Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Digital projection only for adverts?

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Posted by Thomas Pitt (Member # 4322) on 05-26-2009, 05:29 PM:

Yesterday I went to see "Tormented" (a British film) in a multiplex. The auditorium was equipped with a digital projector in addition to the regular 35mm projector.

To my surprise, the advert 'reel' was shown on the digital projector, then the trailers and the actual movie were on film. Isn't this a bit of a waste and making things overly complicated? Why not have the entire thing on film, or the entire thing on digital?

I have seen it the other way round before - i.e. the adverts and trailers on film, then the movie itself on digital - but never like this!

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 05-26-2009, 05:40 PM:

It would only be a waste of money if the digital projector had been installed for the purpose of showing digital trailers and not for the purpose of showing digital movies. And clearly they kept the 35mm for the handful of movies still only available in that format.

And it would seem to me that if all the trailers were already sent out in a digital format, wouldn't sending out 35mm ones be a waste of money?

And why is it overly complicated? Couldn't this be easily automated, where the end cue for the digital triggers the 35mm projector to start?

edit: Also, when you say "advert" do you mean "trailer for a movie" or are you referring to pre-show advertising? Because if it's the latter, it's the norm to have that stuff run off some regular video projector. A lot of chains here use that controlled via a computer server. No more dealing with sending out ads and they can pretty much guarantee that the ads they requested get played.

Posted by John Hawkinson (Member # 1135) on 05-26-2009, 06:54 PM:

There are huge questions of availability. Movies are often not available in digital, only in film, and sometimes vice-versa.
And advertising is probably more easily handled digitally.

Many U.S. cinemas use cheap digital projectors for pre-show advertising that don't have the resolution to support digital cinema.

--jhawk

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 05-26-2009, 06:55 PM:

I think most theaters do it this way. The digital projector (which is only 480p quality) is for the ads, and the trailers and movie are shown on film. Basically the digital projector replaces the slide projector. These ads start up to 20 or so minutes before the movie is scheduled to begin. They take you on exclusive looks from behind the scenes of upcoming movies that promise to be awesome and show you a hot new music video and all of the latest ads. To top it all off, when the program ends they tell you what you just saw because they figure the customer is an idiot and cannot remember. Then they say it is all over and then they show more ads. Unfortunately you must wait until these ads are over before you can begin your movie (the projectors are connected to the internet where they spy on you). If you start the movie a bit too soon or turn off the ads for any reason, a representative from Screenvision or whoever comes out and rapes your children.

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 05-26-2009, 07:14 PM:

Digital ads are definitely easier to handle than rolling stock ads. Where I worked before, we'd get rolling stocks but never enough of them for the formats of prints we were running so to be compliant, there had to be use of lens changes.

And if you ordered additional ones for the format you need, good luck. Seriously, I remember my manager having me call in an order for the additional ones every shift I worked for a couple weeks then having them arrive the day after I'd replaced all of that run's ads.

And we had to keep track of how long the ads were so we'd know how early we were supposed to start the movie.

Posted by Scott Christopher (Member # 834) on 05-26-2009, 07:39 PM:

I agree, digital ad's are much easier to work with. Our advertising company likes to move ad's from one film one week, then put them back the next week. If they book it in for one film, they'll send us one copy - no matter that they'll be moving it around for the next 6 weeks.

I've got my own system going now and can move through ad' changes with ease, but i'd prefer digital ad's. Automating the c/o is easy, I've installed many units without a problem.

Posted by Caleb Johnstone-Cowan (Member # 3710) on 05-27-2009, 05:24 PM:

The vast majority, if not all UK cinemas show a 35mm advert reel before the trailers on each show and have done ever since I've been going.

I also recently encountered digital adverts for the first time, it is a massive improvement as the ad reels usually look and sound like crap out of the can. However the trailers were in digital 3D as was the film.

The showing of digital adverts, then a 35mm film is no more stupid than showing of 35mm ads and trailers then a digital film which is what normally happens.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 05-27-2009, 11:06 PM:

quote: Chris Slycord
It would only be a waste of money if the digital projector had been installed for the purpose of showing digital trailers and not for the purpose of showing digital movies. And clearly they kept the 35mm for the handful of movies still only available in that format.

I've seen more than a couple Cinemark locations do this, have a digital projector installed for pre-show ads only and then run the movie off 35mm. The difference is the digital projector is a much lower cost, much lower powered unit. The pre-show imagery is pretty darned dim, really not much brighter than the old film slide projector method.

Our local Carmike theater, and I assume just about any d-cinema equipped Carmike location, runs its pre show videos and static slides through the primary digital projector. The lamp is operating at a lower brightness level and possibly a lower resolution setting too, probably 720p.

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 05-28-2009, 10:01 AM:

Bobby, I explained later in the post about what you're referring to.

The way he wrote it, I thought he meant that they were using a D-Cinema projector for the ads and that seemed like a waste of money but I explained that even that would make sense because the projector wasn't installed to show the ads (but to show movies and you got a better pre-show projector for free).

Posted by Galen Murphy-Fahlgren (Member # 4535) on 05-28-2009, 10:34 AM:

I don't know if it would actually be more economical to play the preshow on the real DLP. Considering the lamp cost of 2K DCinema projectors, over time it may be cheaper to spend the money on the smaller projector with cheaper lamps that last longer, rather than jacking the output down on the the main projector's lamp to the detriment of its long-term performance. Remember that one does not want to run a lamp at less than 75% of its rated output, and running the 4kw lamp in your CP-2000 or whatever at 3kw to show preshow ads that could run on a 1200w 1080p projector just fine may be more expensive when lamp cost is factored. It'll look a lot better on the CP-2000, but it may not be cheaper. Perhaps someone has run the numbers.

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 05-28-2009, 10:56 AM:

I've heard of some places doing it that way (everything through DLP) because it was only slightly more expensive than using the cheaper projector while looking a lot better. Plus, it would make things easier in the sense that you have less equipment to deal with and possibly using a simpler setup for automating stuff.

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 05-28-2009, 12:10 PM:

In a digital theater, it is cheaper to use the D-cinema projector for intermission preshow/advertisements than it is to use a separate small LCD projector. The reason is due to the bulb costs. Leaving the D-cinema projector's xenon lit all day and never turning it off, vs. turning it on and off for each show...and likewise turning on and off the LCD projector's bulb for each show costs more money in operating costs. Plus you get a significantly better looking preshow.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 05-28-2009, 01:04 PM:

For the bright LCD type of projectors, lamp costs are not cheap! It would certainly be cheaper to run the DCinema projector for all "video" type images than to have a separate preshow projector.

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 05-28-2009, 01:55 PM:

I thought I head that one of the distributors will not permit a digital preshow on the same machine

Posted by Tristan Lane (Member # 1169) on 05-28-2009, 04:30 PM:

Whether that's true or not, it's totally unfair

If it's your projector, you can do what you want with it. Funny, why didn't the distributors care back when the big chains were running rolling stock ahead of their films on 35mm?

Posted by Louis Bornwasser (Member # 3063) on 05-28-2009, 05:15 PM:

"Fairness" was never guaranteed when you signed that contract for the "free" projector. Louis

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 05-28-2009, 05:43 PM:

quote: Steve Guttag
It would certainly be cheaper to run the DCinema projector for all "video" type images than to have a separate preshow projector.

That depends Steve... Some of the Leasing entities like Access-IT(cinedigum or what ever the heck) charge you to use the DVI input for pre-show and since Christie monitors these projectors they know when and if a projector is no on it's normal HDSDI inputs. The present deal that CBG is getting going to do VPF's also does this. Its then cheaper to use a decent LCD projector then it is to pay them for the use of the main DLP system.

Mark

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 05-28-2009, 06:09 PM:

tristan said "why didn't the distributors care back when the big chains were running rolling stock ahead of their films on 35mm? "
actually one certain distrib did not permit any rolling stock or ads up and still do to this day

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 05-28-2009, 09:35 PM:

Valid point Mark....though that is a cost imposed by the "deployment" company and not a consumption cost like lamps/electricity.

So...why not use the HDSDI inputs instead of the DVIs? Only HDCP content requires the DVI ports and that is really consumer video stuff, not pro. It is relatively cheap to get most any analog or SD SDI sources into a HDSDI format that the projector will handle.

Steve

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 05-29-2009, 09:22 AM:

This is how one customer puts it...

CBG contract with Cinedigm will more then likely require a reduction in virtual print fees if the digital projector is used for projecting content other than studio pictures.

So that is not a good thing and even if Sony suceeds in creating a monoploy or not the small market LCD/DLP projector field should continue to do well.

Mark

Posted by Tom Inglis (Member # 5181) on 06-01-2009, 04:16 AM:

I'm not entirely sure why, but we now use digital adverts in our Screen 1, regardless of whether the film in Digital or Print. I guess it might save them some money, but it sure is a bit of a drag for us.

The automations of the 2 projectors aren't linked, so we can't set a digital cue to start the 35mm projector... which is a shame.

That said, they do (obviously) look very nice...

Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 06-01-2009, 06:39 AM:

Tom, are your adverts P&D or Carlton? Until quite recently, within the last year, I used to project from time to time as a relief at the Clocktower. All of the adverts, and almost all of the trailers were on film, even after most of the features had gone over to digital. Everything is fully manual there on all three projectors. The last I heard P&D weren't supplying adverts on digital, but that was some time ago.

Posted by Bernard Tonks (Member # 809) on 06-01-2009, 09:44 AM:

ITV sold Carlton Screen Advertising which became Digital Cinema Media. DCI is a joint venture between ODEON and Cineworld - the two largest cinema exhibitors in the UK.
http://www.dcm.co.uk/

I have seen a digital Pearl & Dean advertising reel projected on a large wide screen painted onto the safety curtain, during the interval of a stage show at the massive New Theatre Oxford (formally the Oxford Apollo). Looked almost as good and same as a 35mm cinema reel, considering with full houselights on. This was over two years ago.
http://www.pearlanddean.com/

Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 06-01-2009, 03:48 PM:

Bernard,

I've been rather out of circulation for the past year or so, but I've never seen a P&D 'reel' run digitally, they've always been on film, at the several theatres where I've seen them with a feature on digital. Were they generally available in digital form at the the time that you saw them in Oxford, or was this a 'special'?

It surprised me that adverts were not being shown digitally at theatres which were equipped to do so. How is the digital content being delivered? With the short running time involved, and the need to send only the changes from the previous week, and a playlist, rather than the whole reel a download via ADSL should be a practical proposition. Running the adverts in digital would also simplify matters where the same adverts reel is being run with several different features.

Posted by Bernard Tonks (Member # 809) on 06-01-2009, 06:32 PM:

quote: Stephen Furley
I've been rather out of circulation for the past year or so, but I've never seen a P&D 'reel' run digitally, they've always been on film, at the several theatres where I've seen them with a feature on digital. Were they generally available in digital form at the the time that you saw them in Oxford, or was this a 'special'?

Stephen,

The old Pearl & Dean website a couple of years ago used to list 'Special Venues' which had the New Theatre Oxford included. Looking towards the control room in the lower circle I suspected a digital projector, possible DLP playing DVD format. Also the throw was short and keystone corrected.

I don't think this was a 'special' as the touring stage show was Miss Saigon playing to capacity houses.

Posted by John Joseph Fink (Member # 3619) on 06-01-2009, 06:50 PM:

IFC Center in Manhattan shows actual trailers digitally and films either digitally or on 35MM. Given the variety of digital formats they screen (DigiBeta, HD, even MiniDV at one screen I attended) and the fact that smaller indies and documentaries probably won't print 35MM trailers, it makes sense.

The digital pre-show isn't like "First Look" - they show their policy trailer, a short film and then trailers, all digitally. Certain releases from more established indie distributors are often shown on 35MM where as the smaller distributors and IFC Films releases that get a token release (like Flakes) are shown digitally.

I've also seen theaters use their preshow projector for special events and certain screenings, although it's pretty rare (usually at film festivals or for limited regional releases like Buddy in Providence, RI).

Posted by Caleb Johnstone-Cowan (Member # 3710) on 06-01-2009, 07:44 PM:

The digital ads I saw were Pearl and Dean, it's probably quite a recent thing and could be because I saw a 3D film which had 3D trailers.