lamps if your system can perform properly with them, you can then enjoy very long lamp life. Christie has already come out with their second(perhaps third) generation projector... smaller DLP chips, the same resolutuon and higher optical efficiency, simplified chassis and 20K lower price tag. Overall I don't think you'll see it take that long for things to become more realistic price wise. HEck a full blown very well built THX system is going to set you back about 70 to a hundred grand! None of you are cheapskates ... right! And who knows that LCD D-Cinema Projector, Panasonic I believe may look really good on a 20 foot screen. As for LCD's and color fading it depends on what type of optical block is being used.... Typically 3 LCD imagers with Color Dicro filters in front of them or in each one's optical path... There's no more to fade with this sort of LCD optical block than there is with DLP. Both are similar in how they create the 3 colors. Too many of you are basing D-Cinema on what it costs today... well none of you are buying it today... it will be the day after tommrrow at least. But you should not ignore it, you all need to plan for it or someday or eventually find other employment if you don't. Mark  |  IP: Logged Thomas Pitt Master Film Handler Posts: 266 From: Leeds, West Yorkshire, UK Registered: May 2007 posted 06-20-2007 03:20 PM                     Most multiplexes in the UK still run 35mm prints for the majority of their showings. Even though the technology exists, they already have a well-implemented film showing system and the costs of converting to digital would be prohibitive. Think of how much it costs to install a digital projector and playback system in a single-screen cinema. Now multiply that value by the number of screens you've got to upgrade... it could easily go into the millions! The Vue Leeds Light I go to has one screen (fairly small auditorium) that has a digital projector in addition to a 35mm film projector. The digital projector is used almost exclusively for subtitled movies - such as foreign language films and when they do special screenings for the hard of hearing. All the rest of the screens have film projectors only. Another important question is, if you do decide to upgrade to digital, do you keep the original film projection equipment? Or do you sell it for money to help with the digital conversion? Digital intermediates are good to test out films; then ask the audience for reviews. It's far easier to add and delete scenes from a digital recording than it is to splice film and strike a new print - not to mention what to do with all the 'waste' film! Also, when films do go through a digital intermediate stage, how are they transferred back to film? Do they have a device to expose the digital recording onto every single print that's sent out to cinemas? Or do they just expose the digital onto one negative, and duplicate that the old-fashioned way to make prints?  |  IP: Logged Mark Gulbrandsen Resident Trollmaster Posts: 16657 From: Music City Registered: Jun 99 posted 06-20-2007 07:04 PM                     quote: Thomas Pitt Or do they just expose the digital onto one negative, and duplicate that the old-fashioned way to make prints? Exactly! They use a special digital film recorder to do the job. You can ask John P. how it works. Lasers I think. Mark  |  IP: Logged John Pytlak Film God Posts: 9987 From: Rochester, NY 14650-1922 Registered: Jan 2000 posted 06-20-2007 11:35 PM                        Yes, laser recorders are the most popular "high end" way of putting digital images onto film, usually making a master positive or duplicate negatives. Kodak was a pioneer in developing the technology with its CINEON LIGHTNING laser recorder, first used in the early 1990's (e.g., the "Snow White" digital restoration). Today, the Arrilaser is widely used.  |  IP: Logged Joel N. Weber II Expert Film Handler Posts: 115 From: Somerville, MA, USA Registered: Dec 2005 posted 06-22-2007 08:53 PM                     quote: Thomas Pitt Another important question is, if you do decide to upgrade to digital, do you keep the original film projection equipment? Or do you sell it for money to help with the digital conversion? If lots of theaters are converting to digital, there's going to be lots of film equipment potentially on the market, and there probably aren't going to be many buyers if most people building new theaters are installing digital. I doubt many multiplexes converting to digital are going to get much money for their projector heads. It's a lot like how if you want a new computer, selling your three year old computer isn't going to help all that much with getting money to help pay for the new computer. Newer film sound processors and digital sound decoders and lenses might be useful to single screen venues looking to upgrade, but in a few years, there may end up being a lot more sellers than buyers. And a venue looking for cheap used equipment is unlikely to get cheap speakers/amps from theaters converting to digital, which may somewhat limit the benefit of getting some of that sound equipment, although a theater that already has a speaker system that can handle digital film sound might benefit from being able to cheaply switch to a different digital format.  |  IP: Logged Damien Taylor Master Film Handler Posts: 493 From: Perth, Western Australia Registered: Apr 2007 posted 06-22-2007 09:24 PM                     Looks like the dawn of a golden era for people looking for cheap 35 equipment. Sounds like the chains will be practically giving it away. eBay is going to have to add a new category.  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 06-22-2007 11:25 PM                     I don't know. From what I've heard regarding chains such as Carmike they're keeping the 35mm film projection equipment and a lot of DTS and Dolby SR•D processors in mothballs right up there in the booths. It would seem that companies like Carmike would want to sell a bunch of that equipment. But I think the reality is there just isn't very many potential buyers of that used equipment. There is a lot fewer 2nd run/bargain theaters than 1st run/full price locations. And the first run circuits that have a decent number of stereo or mono audio screens probably don't want to spend the extra money it takes to put in the amps and speakers required to do DTS or Dolby Digital anyway. The slum companies are merely trying to get by doing as little as humanly possible. From their mindset things like quality 35mm projection and 5.1 audio are unnecessary.  |  IP: Logged Cameron Glendinning Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 845 From: West Ryde, Sydney, NSW Australia Registered: Dec 2005 posted 06-23-2007 01:27 AM                     quote: Damien Taylor Looks like the dawn of a golden era for people looking for cheap 35 equipment. Well if you want a 35mm machine, I've never seen them cheaper than whats avalible second hand today, $500 seems the going rate for a kalee here in australia, except on ebay, starting bid $38,000 anyone?. With the cinema building boom coming to a close, there is no great demand for second hand gear. Of course if your willing to wait, Im sure you will find one for free eventually, unfortunatly by that time it might actually be hard to find any film to put through it!  |  IP: Logged

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