Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Digital Cinema a Step Closer to Reality?

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Posted by David Hitt (Member # 294) on 03-09-2001, 08:40 AM:

This is being widely reported, but I reprinted this from the Internet Movie Database (www.imdb.com):

Theaters Offered "Free" Digital Conversion

Technicolor, whose name was once synonymous with color motion picture film, has offered a plan to convert U.S. movie theaters to digital projection. At the ShoWest convention of exhibitors in Las Vegas Wednesday, Technicolor's Digital Cinema unit (a partnership with Qualcomm, the wireless communications giant), outlined a strategy that it said "will help transform the way movies are delivered and viewed at theaters." In a keynote address, Dave Elliott, president of Technicolor Digital Cinema, said, "By putting digital cinema in theaters nationwide, we are demonstrating that this is indeed a superior product whose time has come." News reports said that Technicolor was offering to pay for the digital projectors -- worth about $150,000 apiece --- in return for 12.5 cents for each ticket sold. (Boeing Digital Cinema is reportedly planning to offer a similar arrangement.) Technicolor is being acquired by France's Thomson Multimedia SA, which manufactures consumer items for the U.S. under the RCA brand.
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It looks as though they have finally figured out a way for cash-strapped theatres to pay for digital cinema.

David

Posted by Greg Mueller (Member # 17) on 03-09-2001, 08:47 AM:

"By putting digital cinema in theaters nationwide, we are demonstrating that this is indeed a superior product whose time has come."

What a load. So if I've got enough money to put elephants in theaters that makes it a "superior product"?

------------------
Greg Mueller
Amateur Astronomer, Machinist, Filmnut

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-09-2001, 09:32 AM:

If the service is the same quality as Qualcoms cellular phones then the industry will die within months. What a farce....and the Sun Microsystems-JVC,Sony systems are far superior to any of the DLP stuff out there. They also have almost double the number of active pixels, better contrast ratio capability and superb color rendition.
Mark @ GTS

Posted by Jerry Chase (Member # 660) on 03-09-2001, 09:35 AM:

Hey! Don't give elephants a bad name!

Such a plan could quickly kill a lot of small and medium size theatres. You just know that there would have to be a floor to the offer, where X dollars were guaranteed per year to the finance company.

With the high grossing theatres using digital, striking a few prints just to serve the mom-n-pops wouldn't be cost effective. Within a short time those theatres wouldn't be served.

IMO, the whole idea of such a financing scheme is lame. It would tighten the stranglehold technicolor has on exhibition though. With a nationwide bottleneck on distribution and projection technology, technicolor would be in a position to put the squeeze on distribs big time.

Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 03-09-2001, 10:23 AM:

I guess they like to shoot people in the leg before they take them out. The point is yeah, they may buy the systems for you but you all know that nothing is that easy and nothing comes without paying a major price. It's not the 12.5 cents a ticket thats going to be our cost it's going to be the fact that you no good and well that they are not going to cover the costs of upgrading the systems in two years. They are not going to cover the costs to replace a major part of the system if something goes wrong. A cost that would far exceed the costs of installing and maintaining a film projection system over a course of twenty years. Lets look at who's going to lose.

1) The customer...yes they are going to lose...a lot of money. Because ticket prices are high in some areas as it is and if you have to give up 12.5 cents a ticket the customer is going to feel it. That is not fair for someone to have to pay more for less than film done right quality. I have heard the larger the screen the worse the quality.

2) The people who enjoy this type of work will be esentialy screwed out of their job. I know in some respects that some people don't care that you effect someones life because of progress. That is understandable. But if you are going to f**k with my job you better damn well have a system that is far superior to film done right 70mm quality. When I sit and watch the film I do not see any pixelization or anything that would make me say why did they screw up what I enjoyed doing the most for this crap.

3) all the people who will lose their jobs because of no more need for projectionists, old school film technitians, the not so good people at technicolor depot and ets. (They are still human and deserve a job). Now I know that they can get other jobs but that's not the point. It's the fact that some of these people love doing their jobs.

To sum it up. Yes it is a technology that will not be stopped. But for gods sake don't buy into this hogwash that somebody is going to give you something without screwing with someone else or screwing you the exhibitor in the long run. It better be a perfect as can be no need for major up grade in 10 or more years type of system better than 70mm done right quality before I will accept being a manager or something I am not happy doing with out having a totaly better taste in my mouth for our industry.

Guess Brad will have to change the name of his site from Film-tech to Video-tech

Enough said on the subject.

I didn't realize celluloide made up over half of my blood supply until now.

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 03-09-2001, 10:48 AM:

Ditto to everything above. I think Darryl has the best point here in that, sure they will provide the equipment, but who must service it and who must pay for that servicing? I'd like to see a copy of the fine print on this deal.

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 03-09-2001, 11:19 AM:

One of the things that no one has mention here yet is that this deal apparently requires giving Technicolor the rights to any on-screen advertising, which means that existing theatres which show slides or film ads will have to give up that revenue. Apparently, an 8-10-plex can make about $50k per year on slide advertising (this is third-hand information; if anyone has better figures, please post them). By giving up the slides, the theatre loses $50k/year. Even if they fire their projectionist, they're still losing out, since I don't know of any theatre that pays that much for a projectionist. I'm only considering slides here, not film ads, which presumably would also have to be given up and which are probably also a substantial source of revenue.

The point that I'm trying to make here is that it's not just the "mom and pop" theatres that would lose out here. At a time when tickets in major cities are pusing $9 or $10 and when the industry as a whole is terribly unhealthy, I can't see any accountant who would think that this is a good deal, even if the maintenance and periodic upgrades are included. Nor can I see anyone wanting to buy the equipment outright until it becomes clear how long the equipment will last and what the long-term cost of ownership will be.

The only way that I can see this working is if a) a distribution format is standardized for "electronic cinema," so that you can, say, show the same movie on the DLP and ILA projectors without having to request separate media from the distributor; b) a large number of distributors agree to make available a large quantity and variety of titles in this format (not every new title, of course, but more than the 1-2 per year that are currently being shown electronically); c) the distributors agree to reduce the rental per centage for theatres which agree to accept a box of DVDs, DLTs, etc. or a fiber or satellite feed instead of a film print; d) there is some provision made for protection against piracy; and e) the theatres are provided with the equipment on a rental basis, with a single [monthly,yearly] fee to cover all costs including installation, maintenance, etc. If this happened, it would be possible for the theatres to see some economic benefit to installing electronic projectors, depending on the fee.

Posted by Ian Price (Member # 14) on 03-09-2001, 02:48 PM:

What I heard at the Technicolor Luncheon.

1. The only improvement in the DLP chip this year has been the TI Black Chip that gets the contrast ration up to 1,000 to one. The president of Technicolor said that the technology is “mature.” The resolution is 1280x1024

2. The distributors will save money because it is cheaper to duplicate a digital image and shipping a digital image to thousands of theatres costs the same as shipping a digital image to one theatre. The even gave monitary examples. They say that the distributors will save $6,000,000 on a 3,000 print distribution. They will save $2,000,000 on a 9,000-trailer distribution.

3. They said that a film print degrades after as few as 5 showings. I almost stood up to tell him that I had been showing Billy Elliot for 17 weeks without degradation. He went on to tell the exhibitors that they will save so much in staff costs because it no longer takes an hour to build a show. You can build a show by pointing and clicking in a matter of minutes.

4. On the Exhibition side they failed to demonstrate how it would increase our bottom line except for the following points. Perhaps more people will come to our theatres because of the word Digital. They will give away the first 1,000 projectors. They will undertake all maintenance and cover the costs of all lamp replacements. (I am already pimping my friend who works for them to get us one of those 1,000 free projectors. Not that I need one, but the fun is in the effort. )

5. The only costs born by the exhibitor is said to be 12 cents per seat. I heard it three ways. 12 cents per ticket sold for digital exhibition. Or 12 cents per seat in that auditorium or 12 cents for every seat in that auditorium no matter what is being shown. GET YOUR HANDS OUT OF MY POCKET! THERE ARE TOO MANY IN THERE ALREADY!

6. They will control all programming. You cannot jack any other video source in to this projector. At the present time past titles will not be converted to Digital. So even if you get Bridge Over the River Kwai from Technicolor, they don’t have it in Digital. You get to pick what you want to show, from their catalogue of shows.

7. They are pushing the security issue. Of course this is of no interest to me. I have never pirated a print nor known anybody that has. I don’t include collectors in this problem; they do more to preserve the heritage than do it for profit, if fact there is no profit. The security issue is only for the distributors.

8. They pushed the alternative-programming angle like rock concerts and sporting events. Of course, it would have to come from Technicolor and Ky can’t see somebody paying us to watch opera on the big screen. He also thinks that PBS and Bravo might have something to say about theatres horning in on their core business. TV is TV and Cinema tells a story.
In short they demonstrated how this would benefit the distributors but not the exhibitors. The process places too much control with the distributors at the expense of the exhibitors. If they had offered a 10-point reduction in film (content) rental to the exhibitors they might have generated more than the tepid applause they received.

The film clips were presented letterboxed and the concert clips were presented with that rock concert sound, you know, where you can hear the distortion.

We received a rather gay lunch, consisting of a fruit plate, chicken salad and a chocolate mousse cake desert. Everybody got a leather piece of luggage with a Technicolor Electronic Cinema t-shirt. Some people walked out with multiple bags. The ballroom was very impressive with no less than 10 very large video screens to show I-mag and clips on. But it wasn’t as impressive as the Spy Kids dinner, but that is another story.

Posted by Ian Price (Member # 14) on 03-09-2001, 03:33 PM:

The Spy Kids Party

Miramax has its first children’s movie. It’s called Spy Kids. It stars Alan Rickman as Pee Wee Herman, Antonio Banderas as a spy and features a cameo by George Clooney. The other actors were kids or unknown. It is directed by Robert Rodriguez of Desperado fame.

The film was delivered digitally by Boeing via satellite and shown on a DLP Digital Cinema projector in Theatre Des Arts in the Paris Hotel. The theatre seats well over a 1,000 and the screen was large, but not in relationship to the room. We sat in the upper part of the theatre.

The did run two R rated trailers in front of Spy Kids for films we want. They had Bridget Jones’s Diary and With a Friend Like Harry. Ky thought it was disturbing that in the current atmosphere of concern over what you show kids that there were two R rated trailers on a G rated film. “Oh Shi…taki mushroom!”

Spy Kids is awful and will not be appreciated by anyone over the age of 13. Robert Rodriquez stood on that stage and told the audience that he has never been happier with a print. He told us that the contrast was better and that the colors were closer to his vision than on film. He neglected to say that his first film was El Mariachi but said it was Desperado. He also neglected to tell the audience that when the film was transferred the colors were wrong and that they had to hand carry back up DLP discs, and that is what we watched.

PS the film is mostly CG and that is why it looks ok on video. We and other techs noticed stair stepping on the curves and motion artifacts during fast motion. We also thought the CG was rather poor. The sound in the Theatre Des Arts was very good.

But the party was better!

We went to the bathroom and noticed that if you just went from the bathroom to the party no body stopped you. We were not invited. They had jugglers and acrobats and stilt walkers. There were people performing on the ceiling. People were walking on large balls. They had props from the film and they gave away an Isuzu Axiom to one lucky winner. There was a throbbing techno disco soundtrack and the video screens had silhouetted dancers and looked like strippers. One whole wall was a fiber optic star field.

In short, the party was better than the film.

Posted by Mitchell Dvoskin (Member # 751) on 03-09-2001, 04:31 PM:

Two unrelated points...

1) Maybe I am just being paranoid, but any system that can download a feature could be designed to upload what it had run, when it had run it, etc. No more private staff only shows, no unauthorized trailers, etc.

2) I seem to remember in the 60's and 70's that special events (boxing, etc.) would be run in theatres. With the advent of pay per view, this stopped, because the viewers of these events voted with their wallets to stay home. Within the next few years, hi-def tv will be affordable to the masses. I still don't understand why anyone thinks that the majority of people will pay to see a big screen tv, no matter how good it looks, once the novelty wears off.

/Mitchell

Come on dear, lets take the family to the Big Screen (Pay Per Person) TV Theatre...

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-09-2001, 04:48 PM:

Ian, What they told everyone is a bunch of bull! The DLP chip is really obsolete now as the Sun Microsystems display panels have blown right past them. Sun/JVC is making prototypes of a 3840 by 2048 panel that has an 1100 to 1 contrast ratio. The projector that JVC had setup did not require an anamorphic lens either. The projector has a simpler light path as well.
Mark @ GTS

Posted by Ian Price (Member # 14) on 03-09-2001, 05:33 PM:

Yea! I wish I had spent more time and listened in the JVC booth.

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 03-09-2001, 06:07 PM:

Good God I hope they can get the resolution better than 3840 x 2048! I mean that is a good resolution, but it's just not quite good enough yet. Give it more time to advance.

With the lack of concern for quality and the apparent need to get this into theaters RIGHT NOW I'm surprised they just didn't rush it out at 640 x 480!

Posted by Ian Price (Member # 14) on 03-09-2001, 06:21 PM:

Joe, it is my understanding that you have never laid eyes on a professional video image of the kind we are talking about. I invited you to the NATO shoot out in Denver years ago and you didn't go. Do they have Electronic Cinema in Denver now?

JVC & Sony had 3840 x 2048 chips on display but as prototypes only. Nobody saw an image with these chips. 3840 x 2048 may be sufficient to mimic the 1.85:1 image with all the benifits that video has, like perfect registration and zero flicker and a very good flat field of white.

I not defending Digital Cinema as a concept, I am just asking you to speak of what you know, like film and flash.

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 03-09-2001, 08:40 PM:

Ian-

I'm not looking for 'sufficient' here, I'm looking for 'incredible!' I know a shitload about video, and you know that. I know enough that the aforementioned resolution is not good enough for a really big screen. Ian, that is barely 3 times above what my computer monitor is set at! I sure hope digital cinema can surpass that! Forgive me if I have high expectations, but I just can't be satisfied with mediocrity or 'sufficient' like you can (note to others: Ian and I know each other very well... this is not an attack). If we wait a year or two more, then I'm sure that the chips and the resolutions that they offer will far exceed my expectations. I agree about the registration and flicker free imaging, though. But will it FEEL like you're watching a movie? Actually video DOES flicker at 60hz, which is kind of annoying. Set your computer monitor to 60hz and you will want to switch it back FAST! What is the general refresh rate of digital cinema?

I couldn't go to that NATO shoot out because you didn't give me enough notice and I had to work. Trust me, I wanted to go!

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 03-09-2001, 10:07 PM:

The comment that distributors will save $6,000,000 on a 3000-print run is total BS. That assumes either that the prints costs $2k apiece (which, for a standard-length feature film is unlikely if the order is for 3k prints...they would probably cost 1/4 to 1/2 that price) or that TI (or someone) is actually paying the distributors cash to not make film prints. More likely than either of the previous explanations, though, is that someone is just making up random numbers that sound impressive on the assumption that no one will actually try to question them.

As for resolution--my take on the current DLP machine is that it's pretty darn impressive -- for video. Although it's the same resolution as HDTV, it blows away every example of HDTV (all half-dozen of them...) that I've seen. I am totally underwhelmed with HDTV, but I was really impressed with DLP. It looked much more like film than like video. It's still not ready for prime time (no pun intended), it's still not as good as a half-decent 35mm print, and the lossy compression makes me nervous, but the resolution itself is pretty good.

The weird thing about DLP, though, is that they seem to be using some sort of edge enhancement scheme to make it look slightly sharper than it really is. When you first walk into a theatre that's showing a DLP image, it looks amazingly sharp; after watching for a few minutes, though, your eyes start looking for more detail which simply isn't there. I'm not sure if this is a data-compression issue or a resolution issue or what, but it _is_ an issue. I do believe that if you put DLP and 35mm side by side and had people watch it for only a few minutes, they would overwhelmingly prefer DLP; if you made them watch an entire feature in each format, I think that the overwhelming preference would be for 35mm.

Note that I'm not a video guy and I'm not very knowledgeable about electronic imaging in general. I know how to set up an NTSC monitor with color bars and adjust the "convergence" settings on CRT projectors (which, sadly, is more than most "video guys" seem to be able to manage), but that's about the extent of my technical knowledge of television.

Posted by George Roher (Member # 91) on 03-09-2001, 11:54 PM:

If theatres can only run what Technicolor sends them, and they can't hook up another source to the machine, than that is taking too much control away from exhibitors. When I worked at an independent arthouse, we'd run stuff for indie filmmakers who didn't have distribution deals. They'd borrow our theatre to see how their footage looked on screen or run screenings of their completed films for a small audience. If a theatre only has E-Cinema and can't run anything that isn't sent from Technicolor, then they will no longer be able to help out indie directors in this way. That would be terrible.

Posted by Aaron Haney (Member # 747) on 03-10-2001, 06:26 AM:

A system where only video data that comes directly Technicolor can be shown? Wow, sounds like Technicolor is excited about the possibility of totally monopolizing distribution. Makes me want to smack people like Ben Affleck (who made lofty predictions about how digital would allow "indie" filmmakers to get their work into theaters more easily) upside the head!

Actually, 3840 x 2048 sounds quite good. That approaches the "4K" resolution that Kodak and various filmmakers have been asking for. With good color management and little-to-no lossy compression, that could make a decent replacement for 35mm film. The only thing is, Technicolor is talking about putting current DLP systems (at 1280x1024) into theaters on a massive scale (with the first 1000 projectors free, according to the pages in the picture warehouse). If that happens, what are the chances that theaters will get upgraded once the 4K and higher resolution systems hit the market? Can't these companies wait just a little while longer for the technology to mature?! I can go to the store right now and buy and HDTV set with higher resolution.

Unfortunately, I have not had the chance to see D-ILA in action yet. (I have seen DLP on multiple occasions, and it isn't too good -- especially not at the resolution they are currently at.) How is the image? Are the boundaries between the pixels very visible, or is it more of a smooth, continuous image?

Scott: The DLP website is pretty vauge, but it sounds like they usually scan the film (if that's the source material) at 2K resolution, and then at some stage, scale the image down to 1280x1024. Some of the early demonstrations of "Star Wars" were run from a D5 videotape, which is the standard HDTV resolution of 1920x1080, meaning the electronics in the projector would have to do the scaling. I doubt in those cases that it was doing edge enhancement on-the-fly. On the other hand, when it's being run off a QuVis player, they might prepare the data at 1280x1024 ahead of time, and that would give them the chance to do some edge enhancement. Unfortunately, the DLP website doesn't really say. It's long on hype and FUD, but short on real information.

Posted by Dave Bird (Member # 490) on 03-10-2001, 08:40 AM:

1000 screens sounds like a test to me, see if they can actually distribute video on a reasonably wide scale. But if your 20-plex only has ONE of these things, film will be around for a long time. Doesn't appear that the studio or exhibitor benefit. And to save $6mil per movie? Not unless EVERY screen in the world has one of these things, and just think of the loss to the studios if they quit making film. Meanwhile, the distrib scoops your advertising? Forget it, wait until Kodak perfects this thing (they're the only ones who care about quality and not rushing it), and buy your own. As far as special events, the only "non-feature" format
that consistently draws is IMAX, and digital will never top that. The dream of filling seats in the daytime will never come to pass, people work and go to school. No, when it comes, buy your own and be looking for a piece of that $6mil you just saved your distribs.....

How dare they even think about obsoleting my 50-year old XL's!

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 03-10-2001, 11:03 AM:

Aaron--the Star Wars show in Secaucus was run off a 300-gig PLUTO disk array. Maybe some of the other locations used D5 tape. The more recent DLP shows are being run off a Qubit player. I don't know the exact capacity of the Qubit, but I think it's somewhere around 50gigs, so there's definitely a lot of compression going on there (which can be seen on screen).

I'd like to know the details of where in the "chain" (or if) the edge-enhancement takes place.

picture of Qubit (the funny-looking thing in the middle of the rack)

Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of the PLUTO array...the TI people in Secaucus were pretty touchy about letting people take pictures of the equipment rack.

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-10-2001, 11:36 AM:

Hello Joe
Lets see how much you really know....about the video show. Here are 5 simple questions that most video buffs would know. No prize for the correct answers just the aura you will generate by getting them correct.

1. What famous 10" Black and White CRT was used in all post-WW2 TV sets?

2. Are present day high power transmitters completely solid state all the way up to the final P.A.?

3. What style of projection CRT did the first Advent TV projector use....Direct projection CRT, Schmidt type CRT, or mirror relayed?

4. Who invented the Betamax video format?

5. Present day Digital Television is transmitted on the VHF or UHF band?
Good Luck and may the video gods be with you!
Mark @ GTS

Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 03-10-2001, 01:01 PM:

I think the only non-movie event that would draw a lot of people to theatres is the Super Bowl, and then only if beer was served, along with free chips and snacks.

As for concerts, etc.: Please, digital proponents, name all the blockbuster concert films that have been made. That's right, none. How much did "U2-Rattle and Hum" gross?

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 03-10-2001, 01:15 PM:

If Nsync in Imax died what does one think a "video" will fair

Posted by John Walsh (Member # 168) on 03-10-2001, 02:24 PM:

The Rolling Stones IMAX did well, at least around here.

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 03-10-2001, 02:28 PM:

We did well with it too when it first came out. Now it doesn't even bring out a wimper

Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 03-10-2001, 03:38 PM:

Rolling Stones at the max was a joke. Only the wide angle shots were captured during an actual show all the close ups were done in an empty setting no crowd because the Imax equipment was so big that it would block the performers from being seen by the crowd. I have been to many concerts and there is only one way to experiance a band performance and that is at the arean in the concert setting. I am not interested in paying $20 dollars to sit and watch the show on a movie screen. Movie theaters were ment for one thing and one thing only. MOTION PICTURE FILMS!!!!!

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 03-10-2001, 03:52 PM:

I kind of like the "idea" of concert films, but the implementation is usually quite poor. For example, "Last Waltz" is widely considered to be one of the greatest concert films ever made, and even that can get dull at points--it totally lacks any coverage of the "experience" of attending the show...it's a documentary about the performers, which is fine, but it doesn't cover anywhere near enough of the experience of the fans--e.g. the lines to get into the venue, interviews with concert-goers, etc. I agree that concerts don't "work" on film in the same way that they do live, but I do think that it is possible to produce an interesting concert film, even though it doesn't seem to have been done yet. IMAX is the wrong format for this, though...my idea of a concert film involves lots of handheld 16mm or s16 footage (probably in B&W).

There are lots of good music-oriented films, though, that aren't concert films per se. Check out the recent Phish documentary or Don't Look Back (the Bob Dylan film).

The Nsync IMAX thing sounds like a pretty horrible idea. Actually, I think that the whole concept of Nsync (and other cookie-cutter-type bands) is a bad one, but I digress. Having said that, if I had the chance to see it for free, I might actually go to see it, just to see how horrible it really is (or maybe be pleasantly surprised that it isn't as bad as I had expected).

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 03-10-2001, 03:59 PM:

At the Max was better than average especially considering it hadn't been done before.
It also had a good soundtrack and wasn't the load of greif Nsync Bigger than live has been
At the Max was delivered in correctly labled tins all wound the same direction.
Nsync was delivered in used tins and boxes with differnt lables and opposite winds
At the Max was In synce when we ran it
Nsync was outof sync by 8 seconds
Nsynce had to have a roll replaced due to changes At the Max did not
At the Max the movie and sound ended togather Nsync had to have black spliced onto the tail after the first screening when the picture ended before the music (apparentky a new last roll is expected)
For concert films i still like Tommy (in Quintaphonic sound) and Pink Flyod the Wall the best
Has anyone heard how Nsync is doin at the new Dallas Cinemark?

Posted by Ian Price (Member # 14) on 03-10-2001, 04:16 PM:

We have gotten off topic,

But what the hell!

Best concert film ever was Talking Heads Stop Making Sence. We used to run it at midnight. Best concert film from an act I wouldn't pay for was Laurie Andersons film.

Posted by Aaron Sisemore (Member # 145) on 03-10-2001, 04:36 PM:

Best concert/rockumentary films are 'Song Remains The Same' and 'Sting: Bring On The Night'.. in the case of the former, when we played it at the Phoenix in 1983, we had many requests to TURN IT UP and had the fader at 20 (max) and the amps [Yamaha and SAE] were going into thermal shutdown, and we got praise from people that had seen the real thing and said it was louder than Led Zeppelin LIVE(!) A real crowd-pleaser for sure.

and no we didn't play the Sting movie that loud.

'Purple Rain' had some great 'concert' sequences as well.

Aaron

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 03-10-2001, 05:30 PM:

Mark-

Your attempt to make me look like an ass with those questions won't work! They don't have anything to do with what we're talking about here! Anyway as I type this I can't even see the questions, and I'm not going to print them.

The answer to the Beta question is Sony, however. But that is trivial knowledge and not actually video knowledge. Trivia does not equal knowledge.

So I have a few for you.

1. What is the actual resolution of DV Video (not just digital video, but specifically the DV format)?

2. While on the subject of DV, what is the compression ratio?

3. What is the best way to remove flicker from video shot from film showing on a screen (moral obligations aside) using only standard video editing equipment? (I am not going to post the answer to this one, by the way).

4. (Non video related) How long does it take a single person to write a product review?

I don't actually expect answers here. Not because of lack of knowledge, but because this is just stupid. I honestly have no reason to feign superiority by testing others. Sorry if I'm overreacting. The end.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 03-10-2001, 06:37 PM:

At the MAX was ok as concert films go but that is just it...it is a concert film and should be judged that way.

The Song Remains the Same is fine in its own right but certainly not great though I love Led Zepplin.

Fleetwood Mac had a very good concert film for their TUSK album.

Paul McCarney had a good WINGS concert film in 1980 too

And of course in Rockumentary, THIS IS SPINAL TAP is supreme!

Steve

------------------
"Old projectionists never die, they just changeover!"

Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 03-10-2001, 06:48 PM:

There ya go, Steve! I was waiting for someone to mention "Spinal Tap." The one concert film that DESERVES to be a blockbuster! (But it still wasn't!)

Posted by John Walsh (Member # 168) on 03-11-2001, 12:46 AM:

I thought the Rolling Stones "At the MAX" was pretty good. The ticket was $14, which I felt was justified for the image and sound. When I saw them live during the Steel Wheels tour at Shea (seats 55,000 people I think), I could hardly see them, they were so far away, and the sound was blaring. That ticket was $75. Of course, a live show is unique, and is cool in it's own right.

I felt each were different, but worth it. Nothing is going to match a live performance, but for the price, it was quite acceptable.

I did feel (and Gordon sort of confirmed it) that "At the MAX" was treated as a regular, "real" release by IMAX.

A slightly funny story; IMAX theaters are usually used to getting tourists, school groups, etc. so the ushers usually have a fairly easy time. When an IMAX theater near us got "At the MAX" they had to get used to unruly crowds, late-commers, people who want to go out, come back, people stoned, drunk, barfing in the aisles and bathrooms, mad rushs at the consession stand, and so on. We had to lend them a few seasoned ushers and candy people to actually help and train the IMAX staff to deal with it all.

Personally, I glad they filmed close-ups in an empty setting, because if a huge IMAX camera was in my way during a live show, I'd be pissed. I went to a Jerry Rafferty (sp?) concert with a friend which was filmed for use in "Eddie and the Crusiers." (I don't think they ever used the footage.) The film crew had them do the same damn song three times in a row until they could get a good take. I got a little pissed; I didn't pay for this. Even the pleasure of seeing several Panaflex's really up close didn't help.

Posted by Kevin Crawford (Member # 469) on 03-11-2001, 02:49 PM:

Has anyone thought that the only theatres that might get this will be UA, Edwards, and possibly Regal if the buy out is approved. Do recall that Anshutz (spelling?) owns UA now, is buying Edwards and Regal. With well over 6,000 screens they could just convert some of those screens. Even if nobody else wanted to buy into this idea.

And I agree Spinal Tap is the best. After all its not like you can dust for prints on vomit.

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 03-11-2001, 03:41 PM:

"With well over 6,000 screens they
could just convert some of those screens. Even if nobody else wanted to buy into this idea."
He will probably follow the old saying
Big money will do what Big money always does Whate ever it wants!

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-12-2001, 10:11 AM:

Joe,
You have taken my post completely wrong, it was simply a tease. I doubt that many could answer the questions that I posted and the difficulty of the questions were simply meant to poke fun. Sorry you mis-took it, try to lighten up a bit. Others that sent me direct e-mail after they read the post saw the funny side of the questions! I agree that you are good with video....not argueing that point at all.
However it was actually Matshusita Electric Industrial Co. that invented The Beta format and discarded it in favor of developing the VHS format. This was happening back in the mid 70's when I worked for Panasonic in their factory service center near Chicago.
As to your questions I will answer that as far as resolution goes for the DV format it can exceed 500 lines which is a tad better than NTSC(never the same color!). As far as actual optical resolution, this is dependent on the number of pixels that reside in the CCD, and the quality of the optical system. Eliminating the flicker can be done in several ways. The best is to use a 5 to 1 pull down with a 5 blade shutter and a sync drive motor. I have built many of these for home movie transfer places. This can be done with almost any 8/16mm projector. The second way is to frame maatch, via computer, for density.
As far as the review goes, I basically work two jobs here at GTS. The reviews are about# 42 on my list of to do's. Family,friends, and buisness come first...in that order anything else comes later down the line. You could also write a review as well. You seem to have more spare time than I do.
Mark @ GTS

Posted by Jon Hudson (Member # 439) on 03-12-2001, 07:11 PM:

I would just like to share something interesting. I was at that bar at The Paris, the one just before the casino, just after that presentation and I think that I was the only person that saw Dave Elliot go thru the motion of casting a fishing reel and then "reeling them in". I think he was maybe talking about catching "The Big One".
(exhibitors?)

Posted by Ky Boyd (Member # 23) on 03-13-2001, 01:46 AM:

Well I guess I'm late into the fray here but I thought I'd chime in on a couple of non-technical points anyway.

My favorite digital cinema myth is the one where the proponents of d-cinema talk about how exhibitors will be able to change their schedules at the drop of a hat to accomodate demand (or lack there of) for certain offerings. The problem here is that no one is considering that the earliest an exhibitor can change it's schedule is based on newspaper advertising deadlines. For instance if you open picture A and B on the same Friday and A is a huge dog and B is a huge hit, you can't just drop A or slash it's showtimes until Tuesday, at the earliest, provided that your newspaper can accept an ad for Tuesday on Monday. All you'll be able to do is what we do now, move the dog to the smallest room possible and move the hit to the biggest room possible. Nothing changes. The majority of the public still get their movie times from the newspaper.

My second favorite digital cinema myth is the ancilliary revenue d-cinema will bring in by being able to show concerts, sports and all kinds of other TV at your theatre. There are two problems here. One, who is going to pay $8.00 to see a concert when TV is flooded with concerts and music stuff. Heck, you can't even revive classic concert films right now because they are all on VH-1 all the time (except of course for the ubiquitous showings of Behind the Music, but that's another rant). Secondly, just because a theatre has digital cinema, Sony, Disney, Paramount, Fox and all the other distributors aren't suddenly going to roll over and say, "ok, my movie can share a screen with the non-movie product." Absolutely not - if you've ever read the exhibition license agreement or the letters the studios send everyone every 6 months, you know that an exhibitor can't split product on a screen without the permission of the distributor, according to the license agreement. The distributor is entitled to have their film be the exclusive presentation on that screen during all open hours. Yes, theatres do sometimes split product without permission and yes they sometimes get caught and taken off-service, but digital cinema isn't going to overturn that tenent of the business.

And, don't you think the tv networks, who pay hundreds of millions for the broadcast rights to sporting events are gonna put up a fight over Technicolor d-cinema and exhibitors showing the same events for a fee in theatres? I think they'll kick up a huge ruckus. Same story for plays, broadway shows, opera, etc. There are long established relationships that aren't going to go away just because movie theatres have digital projection capabilities.

Don't get me wrong, as a specialty exhibitor, there are lots of programs I can present on video and charge for and make money off of, but showing stuff that is already readily available on television isn't one of them.

That's just my non-technical two cents.

Posted by John Walsh (Member # 168) on 03-13-2001, 09:49 AM:

Oh, great. Sports events broadcast at theaters... Now you can have a bunch of guys leave pizza, soda and chips on all over the seats. Then, if the home team looses, they can also knife the seatsand pull the curtians on their way out.

What a business. Retirement just isn't comming fast enough...

Posted by Jerry Chase (Member # 660) on 03-13-2001, 10:06 AM:

Ky, excellent reality check! Shoulda been handed out as a flyer at Showest along with one on the realities of internet ticketing!