This is topic why is the "digital transition period" being handled so badly? in forum Digital Cinema Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.
To visit this topic, use this URL:
https://ft-forum.com/ft/cgi-bin/ubb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=16;t=000913
Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 10-12-2011, 12:04 PM:
The subject line pretty much says it: why are the "film" distributors botching this transition so badly? (Or are they?)
Specifically, this is what seems to be going wrong with the transition from 35mm to D-cinema:
- for the most part, the distribution and exhibition industry seems to be operating under the assumption that 35mm film prints of new releases will not be available at some point in the forseeable future, yet not one distributor has set a firm, believable, realistic deadline for the end of 35mm print availability, nor has anyone (to my knowledge) told exhibitors that they must install D-cinema equipment in order to have continued access to new titles
- as far as I know the only actual dates that have been mentioned (and which, sadly, people keep quoting as "fact") come from NATO, which is not actually in the business of distributing motion pictures
- NATO supposedly exists to represent the interests of theatre owners, yet is not fighting this or at least pushing for better transparency from distributors; why?
- because of the above, the communication between distributors and exhibitors about this issue has been just horrible; contrast this with the cyan-dye track issue (another example of replacing something that worked well with something that was demonstrably inferior in the name of shifting costs from distributors to exhibitors): exhibitors had about six or seven years in which to spend the $1-2k per screen that was needed to install LED readers to play cyan tracks...now, there is an implied threat (with no real information) that exhibitors who do not spend $60-70k per screen to install D-cinema equipment will be unable to play new titles within a few years
- the VPF deals that seem to exist (to my knowledge) are not transparent and may treat exhibitors unequally, even if the exhibitors are in the same class (e.g. mainstream first-run cinemas in top markets); they tend to come with some rather nasty conditions and are often covered by non-disclosure agreements (generally not a good sign); this will require that exhibitors somehow increase their revenue (or reduce costs) to cover these upcoming costs, yet there seems to be no indiciation of how or why this can happen
- there are many categories of exhibitors for whom no viable VPF deal exists
- there is no provision for VPFs for the second round of D-cinema equipment after the first becomes obsolete; that cost will likely be covered entirely by the exhibitors (those who don't close their doors before then, anyway)
- the two largest US exhibitors (AMC and Regal) have signed deals with Sony, the purveyor of what seems to be (from reading here and elsewhere) the most generally disliked equipment in the industry (I have no personal experience with their D-cinema products)
- at least some of the equipment that is currently in the marketplace and which is being sold and installed for D-cinema is not fully DCI-compliant
- the technology that is being pushed by manufacturers is still in its early stages and is still lacking in many areas
My take on the current situation is that the industry has created a giant mess for itself, which only promises to get worse in the forseeable future. The whole push for exhibitors to install new equipment seems to be based on implied threats, with no real details and limited credibility. For those who agree with this opinion, why has this happened? Why haven't distributors done a better job of keeping exhibitors informed of their plans and made more of an attempt to work together to achieve a goal which, for the most part, offers few benefits to exhibitors. For those who disagree with me, what am I missing?
I should point out here that these observations come from the point of view of a third-party observer. My involvement in the exhibition industry at this point is extremely limited outside of film festivals and special events. I have no financial interest in or close involvement with any of this (regardless of the outcome), but I do like film (actual, physical film) and hope that it is able to survive in so me form for many years to come, at least for screenings of older titles and for filmmakers who want their work exhibited by mechanical and photochemical means rather than electronic means.
I am not so delusional as to suggest that this industry will never or should never embrace the interesting possibilities offered by electronic transmission and digital projection, but I do think that the transition has been premature and poorly handled. I work with computers every day in my "real job" (not in the cinema industry) and know quite well what benefits and challenges this transition will bring to the industry. I will be the first to say that I find the technology interesting, but I also believe quite strongly that it has a long way to go before it becomes a mainstream product.
Edit: Why is it so hard to find anyone who has informed opinions on this issue, but who has no financial stake in it? I'm sure that the dealers and technicians love the extra sales and installation work that this has brought in (expecially compared to something that lasts 25-50 years with little attention), and I know that projectionists hate it (because it reduces the number of available jobs) and theatre owners generally aren't thrilled about it (due to the cost), but there are few objective opinions about this transition that I have seen (here or elsewhere). Theatre managers probably come the closest, though.
[ 10-12-2011, 02:20 PM: Message edited by: Scott Norwood ]
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-12-2011, 12:29 PM:
quote: Scott Norwood
....yet not one distributor has set a firm, believable, realistic deadline for the end of 35mm print availability...
You kinda said it here in a nutshell - looks like they are still willing to strikes prints for those who needs them.
Kinda looks like the studios wants to stay in business making prints for anybody...not push the little guy out the door and lose their business.
quote: Scott Norwood
in my "real job" (not in the cinema industry)
Now, I'm curious on this statement for I've heard it before: what would be the difference between the "real job" and the cinema industry? Both occupations can earn the employee an income, both occupations CAN be fun, esp when it's a career based occupation and not just a "McJob", et.al. ..
Posted by Martin McCaffery (Member # 37) on 10-12-2011, 12:45 PM:
quote: Scott Norwood
Why is it so hard to find anyone who has informed opinions on this issue, but who has no financial stake in it?
Because it is ALL about the financial interests.
It's not about art. It's not about quality.
Depending on which side of the checkbook you are on, it IS about efficiency (where efficiency is defined as the most amount of money for the least amount of investment).
Had a talk with a rep from a small arthouse distributor yesterday. They are as pissed as many of us small theatres are about the conversion. Film makes sense for them because most of us are film. When they have a film with crossover potential, they'll do a DCP of the print, but they can't make money on it because of the VPF-- it's still a small art film and is not going to be playing for weeks and weeks to compensate for the fee. They've been able to negotiate away the fee in a couple of instances, but have had to eat it in others.
Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 10-12-2011, 12:49 PM:
I don't think anyone has issued any firm dates for the end of 35mm because there are still too many unknown variables. From the perspective of the the studios, this will largely be determined by when the cost of a 35mm print is no longer justified by the gross said print will generate. Even as print orders begin to decline, each print still has the potential to generate well more than it's cost as it moves from one theatre to the next.
From a theatre perspective, individual owners who have not yet converted will have to make their own decision as to when print availability begins to undermine their business to the point where they can no longer afford not to go digital.
I disagree about the equipment not yet being mature enough to replace film. While the long term reliability of series 2 projectors may not be known, the picture quality is superior to 35mm in the average location. I know some FT detractors will swear otherwise, but I'm going by my own eyes and the comments I've received from customers.
The lack of transparency in the VPF deals is something I find troubling. I am not really involved in that end, so my understanding is limited. But the fact that the banks are being told the information and told not to discuss it will the people they are lending money to is beyond troubling. It does make you think there are shady deals happening.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-12-2011, 12:52 PM:
quote: Scott Norwood
Theatre managers probably come the closest, though.
...since it made their work tons easier and not having to worry on what is going on upstairs. Sure, they may have to do the DCP builds, but that's all computer work now, in which they are accustomed to at the beginning.
Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 10-12-2011, 01:20 PM:
quote: Monte L Fullmer
Now, I'm curious on this statement for I've heard it before: what would be the difference between the "real job" and the cinema industry? Both occupations can earn the employee an income, both occupations CAN be fun, esp when it's a career based occupation and not just a "McJob", et.al. ..
I did not intend this to be disparaging in any way. I know plenty of people who make their living in the exhibition industry, and I have the highest respect for them. There are some very good people in this business and I am happy to know some of them personally.
I was simply trying to imply that the majority of my income is derived from a different occupation. I very much enjoy my full-time job, and I consider movie stuff to be a hobby of mine. I find it very satisfying to help make movies look and sound as good as they possibly can, but that is not what keeps my lights on and puts food on my table.
quote: Justin Hamaker
I disagree about the equipment not yet being mature enough to replace film. While the long term reliability of series 2 projectors may not be known, the picture quality is superior to 35mm in the average location. I know some FT detractors will swear otherwise, but I'm going by my own eyes and the comments I've received from customers.
I will not argue with your opinion (especially with some of the crappy prints from 2K DIs that we see all too often now), but my emphasis here is more on the operational and business issues, anyway. At the very least, I suspect that few would say that ![[dlp]](graemlins/dlp.gif)
is more reliable and/or less expensive than 35mm from the point of view of the exhibitor.
One additional point that I failed to make earlier: it will be interesting if the distributors end up getting bitten by their own creation. If they continue to provide prints for some time, they will be paying a) a higher cost per print as print volume declines, b) VPFs to many of the venues which screen a DCP, and c) the additional expense to create the DCP and issue keys. It is entirely conceivable that, at least in the short-term future, this mixed-inventory situation may be more expensive for distributors than if they had stuck with 35mm film exclusively (with the associated reduced print costs due to higher volume).
Posted by Louis Bornwasser (Member # 3063) on 10-12-2011, 02:18 PM:
Scott: I think you have a full understanding of the "digital problem."
This is the primary reason I have closed Hadden Theatre Supply. I think that there will be no customers left for me, and no small customers for digital.. Louis
Posted by Bernie Anderson Jr (Member # 410) on 10-12-2011, 02:45 PM:
As far as Im concerned, the theatre industry is so flaky that even as a manager, it doesn't feel like a real job anymore. For the most part, at the theatre level, chains would prefer kids (19-21) to run their theatres. They are cheap, usually unmarried and can move around freely, and if they don't want to move, they find another job for the same minimal pay. Most of the people I know in the theatre industry, do have a second job or a "real job" because there is very little pay and with this digital conversion it is pushing the "professionals" out and the end product will be another business that is operated mostly by kids like a buger king or McDonalds.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-12-2011, 02:59 PM:
No prob on that question, Scott, for I've been "scolded" at by a few for working in the theatre industry and not getting a "real job" - like, "what's it to them .. to date, this has been the most stable occupation (so far..lol) that I ever had and seen those other who "scolded" me, been laid off a few times off of their jobs.
quote: Scott Norwood
VPFs to many of the venues which screen a DCP
..isn't this what Cinedigm is doing now if the studio's VPF's are drying up?
Posted by Sam D. Chavez (Member # 1841) on 10-12-2011, 03:04 PM:
I believe I commented on another thread about not one "adult" left in the building.
And unlike fast food joints, there is a lot of complex equipment, plus money at stake if you dump a full house.
Sad outcome looming.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-12-2011, 04:30 PM:
quote: Sam D. Chavez
not one "adult" left in the building
Yep, "kids playing in the sandbox, making up their own rules as they go along" sort of episode.
Posted by Bob Bregazzi (Member # 5623) on 10-12-2011, 04:35 PM:
it is exactly the same over here. i've spent the last 43yrs in the cinema industry, the last 23 of them with odeon cinemas who will before the year is out be fully digital. i accepted voluntary redundency along with all the old odeon old school techs. the majority of us were in the union and we were seen as "trouble" and they wanted us out but knew they would have to pay us to get rid of us. apart from that techs from all circuits are going as well. boxes (we don't call them booths here) are run by kids and sausage turners from the floor. it's a very sad state of affairs and going to get worse i'm affraid. by the way there is a good book out here by a guy called mark kermode who is a film critic for the bbc and is very outspoken in his views, it's called "the good, the bad and the multiplex, well worth a read if you can get it, got my copy from amazon.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-12-2011, 06:03 PM:
The above description (and all of this digital stuff in general)sorta reminds me as a parent on how our kids react when around the parents: in being of ...
1) "That is how you guys think, where we want to find our way on how to think and do things - we'll find the truth our own way." (then, they'll poke at truth with a very long stick so none of it will get on them...lol)
2) When they see an older cinema, the first thing that pops in their mind is: "This was the cinema that mom and dad went to. This is not the cinema that we, our generation, want to attend. We can't see ourselves attending where mom and dad attended. We want the new, new, and new!"
Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 10-12-2011, 06:26 PM:
So aside from kids running many theaters now how is the digital conversion going so badly? Btw: many of those kids will be running this country some day!! I just don't see real problems other than smaller profits in sales and VPF racks taking for ever to get. There is no short supply of projection equipment and at least the DLP equipment works. Sony isn't even a factor in this conversion as far as I'm concerned. What, they have about 8,000 projectors world wide now compared to DLP's close to 40,000? Please! Anyone buys a Sony deserves the Sony related problems that go along with them!
I was smart and jumped into digital almost at the very beginning and it's been going pretty good for me having done digital installs, repairs, etc. almost non-stop in varying volumes ever since. If you as a dealer didn't jump into it in the very beginning then it IS probably too late now. However, if your customers are actually loyal and if you've done a good job for them they won't mind paying a little extra to buy it from you and to continue to get your great services. No National type technical services outfit can begin to give any sort of quality-reliable-consistant service on this sort of scale!! You might get a good tech one time and a brand new to digital guy the next time...LOL! They will try and they will fail and they already have failed in many locations. I think wise theater owners already know that. Theaters from one screen to how ever many can get VPF's and actually get back a large chunk of what they invested in the systems And... this doesn't preclude the dealer or the independent service tech from making the sales and doing the install-maintainance work.
Mark
Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 10-12-2011, 07:07 PM:
quote: Mark Gulbrandsen
how is the digital conversion going so badly
It is going badly because many exhibitors are spending or considering spending significant amounts of cash to install new equipment based upon an implied threat. As more exhibitors do this, a feedback loop is created whereupon the reduction in film-based exhibition creates paranoia and fear and encourages other theatre owners to spend money to install equipment. In this process, some exhibitors are receiving large subsidies (VPFs) for the new equipment, while others are financing the equipment themselves (either by choice or by necessity). And none of the new equipment (with the possible exception of 3D) is likely to increase ticket sales one bit.
This could have all been solved if film distributors (err..."content providers") had communicated their intentions for the future clearly and openly. As far as I know, they have not done this.
As for the failings of the technology and the current state of operations, I will list a few that come to mind:
Documentation - manuals for pretty much any film projector ever made can be found on this site in the "manuals" section. Look there now and see exactly how many D-cinema manuals are there and contrast that with the number of various types of equipment that are available. The Dolby server (which I believe is otherwise a decent product) has an installation manual which is nearly useless and NO OPERATIONS MANUAL. This is crazy. What is everyone trying to hide? Manufacturers should be bugging Brad to post all of their manuals here (or at least make them available freely and without registration on their own web sites), but they are not doing this.
DCI compliance issues - This came up in another thread--some servers will not play a valid DCP with no soundtrack. The Sony 4K projector is not DCI compliant when showing 2D material with the 3D lens installed, yet distributors are not refusing to supply their content for it. If distributors are going to insist on DCI compliance, then they should refuse to supply content to non-DCI-compliant installations (including the many series-1 installations which have not been upgraded). That is not happening.
Key delivery - As far as I can tell, this requires the intervention of the server manufacturer and some third party which has the master key for a particular DCP. What happens if/when the manufacturer decides to stop supporting a particular model of server and/or goes out of business?
Stupid design issues - D-cinema gave manufacturers a chance to actually improve certain presentation issues, but it is still possible to show a flat DCP in scope, or vice-versa. Why is this even possible?
Secrecy - There is a ridiculous amount of "security through obscurity" with the D-cinema infrastructure. If I buy a server, I expect to be able to find out how it works, how to fix it when it breaks, and get all of the necessary root passwords. Equipment manufacturers seem to not be providing this information. The general attitude seems to be that everything is fine and that lowly users should not be troubled with the details. Too many procedures require a technician with the magical key sequences and passwords. The same applies to the nondisclosure clauses in many of the VPN deals. Why is everyone so afraid? This is unacceptable.
DCP format itself - This has way too many limitations that will prevent its adoption for many markets until or unless it is extended. It says nothing about aspect ratios other than 1.85 and 2.39, its approach to cinemascope is a bad joke, and there is no support for frame rates other than 24 or 48 (no, I will not bring MXF/interop into this discussion, as it is not the standard). The specification itself says nothing about how the actual distribution media need to be formatted (filesystem, file structure) and the naming convention is not standardized (there is an incomplete "recommendation," but no actual standard. Again, this was a chance to actually improve some aspects of presentation, and, again, this has not happened.
Should I continue?
Posted by Tom Petrov (Member # 1534) on 10-12-2011, 07:08 PM:
quote: Scott Norwood
My take on the current situation is that the industry has created a giant mess for itself
I dunno about this statement, Cineplex Odeon in Canada is reporting record profits. Record profits were never reported back when the Union was controlling 35mm film projection in Canada.
quote: Scott Norwood
, which only promises to get worse in the forseeable future.
Not really as Cineplex Odeon (Canada's largest exhibitor) will be all digital in 2012. Don't know how that can cause a mess if they are making money right now.
It's about making money...
Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 10-12-2011, 07:30 PM:
Scott, can I point out that the only reason manuals for any equipment appear on Film-Tech is because someone added them to the site. There is absolutely nothing preventing manuals from all the other equipment being added to the site (assuming they are not limited by licensing issues). Heck, I'll send in the manuals I have for the GDC servers, ACT Automation, Dolby CP-750, and NEC NC2000C.
Of course the conversion from film to digital could have gone better, but again there are so many people and variables involved, that it would have been near impossible to prepare every detail in advance.
You mention that they should have had a drop dead date for 35mm a long time ago, but I feel there were just to many players and too many variables involved for any firm date to have been established. Although it might be something we'll start to see in the near future. How many drop-dead dates were issued when they converted to cyan sound tracks? And yet many theatres failed to upgrade and resulted in the date being pushed back many times.
The other problem, as with any new technology, is that it is impossible to look forward and know how long it will take to see the technology move forward to the point where it completely replaces the older technology. Sometimes it moves much faster than expected (like DVD replacing VHS), but most the time it moves slower than expectations.
Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 10-12-2011, 07:35 PM:
quote: Scott Norwood
- the two largest US exhibitors (AMC and Regal) have signed deals with Sony, the purveyor of what seems to be (from reading here and elsewhere) the most generally disliked equipment in the industry (I have no personal experience with their D-cinema products)
is that true?, there seems to be a trend though that for the largest screens AMC has wisely installed Christie systems, since from what I understand Sony DP don't have enough light output for screens 50 feet or wider.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-12-2011, 08:19 PM:
quote: Tom Petrov
Record profits were never reported back when the Union was controlling 35mm film projection in Canada.
Kind of a no-brainer here when C.O. got rid of the high paid union employees. When "Crapaplex Odeon" was here in the States, they started (or grandfathered..) with the "I.A.", but it didn't take long for them not to renew contracts and go manager/operator, or staff operated to reduce that high payroll. True, it's all about numbers - numbers to keep surviving on and to keep pleasing the investors.
quote: Jonathan Goeldner
I understand Sony DP don't have enough light output for screens 50 feet or wider.
Main reasons is that these units can't use the larger 6K lamps due to the LCoS chips that these units use, which are intolerable to the extra heat...where DLP wins in this department hands down.
Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 10-12-2011, 09:01 PM:
quote:
Btw: many of those kids will be running this country some day!!
Complaining that immature kids are running the industry isn't complaining that some of them might become mature adults and help run the country.
Posted by Victor Liorentas (Member # 5272) on 10-12-2011, 09:30 PM:
It's the suits behind the scenes ruining everything with their greed and wanting everything done for free whenever possible.
We may need to Occupy Head Offices everywhere to fix this! ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 10-12-2011, 09:34 PM:
quote: Martin McCaffery
Because it is ALL about the financial interests.
It's not about art. It's not about quality.
Do you guys really think it hasn't ALWAYS been about money?
The classic movie palaces of the past weren't built that way because the owners liked to surround themselves in luxury. They were built that way to attract big audiences who would -- surprise! -- pay to get in. A lot of those places were built after the depression. Sure, a lot of stupid decisions are made today in the name of money but it's not like it hasn't always been that way.
As to the question of why an end-of-film announcement hasn't been made...it would be short-sighted of the distributors to do that.
Let's say that they announced tomorrow that no more prints would be struck after Dec. 31, 2013. That would start the ramping-down of the print production industry. People would be laid-off, and the industry would gear down....but what if another recession hits? And maybe a strike, or some other thing happens that slows down the production of digital gear? Maybe the financial market hits another crisis and some of the bigger cinemas are unable to make that deadline. With the end-of-film wheels in motion, it would be a lot harder to ramp film production back up.
Was there ever a specific date set for the end of silent movies? If you didn't convert to sound you'd be dead in the water?
It just makes sense that once the big players are all converted, and about 85 or 90% of the industry's revenue is coming from digital locations, that's when there will be an announcement that in a year or so, film will end -- or if not outright end, prices for a print will increase dramatically.
One more thing: The reason for no manuals is (yup) to save money, because they know that most people never even crack a manual. I agree they should be available online for people who DO read manuals (I'm one of them) or want to print their own.
Posted by Victor Liorentas (Member # 5272) on 10-12-2011, 09:48 PM:
No Mike it's much worse today.
Ethics,morals and standards have been racing to the depths of hell!
On the other hand social media is helping regular people organize protests all over the world lately.
It's big business getting to big causing the problems.Wall Street Big banks,corporations having the rights of a person legally,dogs and cats living together!
Posted by Mike Frese (Member # 4361) on 10-12-2011, 10:19 PM:
So Victor how do you suggest we fix these problems of too much greed? (Sorry, I will not let people complain about a problem without expressing ideas of how to fix them.)
I agree 100% with Mike.
My studio reps are certainly encouraging me to be digital by the end of next summer.
Posted by Victor Liorentas (Member # 5272) on 10-12-2011, 10:22 PM:
Holding big business accountable for their actions.
I believe this is Occupy Wall Streets goal.
Posted by Tom Petrov (Member # 1534) on 10-12-2011, 10:36 PM:
quote: Monte L Fullmer
True, it's all about numbers - numbers to keep surviving on and to keep pleasing the investors.
Exactly and thats what it is about. Sadly, projectionists no longer showed a value to the large companies and audiences for that matter.
I know the IMAX Digital is a hot topic among people on here, but IMAX has never been more profitable or in demand than ever before since they went digital.
Posted by David Stone (Member # 4846) on 10-12-2011, 10:38 PM:
Hi Everyone,
I run the only single screen in Sydney Australia.
In Oct 2009 I funded my own coversion to digital cinema, Christie 2000ZX, DOREMI server, CP750 etc.
Business and relationship with local film distributors has never been better.
Cheers,
David.
Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 10-12-2011, 10:41 PM:
Scott, I don't quite agree with your assessment. In the past Exhibitors have been faced twice with similar AND more costly conversions. Just because different people in different times in the same industry are going through this doesn't make it a bad thing. The first more costly episide was the conversion to sound. According to Norm Schneider whose dad worked for Western Electric and actually installed Vitaphone systems told me that it cost over 100 grand in 1928 dollars just to install sound in a 2500 seat theater. Convert that to today's dollars for me please! There existed some optical tracks that required special equipment to play back or they wouldn't play back, or gee... didn't we recently go through round two of that? Second, there was Cinemascope which just about every standard theater in the world had to equip for, Todd A-O and other wide screen processes also showed up. Projection and sound equipment for some of those systems was extremely expensive in it's day AND SO WAS REMODELING THE ENTIRE BUILDING TO ACCOMODATE IT. And not all locations that installed it did all that well with 70mm road shows or Todd-AO. So in reality if some single screen house has to spend 60 to 70 grand on equipment so what. Thats the price of a good car... or a decent theater sound system today. Times change, things change and thats all part of life. No doubt the kerosene lantern manufacturers hated Edison! Sound and wide screen also filtered out the unprepared and the unfit just as D-Cinema will. It's happened before and it will happen again. As for all your other complaints I've not had any major issues nor have my customers nor has anyone else I know, in fact some of them claim LESS down time than with film. I installed lots of D-Cinema this year and we sometimes called for a KDM 5 minutes before show time... no problem! Like I said above... if you install Sony expect trouble! Exhibitors should have learned from their past follies. I don't think I even have a single piece of anything Sony in my house. Only one problem with content in the last 4 years and drives show up days early in case there is a problem so it can be ironed out. But like film, there will always be something there that occasionally comes up. Also, don't forget that D-Cinema is in it's infancy and actually functions pretty darn well for as new of technology it is. No standards... blame SMPTE for that! They have become all but usless any more. Early jet engines were awful and Color tv was not that great when it first appeared, nor was radio, the automobile or the tractor... All the complaints you list also have counterpart complaints in the film world. Nothing is perfect and nothing ever will be so don't expect it to be, for every one theater that did film right a thousand others did it wrong!
I had to go back and skim your last post... on the manual thing. They actually do exist for almost all products and many are very comprehensive right down to how to dismantle it and put it back together. Lots of the gear is too complex or requires special tools or understanding of a given piece of gear in order to be able to work on it.... just like a projector intermittent does or a shutter gear box or a digital sound processor so they may not be available to the general public. I can tell you that they are not hiding them. Go get qualified to work on some of the gear and you'll have so much documentation to deal with that it makes projector manuals seem quaint.
Posted by Tom Petrov (Member # 1534) on 10-12-2011, 11:00 PM:
Mark- Nice post, well said and intersting.
What is your opinion on IMAX digital being able to be monitored in "real time" by IMAX from their head office?
Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 10-12-2011, 11:50 PM:
quote: Mark Gulbrandsen
there was Cinemascope which just about every standard theater in the world had to equip for, Todd A-O and other wide screen processes also showed up. Projection and sound equipment for some of those systems was extremely expensive in it's day AND SO WAS REMODELING THE ENTIRE BUILDING TO ACCOMODATE IT.
I have some documentation on what was done in my own theatre to equip for cinemascope. The original screen was square-ish, of course, and the required back exit doors were on each side of it. They had to pretty much tear-out the whole stage area, move the exit to the side wall and rebuild for the wide screen. Plus buy two new SuperScope lenses. I'm sure that was just as big (and exciting) a project in 1953 as our digital conversion was last year.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-13-2011, 12:23 AM:
Yes, that is an excellent write-up that Mark posted! Well done!
Yet, this time, it's affecting jobs-the projectionist jobs ... and it's apparent that's what the big thing is all about.
Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 10-13-2011, 12:46 AM:
Hang in there Scott. My team has been working non-stop on keeping up with the demand for our DCS systems. There simply hasn't been any time for us to update the manuals in the warehouse. It will happen, but not for awhile.
To those who say there is good digital and bad digital, you couldn't be more right. Just last week we sent an installer into a building that had one existing digital 3d system and he was going to outfit the place with DCS systems. What was found on the existing system was pretty horrifying. They were cropping EVERYTHING down to scope...because the wrong lens was ordered and the original dealer/installer from a year ago didn't care enough to correct it. It was also very much out of focus. This isn't the first time we've seen things like that. We have seen theaters with the wrong color spaces and various settings, some with bad convergence issues, and even some that never even bothered to shoot colors! There is lots of "bad digital" out there. Digital is not perfect if the installer is rushed and doesn't do the job PROPERLY, but done right it can be pretty darned impressive...definitely better than anything available on 35mm these days.
The main thing I am seeing that is downright foolish with digital conversions in general though are much of the exhibitor decisions being made these days. We are seeing TERRIBLE equipment and installation choices being decided upon by either the absolute bottom line with NO regards for how much that will cost them down the road (quite possibly pushing them into bankruptcy due to the increased operating costs). Yes of course I mean Sony, but I also mean some of the DLP-based systems in various scenarios.
The other sad thing we keep seeing are over-aggressive equipment salesmen that are selling horseshit...and because they are slick talkers or they "take care of the decision-maker" under the table, their equipment gets selected with little to no regards for what the consequences. Case in point did you know Christie is the brightest projector? Did you also know that Barco is the brightest projector? Heck, NEC is DLP based and that means it puts out the same amount of light, those other companies are just making crap up. But no, Barco supposedly faked their world record demo by only measuring the center of the screen. Of course Christie's lens calculator is wrong. But then again so is their competitor's.
What some people have said is "THERE CAN ONLY BE ONE BRIGHTEST PROJECTOR! THE OTHER 2 OF YOU ARE LYING!" Of course the reason why even that isn't a fair statement is because there is no one projector manufacturer that is "the brightest" in every scenario. Sorry, but that is a FACT. It is also a fact that the calculators the manufacturers provide are simply incorrect! They don't take into account port window light loss, color correction light loss, screen degradation, bulb degradation...none of that! All they care about is taking a brand new super-duper/super-expensive bulb and blasting it with as much power as they can to take a measurement real quick under completely unrealistic circumstances and then claiming their projector can do it. Well sure it can, just not in an actual cinema environment under real conditions!
I see all the time these salesmen pitching that you can use their smaller projector in certain situations. Well, maybe for the first 100 hours of the bulb. What most people don't realize is that those same salesmen that earn commission from the projector sales commonly also earn commission from the bulb sales! It is IN THEIR BEST INTEREST for you to buy the smaller projector and to get eaten alive with bulb costs!!! After all, once you have made the purchasing decision, you're pretty much screwed...and therein lies the problem.
Nobody does the math. I'm not even sure how many people can. There is one thing I am sure of, don't ever, ever trust a salesman! And yes we even tell customers of ours that applies to us as well. We will work up the data with the TRUE cost of operation as fairly as possible, recommend the equipment that is in the client's truly best interest based upon the findings, and then we ask they take that and go to their techs for validation and we back off. (Nobody likes a high pressure salesman and anyone pushing really hard to buy their equipment is hiding something.) The numbers should speak for themselves and be validatable. We can run the numbers any way with any equipment the client wants in any combination and they are all done fairly. For example, if a client's theater complex is best served with Barco projectors but they want Christie, no problem. After all our system is hardware-agnostic, so any mix and match of projectors and servers can be used. Fact of the matter is depending on screen sizes, throws, masking type and so forth Barco may win on some and Christie may win on others. Without running the ACTUAL numbers for each scenario, nobody can make a blanket statement. We can run the paperwork both ways and they can choose whichever they like...but at least we gave them the proper education.
It is that education that is sorely lacking in these conversions. In the end, one poor decision now will result in millions of lost revenue. That is why we incorporated energy management into our systems and they are the only TRULY 100% projectionist-free systems that exist. (And yes, a manager that does projectionist duties is STILL a projectionist. ![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
) To top it of we have one heck of a good VPF program going with the lowest upfront costs, lowest ongoing costs and highest recoupable amount that exists.
People have for years made the (somewhat lame) joke that Film-Tech should make DigiGuard so people could have "digital done right". Well if you step back and really look at the DCS system and everything we have put into it, you will quickly see...we did. We just gave it a better name.
Digital doesn't have to be a bad thing if it is done right. Not everyone is though.
Posted by Cameron Glendinning (Member # 3516) on 10-13-2011, 03:20 AM:
quote: David Stone
Hi Everyone,
I run the only single screen in Sydney Australia.
What's happening with the 4 other auditoriums that your landlord has/is building within the same building?
David story is most remarkable as he competes successfully with a major chain's multiplex 150 metres away on the other side of the railway tracks!
If however you in the neighbourhood though don't bother popping in, he is often too busy wandering around the foyer aimlessly to chat
Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 10-13-2011, 07:08 AM:
quote: Brad Miller
Nobody does the math.
I do! And I do the measurements as well! There are even more factors that Brad has not listed in the whole light equation. What lens are you using? They are not all the same on the light efficiency thing. Furthermore, the lens will not have the same efficiency throughout its zoom range! The same is true of the lamps. Brand X lamps and Brand Y lamps will not have the same light throughput either at the start or the same characteristics throughout its life.
I know I'm trying to get my calculator more accurate all of the time but the variables and the ability to measure all of them has been and endless task.
There has also been a complete misunderstanding of how the light relates to the screen and gain causing many systems to appear dark. I'm finding this from ALL parts of the industry...techies included.
Don't blame the SMPTE...they DO have standards going on the books...constantly...as with film, people don't necessarily follow them. In the case of light, people only like to look at the center brightness figure...they keep forgetting that it was based on the sides/corners being at 85% (screening rooms) 75% (cinemas). If you have a flat high-gain screen...you'll never hit that spec and you can't just use part of the spec. It is like pumping up JUST the left front-tire and leaving the rest flat (or very low)...it doesn't work very well.
-Steve
Posted by Mike Frese (Member # 4361) on 10-13-2011, 09:14 AM:
quote: Victor Liorentas
Holding big business accountable for their actions.
I believe this is Occupy Wall Streets goal.
Sorry Victor that is very weak. I will make it easy on you. Give me just three policies you would put into law to make big business accountable for their actions if you had such power. Would you limit the size of corporations? Ban companies the size of Wal-Mart? AMC?
Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 10-13-2011, 10:19 AM:
Steve, isn't it implied when people say "nobody does" that such a statement excludes you? ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
After all some of our calculations data came from our very discussions.
Posted by Ron Funderburg (Member # 4561) on 10-13-2011, 10:23 AM:
I have thought long and hard about how to put this and I am not trying to make an argument. I am just sitting here reading all of this and see this mutual group gripathon about film companies and their greed.
Well welcome to the grown up world. The film companies are just like every other major corporation on the face of the earth. They have the same goal as every other major corporation out there, are you ready for it? Their goal is to make money and I am betting the company you work for wants to make money as well. You probable have the same goal.
You may not have the goal of making as much money but you need that money or you won’t be working there. I know that this industry (exhibition) is traditionally low paying believe me I know I have been in theaters since I was 17 with less than 4 years since then that I wasn’t working for an independent, chain, booking, or owning a theater. By the way I managed (not assistant) my first theater when I was 21 years old. I was one of those kids running a theater you are talking about on here only it as a long time ago. Often I worked two fulltime jobs to make ends meet.
Let me go back to the greedy film companies for a minute. If you are a franchise holder for GM, Ford, or Chrysler you sell what they provide. That is because you have a contract and you represent them. If you sell electronics, you sell what the manufactures provide. If you don’t like the direction of RCA you can drop that line, if you don’t like what GM is doing you have only a few of options.
1 you can send them a strongly worded letter (Oh yes that does a lot of good).
2 you can change sell your franchise and perhaps pick up another one.
3 you can just shutdown.
The product belongs to film company we provide it to the customer in the means and manner of the owner of the product demands. I guess you have a few options as well.
1 you can send them strongly worded letters, or complain endlessly on discussion forms.
2 you can look for film companies that will provide product film
3 you sell the theater (if you are the owner)
4 you can leave the business
I don’t know if film will be gone in the near future or ever. My guess is that it will be gone with in a few years. Many independents are already having problems getting film print on break or off break. It is a shame that this would happen but it is out of the hands the local exhibitor except to complain loud and often.
Do I wish we as the exhibitor had more control of the product, well yes I do. That will never happen as sad as it is we are just a means to end for the film company.
Do not get me wrong I was and am dead against digital in theaters. Film that is take care of (TAKEN CARE OF) is always superior to digital at least for now. I will miss the little clickit click click of film running though a projector. This is out of our hands just as discontinuing the Model T was out of the hands of the local dealer.
I agree with much that has been argued on here I just know in the end we don’t own the product.
Added later! Missed something!
I agree with Brad on the conversion it is matter of cost vs value and unfortunately owners are good with the calculator on today's cost but not so good on the long term cost!
Posted by Sam D. Chavez (Member # 1841) on 10-13-2011, 10:26 AM:
Steve writes,
"There has also been a complete misunderstanding of how the light relates to the screen and gain causing many systems to appear dark. I'm finding this from ALL parts of the industry...techies included."
Please elaborate.
Brad's comments are very interesting. It is tragic that audiences get stuck with a bad picture, but the fault has to ultimately be placed at the owners doorstep. They are the people who bought Smart and Eprad processors as acceptable substitutes for Dolby back in the day. How about Frazier speakers?
Nothing new here.
Posted by Victor Liorentas (Member # 5272) on 10-13-2011, 12:14 PM:
To Mike Frese,thanks for making it easy for me.
Of course I am no expert in business or politics but I am learning.
I think everyone should do what they can to be involved in and understand the policies of our elected officials and how it impacts everything.Since many politicians are practically owned by big business we have a big problem in my view.
I don't claim to have the answers but Michael Moore is a big role model of mine.
It seems to me that corporations have to much unchecked power today and have harnessed the system to a point where corrupt and dangerous consequences are the result.The small guy and poor people tend to get stepped on first.
Documentaries like Inside Job,Enron The Smartest Guys In The Room,The Corporation and Capitalism A Love Story show how this is a worsening problem.
So I said things are getting worse but never suggested I have all the answers. ![[Frown]](frown.gif)
Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 10-13-2011, 01:25 PM:
Sam,
I hesitated to re-write what I have stated in other threads on the subject of light and its interaction on the screens.
But the cliff notes version:
If you take a matte white screen, light it to 14fL in the center, you will have something like 13.5fL on the sides. No matter where you sit in the theatre or the projection angle, the odds are the light you are seeing is relatively uniform and approaching 13-14fL. The standard allows one down to 85% of center or about 12fL. Through actual measurements, I've found that lets you go to about a 1.3 gain screen (Stewart Ultramatte 130 was the screens I found that met the spec). Any screen with a higher gain will not. In fact, I've yet to measure a screen with a gain of 1.4 or higher that meets the spec.
If you look at what is happening to the light as the gain goes up is that you are really increasing the "Q" of the light and by holding onto just the center light reading, you are fixing the APEX of the curve at that one point and "pushing" the rest of the light down.
Taking Stewart out of the equation and using "typical" cinema screens from MDI, Harkness and Severtson...if one has a "matte-white" screen with a center brightness of 14fL, the AVERAGE light over the ENTIRE screen will be about 13.2fL if you are sitting in the center seat. Now, take out that white screen and put in a Silver screen with a gain of about 2.2-2.4 (depends on the manufacturer, the run that day and the age of the screen). If you set your center brightness to still be 14fL, your average brightness over the entire screen drops to 8.5fL!!! It will appear darker (about 64% as bright). Yes, if you are the lucky person sitting dead center and you can fixate on the 2-degree portion that represents the center of the image, you will have a "normal" brightness image...but almost nothing is in the dead center of the screen during an actual movie. Faces are biased high on the screen. Your high gain screen actually made the picture DARKER. Now, if you want the silver screen to look as bright as the matte-white, you have to raise the center brightness to about 22fL so that its AVERAGE brightness is that 13.2fL discussed earlier. The corners are still going to suck as they will be down to 6-7fL and you will loose some of your black in the DEAD CENTER but on average, the picture will look about as bright. Curving the screen can mitigate a LOT of this but not all of it. I have a screen with a raidus of 5/6th the throw with a Silver screen that only need to have center raised to 17fL to have the same average light as a matte-white screen of identical size/shape.
(and this was the short answer)
-Steve
Posted by Sam D. Chavez (Member # 1841) on 10-13-2011, 02:04 PM:
I like your novel way of laying this out.
You should do a "white paper" on your findings, in your spare time of course.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-13-2011, 03:26 PM:
Yes, Thx for the "Cliff Notes" on screen illumination, for the written topic definitely answered a few of my questions since I'm operating with white and silver curved screens.
-Monte
Posted by Ron Funderburg (Member # 4561) on 10-13-2011, 03:39 PM:
I have never really liked silver screens. More prone to hotspots, the roll of light on the edges, how quickly they begin to show damage. I don't like 3D I get headaches when I watch them digital or color shift.
I like pearlesant screens do they still make them? 3D dictates silver screens what a rip! Less light, less color, and less enjoyment for me.
Okay well enough of my gripping about product provided to us by the film companies. OH, one more grip better product would mean more people! Give us better movies!
Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 10-13-2011, 03:55 PM:
quote: Ron Funderburg
3D dictates silver screens
Apparently, Dolby disagrees.
Posted by Ron Lacheur (Member # 1126) on 10-13-2011, 04:04 PM:
This is a good read!
Posted by Ron Funderburg (Member # 4561) on 10-13-2011, 04:17 PM:
Chris yes they do but I haven't seen a picture from them. I doubt that their system makes up for the inherent shortcomings of 3D. 3D seems to be running out of steam what a shock! 20's had stereophonic viewing both motion and still photography, the 50's had the run at 3D a small run in the late 70's and 80's. All attempts have failed.
Oh wait ViewMaster was popular for a long time. So maybe the movies need to see what they did to make it work better. And really those big binocular size viewer would be perfect in theaters.
Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 10-13-2011, 05:09 PM:
quote: Ron Funderburg
I doubt that their system makes up for the inherent shortcomings of 3D. 3D seems to be running out of steam what a shock! 20's had stereophonic viewing both motion and still photography, the 50's had the run at 3D a small run in the late 70's and 80's. All attempts have failed.
I'm not wanting to turn this into another 3-D debate but it should be pointed out that this current round of 3-D started in 2005, so it's been going for six years, which is the longest run that 3-D has ever had and there's no sign of it stopping. The average right now is about 40% of ticket sales are for the 3-D version, which has been holding steady for a while now. There are going to be about 40 more 3-D movies in the next 18 months. I would hardly call that a "failure."
Since the film-companies have finally realized that it's best to offer movies both ways, the consumers have a choice. Given all of the above, there may be a smaller number of 3-D films in the next few years as things level out, but I think the format is here to stay.
Oh -- and the Dolby 3-D picture looks great, if the projection system is set up properly.
Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 10-13-2011, 05:22 PM:
I've mentioned this else where on this website but curved screens pose and present new problems that the DCI has yet to be addressed or corrected - the relatively new DLP system at the Uptown Theater has the image at all four corners bowing inwards (I've heard the Arclight Dome also has this problem) - this was never a problem with past 35mm/70mm presentations
Posted by Ron Lacheur (Member # 1126) on 10-13-2011, 08:59 PM:
quote: Jonathan Goeldner
the relatively new DLP system at the Uptown Theater has the image at all four corners bowing inwards (I've heard the Arclight Dome also has this problem) - this was never a problem with past 35mm/70mm presentations
It was just the bottom corners where it was bowing inward.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-13-2011, 08:59 PM:
quote: Jonathan Goeldner
this was never a problem with past 35mm/70mm presentations
..since they cut the aperture plates with a "frown" in them to counteract for the curve of the screen, then cut the sides of the plates with a slight trapezoid to counteract for the keystoning.
Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 10-13-2011, 10:03 PM:
Sam,
I fully intend to develop this into something that will show up in the "rags" and/or in the SMPTE Journal. The spare time thing is in VERY short supply right now, unfortunately. I also plan to introduce the information on the next round of SMPTE docs relating to illuminating screens (both for Film and DCinema). My data is grown, albeit slowly now. When I am taking the measurements, I'm using a USL PSA-200 meter and when possible, also taking a picture from the same perspective as the light meter...I'm also measuring the light when sitting off-axis. One would be AMAZED at how the light improves on the curved screen.
On to the Uptown...a subject I'm rather aquatinted with, in its film days. First off, unlike the Cinerama Dome (aka Arclight)...the Uptown's projection is almost straight on with a very slight upward projection angle. In 35mm, we had lenses for 1.85 and 70mm that mitigated the barrel distortion, for the most part...however, on the sides one would get a pincushion distortion. Scope, on the other hand, never had a curve corrected lens (though I did experiments with how to do it on a Deep Curve screen and it worked...it would cost a pretty penny though).
What one would likely see in DCinema is a barrel distorted image...the top and bottom horizontal lines would curve towards the center but the sides would be mostly straight (the image would be football shaped...in the American sense). A flaw in the plan is that Silver screen...the curvature would be too great and it is likely that the sides of the screen are brighter in the center (if one is seated in the center)...the upward projection angle would keep the lower seating area from being well lit but it would favor the balcony. The rather tallish screen would make the image seem like there was a band of light about half way up the screen that stretched from side to side but the corners would be very noticeably darker than the middle. If they are not using anamorphic lenses there, then they are wasting an large amount of light on Scope. The anamorphic lens would help, minimally, with the screen curvature too. Note, I have NOT seen the Uptown since it has gone digital but I do know the physics of what must occur and I also know its projection location.
As has been pointed out, the Digital Cinema industry has not developed deep-curve lenses and probably never will. There are not enough deep-curve theatres to justify it. The lenses that existed for film have their origins date back to when Cinerama, D-150 and the like. The T-Kiptikon series...but was kept alive and actually made it into the ISCO Ultra line with multi-coatings and such. The MagnaCom 65 was also a very good tool in a deep-curve situation as it will pincushion an image...DCinema does not have such tools.
Short sighted people also put a "no visible artifact" scaling rule in the DCI spec...while for typical flat screens with straight on projection, I absolutely agree. But what if you have some significant horizontal offset? Which looks worse and has more visible artifacts, a digitally keystone corrected image with credits and captions parallel to the bottom masking board or a badly keystoned image that is cropped? In the case of a deep curve screen, scaling the image to deal with the shape of the screen is preferable to cropping a bunch of pixels and having visible artifacts due to the screen shape. As projection resolution goes up, the becomes even more true.
-Steve
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-14-2011, 01:14 AM:
I was going to ask a question, but I already found the answer, thus, please disregard this post.
Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 10-14-2011, 06:44 AM:
It appears that my original post here was widely misunderstood. The intention was not to start another film vs. big-screen-TV flamewar or to debate the aesthetic qualities of each. We have plenty of other threads in which to do that. My issue was with the potential failure of the existing business model for exhibitors and also with the ethics of distributors' making a change to their business which will have a significant impact on their customers (the exhibitors) without providing them with sufficient information to make informed decisions.
In particular, the last issue above has essentially turned the distributor-exhibitor relationship from a mutually beneficial one into a giant poker game. Assuming that the major distributors have every intention of eliminating 35mm film distribution for new titles in the forseeable future (and apologies to them if they do not), I believe that they have an ethical obligation to communicate these intentions to exhibitors. If they cannot set an actual cutoff date for 35mm, then they should make a statement to the effect of "we will guarantee print availability until June 6, 2015 and cannot guarantee availability after that date." I believe that the current policy of silence along with an implied threat to exhibitors is unfair to both parties and is unlikely to result in an outcome that is favorable to everyone.
I agree with those who state that distributors have the right to make money. I agree. They have a legal and ethical obligation to maximize shareholder value. I am not convinced that eliminating 35mm will do this for them, but that is neither here nor there. I do believe that they need to be more open about their intentions to their customers, and that doing so would be in both parties' interests. I also believe that, unless they really want to see a signficiant number of screens go dark if/when 35mm is eliminated, that they need to offer a more transparent and more universally applicable method of subsidizing the equipment costs for exhibitors. I am not convinced that the existing VPF plans do this, as the exhibitor still needs to find a way to increase revenue to support future upgrades. If this cannot be done, then the VPF policy (if it even applies to the theatre in question) has done nothing more than provide (say) ten years worth of life support to a dying business.
I can understand how, in certain situations, D-cinema can make economic sense, particularly in venues which can use the equipment for "alternative content" and/or in multiplexes where the ability to "interlock" or move "prints" among screens on very short notice is necessary. These venues should definitely install the equipment and go that route. My concern is with the majority of exhibitors where there is essentially zero benefit to making the conversion.
As for the manual/documentation issue: where I can I download Dolby or Christie installation manuals without having to register for a web site? This is annoying and should be unnecessary. Where can I get the root password for a particular server? It's not in the Dolby manual (admittedly, it is easy enough to figure out on their server, but that is not my point and should not be necessary). Why is it necessary to have a service technician to accomplish the "marriage" between server and projector? I can do my own 35mm equipment installation...why can't I do this with DLP? I would also argue that source code should be available for all of this equipment (I am not suggesting an open-source license...just that licensed users should have access to the source code), but that will never happen.
As for previous forced upgrades (sound and CinemaScope): these provided differences (and, arguably, improvements) to presentation quality that audiences noticed. D-cinema (with the exception of 3D, which can also be done with film) does not do this. One could argue that talking pictures resulted in a downgrade of film aesthetics for the following few years, but audiences preferred them to silents and bought tickets for them. As for 70mm and Todd-AO, no one was forced to install either, and the two Todd-AO films were photographed twice, specifically to accommodate 24fps/35mm distribution in venues which would not or could not accommodate 30fps/70mm. The only real parallel that I can see here (a forced upgrade that did not do anything noticeable to the average cinema patron) was the cyan-dye track conversion, which had plenty of lead time and communication between distribution and exhibition. It also required a relatively small cash outlay by the exhibitors.
I don't really have a solution here, but I do believe that someone needed to raise these issues while it can still be done. I do think that the push for D-cinema was premature and that it should have been delayed until widespread availability of 4K DLP equipment (which should have then become a mandatory minimum requirement...well, at least the 4K part, if not DLP). I also think that the specification needs work that should have been done before it was agreed to by the various parties. There are some things that DCI got very right, but many aspects of the specification are quite lacking or substandard. I also believe that film terms need to change. There needs to be a discount for D-cinema bookings (not an increase for 35mm) and that this needs to be continued in perpetuity to account for the higher equipment costs. Distributors need to re-consider exhibition as a loss-leader or at least a break-even deal that increases the value of their product in other markets. The whole VPF thing, with its insidious conditions, the typical requirement for an "integrator" (middleman), and nondisclosure clauses needs to be re-worked to be more equal to all exhibitors. And distributors need to make their intentions regarding exhibitor requirements clear, including forcing DCI compliance for D-cinema houses by refusing to provide content to non-DCI-compliant installations (after a suitable notification period to allow for upgrades).
Posted by William F Green (Member # 3192) on 10-14-2011, 10:36 AM:
I personally did not believe that any VPF deal would have realistically worked for us. And I don't like having ANY strings attached which might affect the way I choose to operate our business.. We are an 'independent' cinema and want to stay that way. So we bought a used series 1 machine outright at relatively low cost. And Scott is right, we only bought a digital machine due to the implied threat of impending lack of 35mm supply. I think that will happen, but I really wouldn't like to say when.
Call me cynical, but when everybody is digital what's to stop distributors deciding that they don't 'like' the VPF deals after all and renegotiating them?
Anybody who thinks VPF's are cast-iron legal documents that can't be re-negotiated, just look around and think again.
Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 10-14-2011, 11:01 AM:
I was in the same boat with VPFs. The $ would have been nice, for sure, but I didn't (and don't) like the idea of "big brother" peeking over our shoulder all the time. Not that we have anything to hide here, it's just the principle of it I guess.
We were already experiencing difficulty getting prints last spring when we changed over. This was more due to Carmike's changeover than anything else; since they have over half the screens in Montana, a lot fewer prints were being allocated here.
Everything else aside, I'm really enjoying the ease and convenience digital provides, and yes I think the picture is better...even though we had a darn good film picture before.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-14-2011, 11:22 AM:
quote: Mike Blakesley
I'm really enjoying the ease and convenience digital provides
..and I do believe that this is the basis for this conversion: a win-win for both parties - owner and distributor. From VHS to a simple disc, et.al.
One day, I thought of this convenience thing and did a small test: how many steps is needed to get a show on the screen with both formats. The 35mm, it took me over 40 steps to get the show on the screen (from when I pull the ring out until I hit the "Start" button), Digital, less than 10. And the time needed is also drastic as well between the two.
Sadly, it had to be in this day and generation. Good luck-Monte
Posted by Matt Fields (Member # 3211) on 10-14-2011, 11:29 AM:
The thing that I didn't like about the vpf's is that you are not only depending on the studios to keep their word, but that the third party provider will be around to properly hold up their end.
Look at Cinedigm. The stock trades for 1.20 and the company financial statements are lousy.
Posted by Sam D. Chavez (Member # 1841) on 10-14-2011, 01:46 PM:
Scott raises a lot of interesting points but it's the way of the world.
It's amazing it's as tidy as it is considering every studio has its own legal department, added to the fact Sony Studios has it's own conflicts of interest, where they foist this atrocious projector on the industry in support of parent company Sony.
A lot of our picture technology changes over the years were more about convenience and not about making the perceived image sharper for the audience. For instance, finer grain films were used for the super 35 camera format being used to shoot scope 2.35 films without anamorphic lenses and then throwing away half the resolution in the process.
You could say the only true advance in image quality in the last 30 years was the change from VHS to DVD.
Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 10-14-2011, 02:14 PM:
I'm curious to know if anyone has ever heard an actual number on how much the studios were spending each year for 35mm prints. I've heard various per print costs through the years with something in the ball park of $1500 being the most recent.
Doing a little math with that $1500 number:
$1500 per print x 8000 prints for a tent pole release = $12,000,000
There are something like 150 film a year that get a wide release (1500+ theatres).
150 films x $1500 x 2000 prints* = $450,000,000.
*2000 prints is a total guess at the average number of prints produced for all wide releases, including tent poles where the number could be 4+ times that many.
So basically that's something like half a billion dollars a year spent to produce 35mm prints. Not to mention the related costs for shipping and so forth. Hard to imagine that distribution content on reusable hard drives even approaches 1/3 of that number - especially when one drive replaces multiple prints at a given location. And this doesn't even begin to speculate on the savings from trailers delivered on hard drive rather than film stock.
In my mind, the financial incentive to eliminate 35mm film is not difficult to see.
Yes, it would be good for the studios to come out and say they can not guarantee film beyond a certain date. Although no specific date was issued, that was basically the point of the letter from Disney that was reposted on FT a while back. Letter from Chuck Viane
Posted by Louis Bornwasser (Member # 3063) on 10-14-2011, 02:29 PM:
Justin: if the data you had was accurate, you would be right. As of "How to Train Your Dragon": 35mm print was 800-1000 dollars per print to the studio in bulk. Digital was $2k each plus $1k code key admin charge: net $3k per print.
You may say that this is too high, but that is the number and, because of long term contracts designed to amortise the production system, the studios are stuck right there for the better part of 20 years.
Even I think film will be gone by then.
The difficulty is low grossing theatres who do digital may not be getting "expensive" digital prints. The studio would have to net out at $3k+ just to break even on the print. Film would then have the cost advantage. Louis
Posted by Sam D. Chavez (Member # 1841) on 10-14-2011, 02:50 PM:
I also question the $2,000 price for a digital print. Please!
Hollywood accounting is strange and mystical; films that gross 400 Million $$ and don't show an actual profit come to mind. This strange accounting used to be considered to be an only in LA issue, now it seems to have been adopted by Enron, Wall Street, etc.
As usual, Hollywood is ahead of it's time. Maybe they are trying to amortize the conversion to D cinema on the back of the D-Cinema prints themselves.
Posted by Louis Bornwasser (Member # 3063) on 10-14-2011, 03:02 PM:
This data is accurate; suppliers and film companies were present and agreed on those numbers. I was there myself. Louis
Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 10-14-2011, 03:44 PM:
quote: Louis Bornwasser
Digital was $2k each plus $1k code key admin charge: net $3k per print.
How can that be? I thought the whole reason studios want the switch is to SAVE money, not spend 3X the money. If they're spending $2k a print, PLUS the VPF, plus the $1k KDM charge....how is that saving them any money?
Also, if it really costs them that much why would they ever give a new movie to a little place like ours on the break? In a lot of cases it would be a guaranteed money loser.
I'm not calling you a liar Louis but those numbers just don't seem to add up.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-14-2011, 03:56 PM:
Granted, 1Tb drives have really came down in price where they can be purchased in bulk form for pennies, but I bet that the duplication process from a main source (either analog or digital) to become data that has to be copied to these HD units, is where the expense is coming from.
Kinda makes striking prints look like kid's play.
-Monte
Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 10-14-2011, 04:20 PM:
Assuming Louis' numbers are correct, and I have no specific reason to question him, I have to assume it's not the complete picture. There has to be a massive cost savings somewhere, or a new revenue stream, or there is no financial incentive to transition to digital.
I know some of the savings will come from not sending multiple prints to the same location, but by those numbers they would have had to be averaging 3+ prints per location to realize any savings.
I'm having a difficult time seeing those drive cost $2K each. I know they are not a standard SATA drive, but a SATA drive of similar capacity is only about $100.
Also, I can't wrap my head around the KDM costing $1000 each - especially when they are generating a KDM for each auditorium of a complex.
Again, I'm not trying to say Louis is wrong. I'm just saying there has to be some critical information missing.
quote: Monte L Fullmer
but I bet that the duplication process from a main source (either analog or digital) to become data that has to be copied to these HD units, is where the expense is coming from.
That doesn't make sense either. Duplicating the contents of a HD is not an expensive process.
The only thing I could possibly conceive as adding the cost is the security encoding for each HD/KDM combination, but even that is done by computer on the fly.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-14-2011, 04:42 PM:
Then, wonder if the suppliers and distributors are setting a high price to protect their interests being a somewhat new procedure, in case the bottom falls out - about the only possible reason, I think, for these high prices.
Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 10-14-2011, 05:05 PM:
Please forgive me if this has been floated in earlier postings: I've skimmed the last five pages but may have missed it.
Could the essential answer to Scott's question be that studios and distributors basically don't know when they're going to pull the plug on 35mm prints totally and utterly, and are waiting for the point at which X per cent of theatres can screen DCPs before they believe that the risk of saying to the remaining ones, 'Either you convert or go out of business' is worth taking?
I've been doing some research on the conversion to sound in Britain recently, and trawling through the trade press made (what for me at any rate was) a bit of a surprise discovery: that sound-on-disc had a much longer tail than it's usually given credit for, with the last distributors only finally ending distribution on disc in 1934.
A relatively high proportion of British cinemas installed disc-only systems from the outset, including five of the seven nationwide chains with over 500 screens each; largely because in early 1929 Western Electric moved in with a slick sales operation and very attractive hire-purchase terms relative to RCA and the various European knock-off manufacturers of optical sound-on-film playback systems. I haven't been able to compile exact figures, but would guess that it was around 60-70% of conversions by the end of 1930. Around the summer of 1930, all the major distributors' PR machines go into overdrive with adverts and interviews with their technical managers in the trade rags, warning that film production on disc is over and that it's only a matter of time before the supply of discs with release prints to theatres will be over, too. In particular, Paramount first named September 1931 and then January 1932 as being the end of disc distribution ... but it didn't happen. Basically, theatres were far more reluctant to throw their turntables away than had been anticipated, and the independent chains and theatres were block-booking from distributors that offered a whole season's package with guaranteed discs and ignoring those that didn't. Only Radio Pictures had abandoned disc distribution by the spring of 1931, and the last holdout, British and Dominions, didn't press their last slab of shellac until the summer of 1934. By that stage, every trick in the book was being tried to get theatres to convert to sound-on-film: distributors were pressing 12" discs with thinner grooves to save money, rather than the 16" ones with which the Vitaphone format was launched, adding china clay to the shellac mix to make the records withstand more playings but at the expense of audio quality, charging exhibitors supplementary fees to supply discs, etc. etc.
The bottom line was that distributors and exhibitors were locked in a four-year war of attrition. Most of the initial installation activity seems to have taken place between spring 1929 and autumn (fall) 1930, so of course by the time the Hollywood studios are trying to abandon disc distribution, the boat had sailed. By the time we get to the back end of 1930, distributors wanted to abandon what they saw as an obsolete technology, while exhibitors were reluctant to convert to sound-on-film, because many were still paying for their disc systems (and by this time the effects of the Great Depression were really starting to be felt, ergo no more easy bank loans for capital equipment purchases) and it was also widely believed that Vitaphone-type discs offered better sound quality than the optical reproducers and preamps then on offer.
Could we be in a similar position with the digital conversion, i.e. the studios and distributors would abandon 35mm tomorrow if they thought they could, but there is still a critical mass of hold-out theatres preventing them from doing so?
Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 10-14-2011, 07:04 PM:
quote: Louis Bornwasser
As of "How to Train Your Dragon": 35mm print was 800-1000 dollars per print to the studio in bulk. Digital was $2k each plus $1k code key admin charge: net $3k per print.
That is absolutely ridiculous and I don't buy it for a second. What is your source for these numbers?
Posted by Louis Bornwasser (Member # 3063) on 10-14-2011, 07:31 PM:
I cannot reveal who said what because of the usual "confidentiality agreement," it was said in my presence by those who are in a position to know. NOT video people, not salesmen, film people who do the invoicing. Louis
Posted by Sam D. Chavez (Member # 1841) on 10-14-2011, 08:58 PM:
I believe the $800 film manufacturing cost for a high speed copy because I have heard it a number of times as well and there is a long history.
I do not accept the $2,000 figure, or the $1,000 figure as valid. Someone probably decided that would be the stated charge not the actual cost. They are not selling the prints or KDM's so it's of no real importance.
In any case, I'm sure the "cost" has dropped dramatically in the last few years.
Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 10-15-2011, 07:11 AM:
These numbers may be true for the initial DCDM Mastering and key generation and administration process, so once per release - not for presentation DCPs.
Distribution DCPs take different ways currently, and may be more or less expensive - but in general it wouldn't cost more than 50-100US$ to get it to the theatre, incl. a share for disc replacements and shipping.
Posted by Mark Hajducki (Member # 1732) on 10-15-2011, 07:23 AM:
If the cost of a KDM was genuinely that high a lot more titles would be distributed unencrypted.
The re-releases of pre-dcinema titles are encrypted even though you can buy the DVD/Blu-ray.
Posted by Martin McCaffery (Member # 37) on 10-15-2011, 09:00 AM:
quote: Sam D. Chavez
Someone probably decided that would be the stated charge not the actual cost.
Which brings it back around to the Hollywood Bookkeeping you mentioned earlier The lack of transparency and the confidentiality agreements are a big part of the problem Scott was asking about in the originating post.
It could very well be like the pharmacutical industry where the actual cost of making a pill is a few pennies, but a few hundred dollars of "cost" is added on.
We've had plenty of discussion about what a 35mm print costs, with no definitive resolution, I don't expect better results with DCP's.
Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 10-15-2011, 07:18 PM:
Leo... It's funny that you mentioned Disks.. the 1929 variety. In reality we are again playing back from spinning disks... I just hope the 4:10 fast freight doesnt wreak havock with any of them.
Mark
Posted by Mike Frese (Member # 4361) on 10-15-2011, 08:28 PM:
Louis,
What was the approx. date you were privy to this conversation?
I do not believe those numbers either. Why? Because min. guarantees for theaters not receiving VPFs from a couple studios have been lowered to $1000 from $1500 for film. Move-Over guarantee in many cases has actually gone up from $250 for film to $400 for digital.
So ....Louis numbers have to certainly contain a VPF component and one that is pretty high going to the big three.
Posted by Peter Howard (Member # 3491) on 10-21-2011, 05:23 AM:
For what it's worth, i've been told from multiple distrib sources in Australia that the usual 120 minute 35mm prints are in the range of $1200 - $1500 locally ($A is pretty much the same as the $USD), whilst a 2K drive is about $250 per unit. No idea on KDM delivery charges though.
I dont see how duplicating & supplying a 2K drive could be anywhere near $2K frankly. If they were that much I couldnt see a point in distribution pushing conversion at all.
Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 10-21-2011, 11:19 AM:
I have recently heard, through a source that the distributors charge about $100 to transfer the content to each hard drive and then about $25 for KDM generation. This comes out of conversations I have had with people "in the know" about the business end of digital cinema within the last few days, but I have nothing concrete to support it. However, this sound more like what I would expect.
Posted by Bruce Hansen (Member # 281) on 10-21-2011, 04:43 PM:
quote:
why is the "digital transition period" being handled so badly?
Because it is being run by upper managment-moron greed heads!
Posted by Phil Ranucci (Member # 3820) on 10-21-2011, 06:41 PM:
I was quoted $275 to buy a complete CRU from Dolby. That was in a quantity of 1, from a reseller, and they are reusable. I remember hearing the drives are used 10 times and then replaced.
Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 10-21-2011, 08:26 PM:
10 times and replaced? That would be pretty silly. They'd probably last 1000 times.
Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 10-21-2011, 08:28 PM:
Mike, what I've heard is the drives are being used 3 times for features then used a handful more times for trailers and then are being sold in a secondary market.
Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 10-21-2011, 08:49 PM:
Wow...that's crazy. I'll bet the "suit" behind that decision thinks that the drives run for 2 hours every time the show gets played.
Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 10-21-2011, 09:54 PM:
My experience with hard drives shows that the more they are spun up and down (ie: powered off), the more quickly they will fail. If a drive is left spinning 24/7 (not allowed to spin down) they will last much longer before they fail. Your mileage may vary.
Posted by William F Green (Member # 3192) on 10-26-2011, 09:16 AM:
With regard to the cost-per-print/drive argument:
I had a an informal chat with an independent distributor here in the UK a few months back about this very issue. They often distribute around 50 film prints of their products and sometimes as few as 3 35mm copies are produced.
I appreciate that sounds like a very, very small operation compared to US releases but for the more 'niche' films in the UK it's a reality. And this type of distributor and their material is key for our operation.
Anyway, this particular distributor led me to believe that they would be reluctant to pay a VPF at all on our 1 or 2 day engagements - and I don't blame them. He said that for small print runs that 35mm often worked-out more viable for them as there was no VPF to consider paying and that they needed a certain number of digital 'prints' to be produced before it became cheaper than 35mm - presumably due to mastering costs etc.
It's interesting and not a clear-cut situation as it appears digital does not always equal cheaper even for the distributors.
Then there is the additional third party cost of generating KDM's..
BluRay anybody?
Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 10-26-2011, 09:39 AM:
Blu-ray isn't a good alternative to DCP files on hard discs.
The data capacity of Blu-ray is very limited compared to that of hard discs. Only 25GB for a single layer BD-R disc and 50GB for a dual layer discs. Chances are certain only single layer discs would be burned. Then there's the issue of bandwidth. BD tops out at 50 million bits per second. Hard discs will probably always be much faster than any optical disc, both in terms of file access times and bandwidth rates (sustained, burst rate, etc.). Hard discs are reusable. BD-R discs are not; they'll be shredded and go into the land fill.
I really like watching movies on Blu-ray disc at home, but the AVC and VC1 encoded video on those discs are (usually) inferior to anything made to DCI standards. The video bit rate is typically much lower than that of a DCP, with all sorts of compression tricks thrown in that violate DCI rules. The color depth isn't as great even though Blu-ray does have, on paper, the capability of showing 10-bit or 12-bit per channel color.
The movie distribution people simply have to get their shit together. If anything, they ought to be pushing for higher standards now that things like USB 3.0 is very common. How about some 4K DCPs with considerably higher bit rates?
Posted by Paul Mayer (Member # 355) on 10-26-2011, 11:14 AM:
And yet blu-ray will indeed become the method of distribution in the near term for catalog and niche titles. Several regional chains I've been doing digital installs for over these last several months have installed blu-ray capability on one or more of their screens at many of their locations. Apparently, the US distributors do not want to be bothered with making DCPs/KDMs available for such titles, at least for now.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-26-2011, 11:21 AM:
..and we would need at least 3 BR discs per movie injest due to the reduced storage compared to the 500G to 1TB HD space..
..maybe flash HD's could be in store in the horizon.
-Monte
Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 10-26-2011, 12:12 PM:
At the moment, flash disks are no more reliable than spinning platters (at least in a server-room environment; they are probably less susceptible to physical damage that might happen in shipment). Also, the number of write cycles is limited, although that is probably not a major issue for something that might be re-written a few dozen times.
Blu-Ray in theatres is a load of crap. It's a consumer format that is designed to look good on a living-room size television set. It is not reliable enough or of high enough quality for movie-size screens. And most of the players suck.
Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 10-26-2011, 01:50 PM:
I'm just curious to know how many who are knocking Bluray on the theatre screen have actually seen a Bluray on the theatre screen? As I posted in another thread, I recently showed Avatar on one of my screens via Bluray and the picture was absolutely beautiful. There was nothing about the picture which made me think I was watching a "consumer" product rather than something intended for the big screen.
I'm forced to believe most of the naysayers are only going by the idea that Bluray is a consumer product rather than because they have seen it projected on a movie screen.
Posted by Martin McCaffery (Member # 37) on 10-26-2011, 02:21 PM:
quote: Scott Norwood
Blu-Ray in theatres is a load of crap. It's a consumer format that is designed to look good on a living-room size television set. It is not reliable enough or of high enough quality for movie-size screens. And most of the players suck.
And the distributors don't care, so some are actively pushing it. We're showing one all this week. Actually, we're showing the backup DVD because the BluRay froze. We just have a standard def projector, so the difference between the two is not noticeble, and besides, no one is coming to it anyway.
Posted by Victor Liorentas (Member # 5272) on 10-26-2011, 02:21 PM:
I have seen Bluray on our 30 foot wide screen plenty of times to know what the weakness is using a 3 chip 720 dlp Infocus 777.
Darker shots look pretty good but artifacts appear in brighter shots which look like compression artifacts to me.
I would think this would be even more apparent on a full D Cinema machine.
Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 10-26-2011, 02:35 PM:
I have seen Blu-Ray on smallish cinema screens (25' range) played on D-cinema projectors with good scalers. It looks pretty good. But it is not film and is not DCP. Never mind that many Blu-Rays are mastered improperly, with grain reduction and a separate "sounds good on a home system" sound mix.
But, yes, I will admit that part of my objection here is to the idea that Blu-Ray is a consumer format. We should not be using the same equipment that normal people have in their living rooms to present feature length material in cinemas for which we are charging $10 (or so) per ticket. Our standards should be higher than that, both for quality and for reliability. DVD was never all that reliable as an exhibition format, and Blu-Ray is worse. Add to that the issue of programming trailers and snipes and that of automating the show (important for a multiplex, not so much for a single-screen), and the limitations of the format become readily apparent.
That said, I can totally see BR becoming a sort of (non-)standard format for low-budget art-house releases (with larger art-house titles being on 35mm). That does not mean that this is a good idea, or that we should not fight against it while we still can. I might re-consider my opinion if someone makes a reliable, high-quality, professional-grade player with HD-SDI output and without regional restrictions and with an automation interface, however.
Posted by Olivier Lemaire (Member # 5579) on 10-26-2011, 02:44 PM:
quote:
quote: Scott Norwood
Blu-Ray in theatres is a load of crap. It's a consumer format
(...)
(...)We just have a standard def projector, so the difference between the two is not noticeble, and besides, no one is coming to it anyway.
Sounds like a fact...
Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 10-26-2011, 03:48 PM:
quote: Victor Liorentas
I have seen Bluray on our 30 foot wide screen plenty of times to know what the weakness is using a 3 chip 720 dlp Infocus 777.
Obviously a consumer grade projector is going to have an inferior picture compared to DCI content played on a DCinema projector. But you're comparing apples to oranges and wondering why they aren't the same.
When I showed Avatar it was on our 2K DCinema projector. We were running HDMI from the Bluray player to the projector and using an HDMI-DVI adapter into the projector.
Given that Bluray content is 1920 x 1080 I don't really see how this is a major downgrade from Dcinema content.
Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 10-26-2011, 03:50 PM:
Youtube can deliver 1920x1080 as well. That does not mean that the quality can equal DCI material. There is more to image quality than resolution (e.g. color depth, greyscale, compression artifacts, etc.).
Posted by Paul Mayer (Member # 355) on 10-26-2011, 05:03 PM:
I've run several blu-ray test screenings on a set up similar to what Justin describes: Sony blu-ray player, HDMI-DVI cable, DVI input on an NEC NC2000 with macros set up for blu-ray onto an approx 27-36' screen (flat and scope). USL JSD-100 sound processor set up to decode SPDIF with analog Dolby Stereo as a backup. It looked and sounded great in that former (no longer certified but still equipped) 200-seat THX house. The GM for that place (admittedly a non-techie) was elated with the results. I know I was pleasantly surprised and impressed with the results - me, an anal-retentive tech geek with a reputation for calling 'em as I sees 'em, regardless of the consequences.
In the end, audiences in that small isolated market will have the possibility of seeing titles that otherwise would never make it to a theater in that market, with the sound and picture impact of a real theater - something that the typical home AV set up could not come close to matching.
Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 10-26-2011, 05:59 PM:
quote: Justin Hamaker
'm forced to believe most of the naysayers are only going by the idea that Bluray is a consumer product rather than because they have seen it projected on a movie screen.
I would have to agree with this. I'm not a technical guy, but I suppose I know when something looks good. We've run a couple of Blu-Rays and one regular DVD for special shows. Each time we've put up a sign and made a pre-show announcement that we were using the BR or DVD.
The Blu-Rays looked spectacular. No complaints, in fact people came up to me afterward and were amazed how good it looked. I would've been hard pressed to tell the difference between that picture and a DC picture. Even the DVD looked mighty good -- in fact to me the weakness of it was the sound, but the movie was a 1980 film (Urban Cowboy) so that was more likely the problem.
When we first installed our system we were running some Looney Tunes DVDs as a test, just because I am highly familiar with those films and would know if the color was off or whatever. They looked spectacular, as well.
Just for reference purposes, we have an Oppo Blu-Ray player. The only objection I have to it is, you can't turn-off the onscreen display of the "play" and "Pause" icons.
I agree there should be a pro player with an automation interface and would definitely look seriously at a machine like that. It would make Christmas matinee life much easier!
Posted by Richard Fowler (Member # 893) on 10-26-2011, 06:23 PM:
My most rented "box" is a dual Blu ray setup with an 5.1 audio decoder.....which has been used for many screenings with studio supplied Blu Ray disk + back up; replacing many Betacam and HDcam rentals. Images of 18 to 30 feet with "acceptable" image and sound.
Posted by Jock Blakley (Member # 6552) on 10-26-2011, 07:58 PM:
I've shown BRD on screen more times than I'd care to mention.
I'm sure they're just wonderful at home, but on a 63-foot screen through a Barco DP4K-32B they do start to come apart. Noisy, grainy, visible compression artefacts, and that general "low bitrate" look.
Of course they're still ahead of DVDs, and there's no question they're better than nothing, but I'd not want to see them as anything other than an emergency backup. DCI-standard content may be the same resolution, but as Bobby explains, it's got the edge on BRD in many other ways.
Of course to audiences these things are sometimes not such an issue - our presentation of the BRD of LOGAN'S RUN garnered us a comment on how it was a fabulous new print (and one time we ran the DVD of NIGHT OF THE IGUANA on a clapped-out Digital Projection Highlite 6400 and were congratulated on finding such a great-quality 16mm print... go figure)
BRD's main trouble, and the one that makes me quite afraid of using it, is that it's im-bloody-possible to present reliably. On-screen-displays abound, you press play and it takes three weeks to roll the feature, players decide you actually don't want them to be paused, there's unskippable FBI warnings... you just can't win if you're trying to get a really nice seamless professional presentation.
Not to say that DCI material is the be-all-and-end-all: you can make a DCP that simply preserves an average-quality transfer from the film (as the DCP of JURASSIC PARK we presented a few nights back showed... we were quite unhappy with the lack of contrast and the very noticeable presence of noise).
Scott's objection is also a valid one - this is a consumer format with its reliability problems and also its PR problems. It's bad enough people can get a practically-2K copy of the film within a few months of release, but how can anybody justify their admission costs to an audience that think "I have the exact same copy of this film at home".
If we must abandon the DCI already for non-mainstream releases I'd be really much happier if it was to be on Digital Betacam or HDCAM.
(definitely spoken like somebody who doesn't pay the bills)
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-26-2011, 09:25 PM:
Big fight between home theatre digital and the cinema digital is the pixel size on the screen itself.
Smaller the pixel size, the better and sharper the image.
Home HD units have pixel size range from .32 up to .40 plus (depends on the size of screen diag measurements to remain in the HD 2K requirements of 1080 x 2048). Analog TV was clear up to .92. CRT computer monitors got all the way down to .26
I used to watch TV via the tuner from a VCR to an old AMIGA monitor, which the monitor had a pixel size of .39 - it was a pretty sharp picture for a 14 inch monitor using it's composite input.
I can see BR looking fantastic being shot through a 2k DCP unit-same requirement as the home unit just larger..just don't sit too close to the screen..
Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 10-27-2011, 11:00 AM:
quote: Justin Hamaker
I'm just curious to know how many who are knocking Bluray on the theatre screen have actually seen a Bluray on the theatre screen? As I posted in another thread, I recently showed Avatar on one of my screens via Bluray and the picture was absolutely beautiful. There was nothing about the picture which made me think I was watching a "consumer" product rather than something intended for the big screen.
I'm forced to believe most of the naysayers are only going by the idea that Bluray is a consumer product rather than because they have seen it projected on a movie screen.
The Avalon here in DC presented 'The Best and the Brightest' via blu-ray and surprisingly looked very impressive. The sharpness and colours were spot on.
Posted by Brian Guckian (Member # 1678) on 10-27-2011, 03:21 PM:
FWIW, according to IMDB The Best and the Brightest was shot on Red One, not on film.
Posted by Cameron Glendinning (Member # 3516) on 10-28-2011, 12:36 AM:
The main problem with DVD or bluray discs is reliability, Some movies like Avatar do look stunning but not all are mastered with anywhere near such effort.
It's THAT moment when one freezes in front of several hundred people that seriously changes your opinion about them! If you choose to run a second player 1 or 2 minutes behind for that rare emergency, that makes a lot of sense in a professional operation. Nothing is worse than restarting a commercial disc whilst the audience waits!
Posted by Kris Verhanneman (Member # 5562) on 10-28-2011, 02:12 AM:
We did try it.
Had some fun with it in the beginning of our digital cinema experiance (our boss told us to try everything).
We (projection crew) screened standart DVD (Mission impossible SE01 on a screen that is 10 m high, concerts, ...) Made the upgrade from external 6 channel to optical (thanks to the arrival of the DMA8+) and the last test we did was 'The Dark knight' on Blu Ray.
So yes it can have a nice view but it still is no DCP. That said, we will be showing 'Alien' within a few weeks. Not sure of the state of the 35mm. And what the costumers would prefer. A nice Blu Ray presentation. Or the feel of the 'original'film?
Posted by William F Green (Member # 3192) on 10-28-2011, 10:29 AM:
As I made the 'bluRay anyone?' comment I though I should chip-in again with some of our direct experiences.
One of the reasons I was suggesting BluRay is that it gets around all that nonsense of KDM's etc. The very first KDM we were sent recently was wrong - not a good start. Then the third one was also wrong, so 2 out 3 were incorrect.
Domestic equipment/formats are less reliable than commercial grade stuff - in theory, but so-far we have yet to have a DVD or BD failure. And bearing in-mind the low price of BD players you can afford to have several spare players around if that's a concern.
Up until this point we have been projecting occasional BD on a non DCI projector. We have used BD as it means we don't have to have somebody (me in this case!) make-up a 35mm print and in some cases it also works out cheaper for us.
To my mind (although it looks good) the LCD projector we use has a lot less contrast than film, but the public don't seem to notice anyway, with feedback being all positive.
We've been testing our recently acquired NEC NC800 with BluRay and it (to my surprise I must admit) looks absolutely stunning. It only looks very marginally worse than a 2K DCP and that's using analogue component inputs - not even HDMI (no HDCP on the NEC). On our small test screen a BluRay looks pretty much like a film original to me.
There IS certainly an issue with menu's and it often takes several mins to reach the start of the feature. Some BD's will not stay on pause for more than 4 mins either. These are all challenging to say the least, but nonetheless once you are aware of these and have a machine cued-up with a second machine to run DVD trailers it is possible to put on a reasonably slick presentation. But this really is only applicable to our type of single screen operation without automation I guess.
We are a cinema and do run 35mm (or soon to be DCP with the NEC) when appropriate or when available - but sometimes it's worth exploring other options, and so-far our experience with BluRays AND even DVD's has been positive. I don't think the movie/cinema experience is only about quality, it's also about content and the context that content is viewed in. The right content shown on a technically inferior format in a cinema setting is often preferable to watching at home as an experience.
To give a some examples we've just successfully screened two BD's (all with correct licenses etc) which are in fact available for anybody to buy and both were more successful in terms of audience numbers compared to the 35mm feature we screened on the same weekend. Both BD's were cheaper for us than the 35mm feature and took more money.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying we should abandon the best quality format available to us for an inferior one, I'm just saying that there are some cases where it makes sense both practically and financially to use BD or DVD and rubbishing BD because it's not a pro-format is doing it an injustice.
By the way I would never advise customers that we were screening on DVD or BD. Most don't notice so why tell them anyway? I've always believed that it is the content we should be advertising to our customers rather than the technology used to present it.
Posted by Ron Funderburg (Member # 4561) on 11-01-2011, 02:48 PM:
Well on the digital conversion front, my new 3D screens for the conversion were just delivered. I don't have a firm start date but assume it is a matter of two to three weeks now.
Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 11-01-2011, 06:41 PM:
quote: William F Green
One of the reasons I was suggesting BluRay is that it gets around all that nonsense of KDM's etc. The very first KDM we were sent recently was wrong - not a good start. Then the third one was also wrong, so 2 out 3 were incorrect.
I have yet to have that happen to me in over half a gazillion installs. Someone at the distributor level at your end must be new at his-her job.
Mark
Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 11-01-2011, 07:05 PM:
I have had a few KDM issues. Things like not receiving a 7.1 KDM for my 7.1 house. But nothing major. And every time I have called about a KDM issue I have received new keys within an hour.
This real issue with KDMs was seen last week with Puss in Boots. There was a problem with the 7.1 track on the 3D version. Because the keys were not active until 8:00am the Thursday before opening, theatres did not have a chance to QC the presentation early enough to get replacement drives in time for the first showing.
I can't help wondering how many theatres wound up giving out refunds Friday afternoon because their first show was the first time the picture had run.
Hopefully this disaster will cause the studios to make keys active 2 days before the opening day.
Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 11-02-2011, 08:22 PM:
William bought second hand equipment. There was no integrator involved. So quite obviously there was no one around with the necessary know how to initiate the logistics for proper KDM handling at first.
- Carsten
Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 11-02-2011, 08:46 PM:
quote: Carsten Kurz
There was no integrator involved. So quite obviously there was no one around with the necessary know how to initiate the logistics for proper KDM handling at first.
All he needed to do was give the distributor the serial number of the server... nothing more... nothing less. In the States and I assume over seas there is a form you fill out with all that stuff and fax or e-mail it in. I have sucessfully gotten KDM's 5 min. before a show on new installs fomr Technicolor.
Fortunately I don't have any 7.1 issues at all!!
Mark
Posted by William F Green (Member # 3192) on 11-02-2011, 10:13 PM:
True enough that there was no integrator involved (I suppose you might count me as the installer) but that's not the reason the KDM's were wrong. As Mark says I filled-out a couple of 'Digital readiness' forms with serial numbers etc.
The first KDM was a simple date error - the KDM ended too early. The second one took multiple attempts to get right (about 4 or 5). When it finally worked they told me the problem was that they had given me a KDM for a DCP with 5.1 sound and our DCP was a 7.1 version. I wouldn't have expected that problem but it's early days for us on digital and we are still learning about all the things that can go wrong I guess.
Obviously it needs a human being to produce a key with the right date-range etc so mistakes can be made, but it's a complication we never had with 35mm - once we had the print it worked.
Posted by Jock Blakley (Member # 6552) on 11-02-2011, 11:29 PM:
KDMs have been the least of our digital cinema troubles... nothing like OF GODS AND MEN and the Case of The Subtitles That Only Worked For Every Twelfth Line of Dialogue.
We've had a few KDMs that cut it fine on start or finish times - and on the other hand there's one distributor we go through who's given us 180-day-validity KDMs for eleven screenings each of two titles.
That said we have gotten a bit touchy about the "two-minutes-before-time" starts, and when for our most recent D-Cinema show (JURASSIC PARK) we were suffering ingest troubles we called Universal and asked for it to start a day earlier so we'd have time to pre-screen. They had a new KDM to us within fifteen minutes.
Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 11-03-2011, 10:18 AM:
While I love Blu-ray as a consumer video playback format, it still can be a pain in the ass.
In a theatrical environment you would need to continually make sure the player had the latest firmware and copy protection software patches. It's not much fun to load a Blu-ray disc and find out the player needs a firmware update in order to play it. My Playstation 3 at home gets updated frequently in part because of updates to Blu-ray's copy protection system. It seems like every other time I load a Blu-ray movie into my notebook's BD burner I have to download a "patch" for PowerDVD (which really just replaces the entire program). The updates go fairly quick thanks to broadband Internet connections. If the player isn't connected to the Internet it can be a real PITA depending on the player model (the PS3 is easy to update, some stand-alone players are very user un-friendly to update).
Then there's the usual BD-Java based menus you sometimes can't skip past. I really despise many of the rental-specific video store discs that have loads of forced movie trailers and commercials you can't skip (God forbid they disable the fast-forward button function). Worse, those rental specific discs often don't have chapter stops. If you stop the movie you can't get back to your previous spot without a hell of a lot of fast forwarding. I really want to punch a Warner Home Video executive in the mouth over this shit.
Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 11-03-2011, 10:33 AM:
When we bought our Sony nearly three years ago, I installed the current firmware available at that date and since then never touched it - and never had any issues with any BluRay we played. Standalone players are quite different from Playstations and computerbased players/drives.
That's exactly why we dismissed a computer solution and even the PS3 and chose a standalone player from a major BluRay endorser like Sony or Panasonic.
To overcome all issues with screensavers, Menus, forced trailers, etc., one definetly needs a HDMI splitter or switcher and a 24p capable preview monitor. Adds something like 250US$ to the bill.
- Carsten
Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 11-03-2011, 11:33 AM:
quote: Carsten Kurz
When we bought our Sony nearly three years ago, I installed the current firmware available at that date and since then never touched it - and never had any issues with any BluRay we played. Standalone players are quite different from Playstations and computerbased players/drives.
Stand alone Blu-ray players are not immune from needing firmware updates. I've personally updated the players for a few of my friends because they either couldn't figure out how to do it or were too scared of bricking their machines to try.
If the player is connected to the Internet it's not such a big deal. Quite a few people don't have the players connected. Most stand alone players have only a standard Ethernet connection. Not everyone wants to run a network cable to a player attached to their TV set in the living room or bedroom. Players with built-in WiFi are becoming more common. The PS3 has always had it.
The biggest update pain I encountered with a stand alone Blu-ray player was a certain Panasonic model. Despite its built-in SD card slot it would only take a firmware update from a CD-R disc that was formatted only in a certain way.
By comparison, a Playstation 3 can apply an update from any type of removable storage as long as the update is stored in a PS3\UPDATE folder. All stand alone Blu-ray players should be able to apply updates this way. You can back up the PS3's system software to a USB flash drive, put in a higher capacity hard disc and then restore the system to that new disc drive. It's pretty nice.
Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 11-03-2011, 12:46 PM:
It kind of defeats the argument as well when one has to first update it to the newest version for it to be left alone. If there were no problems... you'd just have left the shit alone to begin with.
And personally, I'd think for guaranteeing accurate playback and avoiding all these issues, it'd be a not-so-bad idea of looking at playing back through a PC with software that removes all the encryption. Sure, it's legally a gray area but if you've got the license paid for to play it back, I doubt they'd bat an eye. Plus, it's much easier to find software that will do this for you than some physical unit.
Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 11-03-2011, 03:21 PM:
quote: Chris Slycord
when one has to first update it to the newest version for it to be left alone
Claimed who? Even that firmware update was not demanded or necessary. Everyone can guess how many DVD and BluRay Players sit in living rooms with no Internet connection ever. These are consumer devices. If these were so dependent on current firmware to play current discs, BluRay would already be dead.
Anyone claiming that accurate computer based playback of high quality media was easier to do than on standalone players has never set up a HomeTheater PC with proper frame rate and multichannel/audio sync handling. This fills endless columns on AV boards.
Been there, done that - it's never 'better' than on standalone players, nor easier nor cheaper nor reliable. It's a solution for people who make more of a hobby from playing around with hard- and software upgrades and patches than actually watching content.
But all this is clearly off-topic and should go to this recent thread:
http://www.film-tech.com/cgi-bin/ubb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=16;t=000759;p=3
- Carsten
Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 11-04-2011, 11:09 AM:
quote: Carsten Kurz
Claimed who? Even that firmware update was not demanded or necessary. Everyone can guess how many DVD and BluRay Players sit in living rooms with no Internet connection ever. These are consumer devices. If these were so dependent on current firmware to play current discs, BluRay would already be dead.
That's because most of the people who have bluray players bought them quite recently rather than the players occasionally needing updates. I've had to update firmware on several players because they wouldn't play a particular new movie.
quote: Carsten Kurz
Anyone claiming that accurate computer based playback of high quality media was easier to do than on standalone players has never set up a HomeTheater PC with proper frame rate and multichannel/audio sync handling. This fills endless columns on AV boards.
I wasn't talking in general, although it appeared as if I was. I'm talking for the people who have equipment that won't work with HDCP. Finding some physical piece of equipment that strips that stuff out for you is becoming harder and harder. Although, yes setting up a PC with frame rate and audio syncing is a pain...
Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 11-25-2011, 06:25 PM:
quote: Justin Hamaker
I'm just curious to know how many who are knocking Bluray on the theatre screen have actually seen a Bluray on the theatre screen? As I posted in another thread, I recently showed Avatar on one of my screens via Bluray and the picture was absolutely beautiful. There was nothing about the picture which made me think I was watching a "consumer" product rather than something intended for the big screen.
I'm forced to believe most of the naysayers are only going by the idea that Bluray is a consumer product rather than because they have seen it projected on a movie screen.
In reality Justin...it is because your skills of evaluation suck! It is the honest truth. You are in the industry and look at DCP every day and SHOULD know better than the average consumer that thinks we have been using DVDs for the last decade or more.
The "tells" of BluRay are many and are quite obvious. I think your other posts about DCinema being crisp is what does you in, in most cases. What goes into an image is more than sharp pixels. It is what is contained in those pixels
BluRay has a form of compression that is quite visible, particularly on the big screen...you may notice backgrounds with an unnatural steadiness to them and other motion artifacts that show up as a bit of lack in fluidity in motion.
Then there is the whole color space thing but that is going to be less obvious to the untrained eye. DCinema will have notable improvement in both color and motion on its image...particularly on 2D (4:4:4 color space) and if you are using DLPs.
-Steve
Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 11-25-2011, 07:26 PM:
I have seen quite a few Blu-Rays that look so good on a screen you could charge admission and no one would know it wasn't the actual film or DCP. Anyone that underestimates the capability of Blu-Ray definately hasn't seen what it is capable of.
Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 11-25-2011, 07:40 PM:
quote: Steve Guttag
In reality Justin...it is because your skills of evaluation suck! It is the honest truth. You are in the industry and look at DCP every day and SHOULD know better than the average consumer that thinks we have been using DVDs for the last decade or more.
That's so sweet of you to say.
Since it's so obvious you know better than I, what I'm seeing with my own eyes, I'll be sure to go and get them checked.
Posted by Peter Castle (Member # 1997) on 11-25-2011, 08:37 PM:
I've compared quite a few BluRays with the DCP version. I can see the difference, usually colour depth and (slight) compression artifacts. I'd always show a DCP in preference. BUT...
In the late eighties and early nineties we used to screen a particular movie at least once a year. In 1992 we closed for reconstruction. The following year we approached the distributor to renew our regular booking and were told they had destroyed their prints as no-one was booking.
In two weeks time we screen the movie again, having finally got approval to show from BluRay. OK, it's not the main feature that our audience is paying to see (it's the support of a double feature), but at least they'll get the opportunity to see a classic (in my opinion) on the big screen, not possible on 35mm or DCP.
I'm not intending to tell my audience that it is coming from BluRay, but if they ask how we are able to show it I will tell them. It is the movie they want to see, not the format.
Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 11-26-2011, 04:20 PM:
quote: Steve Guttag
What goes into an image is more than sharp pixels. It is what is contained in those pixels
On the comparison of BR against DCP is the size of the file content: How many GB's did the 'Avatar' file on the actual drive contain against the GB's size on a BR of 'Avatar'?
If memory serves me correctly, the JPEG2000 filesize for 'Avatar' was around 161 gB's. How many BR's would have to be made to fit this one file?
I see some serious compression here to squeeze 161 gB's down to 15gB's for BR release.
Course also - the the production end for making DCP files and BR files could be completely different as well-each from a different source.
Looks like an "apples and oranges" comparison syndrome again that's going to mislead the public like crazy.
I've always looked at DVD and BR releases to be "the MP3 of video" due to it's compression from the original source..and you lose some bits during the compression.
"Dang!" looks like analog video (and audio) is still winning in the background.
Powered by Infopop Corporation
UBB.classicTM
6.3.1.2