Exhibitor News

CineEurope Solutions: NOC and Screen Verify (UPDATE)

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Harkness Screens is offering their new iPhone Luminance meter – Oops! Digital Screen Verifier app – at a 25% discount this week – until 28 June. This is another tool that brings expertise to the “your own staff”, but it also brings the data into the Harkness database tool, which management or a service provider can use externally to make certain that the projector/screen interface is working well.

USL has announced that their model two version of the LSS-100, as the LSS-100P, incorporating new features, in some cases surpassing and some cases keeping up with the Digital Test Tools Digital eXperience Guardian – both have a method for detecting speakers (or amp) that are not playing  – the Guardian’s as part of the NewNoise Detection System that points out the area of new rattles or noises, while the 100 has added a satelite sync test, this  being a new and clever feature in this Event Cinema Era.

Sony has 3 interesting items at the CinemaEurope 2015 assemblag. First is showing 2 of their 4K systems in one box! The  is good for screens up to 19.5 meters (1.8 gain white) at 48 candela/m2 and 15.4 cd/m2 for 3D on a 2.4 gain silver screen. The nice claim is 8000:1 contrast ratio, which should really make things nice. Oops! These press releases should be read better: The units are not in one box but are a match set of projectors that can be placed side to side or on top of each other. That shoud be interesting to see anyway.

They also point out that their managed services are compelling due to VPFs disappearing. 

Finally, and most interesting is how Sony is promoting the Alternative Content, or as it is better described, Event Cinema market. 

Leading the way in Event Cinema
Projected in Sony 4K for an unforgettable experience, the fast-growing Event Cinema market is attracting new audiences with a revenue-boosting blend of live and recorded events to suit every screen owner. 
  
In February 2015, Sony Digital Cinema 4K announced a ground-breaking initiative with the National Theatre and Vue Entertainment to screen four NT Live stage productions in detail-packed 4K. The first of these –Behind the Beautiful Forevers – was recorded in March and screened as a series of exclusive 4K presentations across Vue’s 83-site estate. 
  
Details of the next 4K productions covered by this historic agreement will be confirmed during the ECA (Event Cinema Association) hosted panel discussion: “Event Cinema- Taking Stock and Looking Forward”, which takes place at CineEurope on the tradeshow floor, 4pm on Tuesday 23rd June. Addressing the session will be Emma Keith, National Theatre Live and Johnny Carr, Vue Entertainment. They’ll be discussing the recording of Behind the Beautiful Forevers – and outlining more exciting technical developments for the upcoming shows – with John Bullen, VPF and Content Manager for Sony 4K Digital Cinema (Europe). 
Learn more about Event Cinema
  
“It’s great to be back at CineEurope once more”, says David McIntosh. “Since we last came to Barcelona a year ago, Sony Digital Cinema 4K has successfully implemented a unified new global business structure. Today we’re seeing this pay dividends with an improved service for our exhibition customers, significant business wins across Europe and beyond – and a further strengthening in our product offering, with industry-leading 4K solutions for cinemas of every size.” 

 Sony has filled in the details of their next Event Cinema adventure and it sounds like a good one.

 

Technique Bin

New Harkness Darkness Challenge

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In the film projector days, it was mandatory for the projectionist to walk by the projector several times per showing to adjust the focus of the lens. For many reasons, mostly dealing with heat stability and the elimination of the sometimes tight/sometimes loose film track, this isn’t required anymore. It is common for focus to remain astoundingly stable over months. Relative color problems have also gone from potentially horrid – as owners stretched a bulb far past its prime – to nuanced imperfections as xenon bulb technology was refined for digital life. No longer do we see the blues disappear and the white point slip so that the yellows turn brown…well, we can, but not often nor nearly as bad as it often was.

Bulbs don’t burn out perfectly though. The remains of a burned out bulb will show the darkening residue from the tungsten electrode (the anode) coating the inside of the glass and pits where arc bounces around giving the effect of ‘bulb flicker’, often long before its the mandatory death date. (Jim Slater has an excellent article in Cinema Technology if anyone needs a refresher course in xenon bulbs. Oram Eichstätt – The home of the XBO) (Cinema Equipment Sales has a reprint of a well done Ray Boegner piece: Everything you wanted to know about xenon bulbs…)

The loss of a skilled and caring pair of eyes on the screen before and during the movie (or alternative content) presentation is a loss regardless of how good the equipment is. This Quality Assurance problem was mentioned for the first time in recent memory during a CinemaCon 2015 seminar, The Unintended Consequences of Digital Cinema. Most usually these seminars have a billion years of expertise on stage, but in an effort to be polite to competitors onstage and customers who chose competitor’s products, many speakers leave trails too nuanced to parse. In this case, Carolyn Giardina – Contributing Editor of The Hollywood Reporter – prompted the panel, especially Rich Phillips – CTO of Arts Alliance – to speak clearly about quality assurance errors that are slipping by, to the extent that some exhibitors figure it is acceptable of the audience to be QA examiner in the non-premium rooms.

Quelle Horreur~!

Just in time, Harkness comes through with an iPhone app that works to get eyes in the room, and measure the screen with ease. They bill their new Digital Screen Verifier as the “World’s Most Accurate Light Meter App for the iPhone”. They will be selling this $40 iOS-only app alongside the handheld device that they introduced a few years ago. Here’s more of their verbiage:

Utilising pioneering proprietary technology, the Digital Screen Verifier from Harkness Screens is a unique utility for iPhones that allows cinema engineers and exhibitors to ensure that brightness levels in digital cinema are regular checked and maintained.  Quick and easy to use, this relatively accurate (+/- 1fL) low-cost light measurement tool allows brightness readings to be taken (in foot lamberts) using white test patterns from a digital cinema projector.  Its unique functionality allows light readings taken in the field to be directly imported into Harkness’ cloud-based Digital Screen Archiver tool in real-time to form a semi-automated entry-level solution to screen monitoring and auditorium maintenance.

They showed this at CinemaCon, but it took a couple extra weeks to become available at the Apple AppStore, but with all the Barco Laser and DolbyVision announcement sucking all the juice from the potential customer’s technology bandwidth it may be just as well that they can legitimately re-introduce this cool stuff as a follow up item.

They also followed up on an earlier announcement that they are working to put the Qalif products from Highlands Technology into the cinema. The Qalif Calibration system is an incredible piece of kit. And the follow-up tool will be a nice monitoring device for those who can’t afford to put a microphone in the sound field and limit their needs to what is available from the back wall. Bottom line is that Post Installation Quality Assurance is getting a major boost from a market leader.

Technique Bin

New Harkness Darkness Challenge

Leave a comment

In the film projector days, it was mandatory for the projectionist to walk by the projector several times per showing to adjust the focus of the lens. For many reasons, mostly dealing with heat stability and the elimination of the sometimes tight/sometimes loose film track, this isn’t required anymore. It is common for focus to remain astoundingly stable over months. Relative color problems have also gone from potentially horrid – as owners stretched a bulb far past its prime – to nuanced imperfections as xenon bulb technology was refined for digital life. No longer do we see the blues disappear and the white point slip so that the yellows turn brown…well, we can, but not often nor nearly as bad as it often was.

Bulbs don’t burn out perfectly though. The remains of a burned out bulb will show the darkening residue from the tungsten electrode (the anode) coating the inside of the glass and pits where arc bounces around giving the effect of ‘bulb flicker’, often long before its the mandatory death date. (Jim Slater has an excellent article in Cinema Technology if anyone needs a refresher course in xenon bulbs. Oram Eichstätt – The home of the XBO) (Cinema Equipment Sales has a reprint of a well done Ray Boegner piece: Everything you wanted to know about xenon bulbs…)

The loss of a skilled and caring pair of eyes on the screen before and during the movie (or alternative content) presentation is a loss regardless of how good the equipment is. This Quality Assurance problem was mentioned for the first time in recent memory during a CinemaCon 2015 seminar, The Unintended Consequences of Digital Cinema. Most usually these seminars have a billion years of expertise on stage, but in an effort to be polite to competitors onstage and customers who chose competitor’s products, many speakers leave trails too nuanced to parse. In this case, Carolyn Giardina – Contributing Editor of The Hollywood Reporter – prompted the panel, especially Rich Phillips – CTO of Arts Alliance – to speak clearly about quality assurance errors that are slipping by, to the extent that some exhibitors figure it is acceptable of the audience to be QA examiner in the non-premium rooms.

Quelle Horreur~!

Just in time, Harkness comes through with an iPhone app that works to get eyes in the room, and measure the screen with ease. They bill their new Digital Screen Verifier as the “World’s Most Accurate Light Meter App for the iPhone”. They will be selling this $40 iOS-only app alongside the handheld device that they introduced a few years ago. Here’s more of their verbiage:

Utilising pioneering proprietary technology, the Digital Screen Verifier from Harkness Screens is a unique utility for iPhones that allows cinema engineers and exhibitors to ensure that brightness levels in digital cinema are regular checked and maintained.  Quick and easy to use, this relatively accurate (+/- 1fL) low-cost light measurement tool allows brightness readings to be taken (in foot lamberts) using white test patterns from a digital cinema projector.  Its unique functionality allows light readings taken in the field to be directly imported into Harkness’ cloud-based Digital Screen Archiver tool in real-time to form a semi-automated entry-level solution to screen monitoring and auditorium maintenance.

They showed this at CinemaCon, but it took a couple extra weeks to become available at the Apple AppStore, but with all the Barco Laser and DolbyVision announcement sucking all the juice from the potential customer’s technology bandwidth it may be just as well that they can legitimately re-introduce this cool stuff as a follow up item.

They also followed up on an earlier announcement that they are working to put the Qalif products from Highlands Technology into the cinema. The Qalif Calibration system is an incredible piece of kit. And the follow-up tool will be a nice monitoring device for those who can’t afford to put a microphone in the sound field and limit their needs to what is available from the back wall. Bottom line is that Post Installation Quality Assurance is getting a major boost from a market leader.

Exhibitor News

CinemaCon Technology: Evolution Has Arrived

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IMAX is making its pitch with their new dual-laser light projectors. Unfortunately, unless one is in Toronto the only screen to make a judgement upon is the horridly dark silver screen with the gold reflections of the Chinese Theater in Hollywood. Horrible green-grey cast to everything.

But the boutique niche of ultra-quality is what Dolby is moving into in an all-encompassing way. If all popcorn weren’t already GMO-Free, perhaps they would have attacked that problem as well.

Barco meanwhile has launched a full range of non-xenon projectors that will have the same Cost of Ownership as xenon in something like 3 years…or 2 or 5 or some number significantly less than the 10 years of their warranty. And, for those 25 or 30 thousand owners of C Series Barco projectors, there is a laser retrofit, with an S Series retrofit later this year.

Why buy anything else? Big room with ability to share profits with Dolby, then the choice is Dolby Vision. Studios will be releasing a special High Dynamic Range DCP for them, and the question will be whether Barco Laser system owners can get that DCP as well and whether Barco can tweak for them a bit more HDR instead of their previous goal of “Let’s keep everything at the DCI minimums until people know what they need and want.”

What we want is more…

Barco Auro will deliver their new object oriented system soon which incorporates some technology from the IOSONO purchase. Time will tell, especially since they have been talking about this for 2 or 3 years…but it aligns with the push for a standard interchange of immersive mixes, driven by the studios desire for the One Master and Open Source where possible, which DTS:X is driving toward with MDA.

But there should be no confusion with any of the other brilliant products shown or discussed at the show. The evolution to the Dolby complete package and Barco’s laser projectors is monumental.

Exhibitor News

CinemaCon Technology: Evolution Has Arrived

Leave a comment

IMAX is making its pitch with their new dual-laser light projectors. Unfortunately, unless one is in Toronto the only screen to make a judgement upon is the horridly dark silver screen with the gold reflections of the Chinese Theater in Hollywood. Horrible green-grey cast to everything.

But the boutique niche of ultra-quality is what Dolby is moving into in an all-encompassing way. If all popcorn weren’t already GMO-Free, perhaps they would have attacked that problem as well.

Barco meanwhile has launched a full range of non-xenon projectors that will have the same Cost of Ownership as xenon in something like 3 years…or 2 or 5 or some number significantly less than the 10 years of their warranty. And, for those 25 or 30 thousand owners of C Series Barco projectors, there is a laser retrofit, with an S Series retrofit later this year.

Why buy anything else? Big room with ability to share profits with Dolby, then the choice is Dolby Vision. Studios will be releasing a special High Dynamic Range DCP for them, and the question will be whether Barco Laser system owners can get that DCP as well and whether Barco can tweak for them a bit more HDR instead of their previous goal of “Let’s keep everything at the DCI minimums until people know what they need and want.”

What we want is more…

Barco Auro will deliver their new object oriented system soon which incorporates some technology from the IOSONO purchase. Time will tell, especially since they have been talking about this for 2 or 3 years…but it aligns with the push for a standard interchange of immersive mixes, driven by the studios desire for the One Master and Open Source where possible, which DTS:X is driving toward with MDA.

But there should be no confusion with any of the other brilliant products shown or discussed at the show. The evolution to the Dolby complete package and Barco’s laser projectors is monumental.

Consultants

Soundly Said | Mel Lambert Gets Immersive

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SMPTE/NAB 2015 DCinema History Panel
Bill Mead (DCinemaToday) speaks to Tim Cook (Alamo Drafthouse), David Pflegl (Carmike), Steven Tsai (Sony), Sean Romano (Deluxe), Wendy Aylsworth (Warners) – Photo from Mel Lambert

Remember to visit our sponsor please:

Digital Test Tools Logo
Welcome To The New Digital Monitoring Age

For a less focused but full-of-dat article on the Summit:

NAB Cinema Summit: On the Trail of Hollywood’s Biggest Villains from David Keene at AVNetwork

A lot of great data, but it derives a whole paragraph of analysis from the correct but asterisk’d data about the terrible reduction in ticket sales. From 10 billion something to 10 billion something…which is truly a rounding error when put under the scope of the limited number of movies released in 2014. 2015 is already on track to soundly beat 2014 and there are many big pictures in queue that should make this year more on trend.

This is only pointed out since a year of minor growth or minor sales diminishment is not the way that good management thrives. Or maybe not. But the point is that the management of several industries are working together and at odds to maintain some semblance of an exhibition industry. Clearly, the major movie studios are all parts of larger interests, and exhibition has long known that it isn’t exhibition friendly. The solution was long thought to be Alternative Content, (or ODS as the punsters like to say – Other Digital Stuff, and perhaps odious for the purests) or as the new group in the EU calls it: Event Cinema. Tim Cooks speaks to how they are doing it well. Picture house in London do too. See Event Cinema Association

Consultants

Soundly Said | Mel Lambert Gets Immersive

Leave a comment
SMPTE/NAB 2015 DCinema History Panel
Bill Mead (DCinemaToday) speaks to Tim Cook (Alamo Drafthouse), David Pflegl (Carmike), Steven Tsai (Sony), Sean Romano (Deluxe), Wendy Aylsworth (Warners) – Photo from Mel Lambert

Remember to visit our sponsor please:

Digital Test Tools Logo
Welcome To The New Digital Monitoring Age

For a less focused but full-of-dat article on the Summit:

NAB Cinema Summit: On the Trail of Hollywood’s Biggest Villains from David Keene at AVNetwork

A lot of great data, but it derives a whole paragraph of analysis from the correct but asterisk’d data about the terrible reduction in ticket sales. From 10 billion something to 10 billion something…which is truly a rounding error when put under the scope of the limited number of movies released in 2014. 2015 is already on track to soundly beat 2014 and there are many big pictures in queue that should make this year more on trend.

This is only pointed out since a year of minor growth or minor sales diminishment is not the way that good management thrives. Or maybe not. But the point is that the management of several industries are working together and at odds to maintain some semblance of an exhibition industry. Clearly, the major movie studios are all parts of larger interests, and exhibition has long known that it isn’t exhibition friendly. The solution was long thought to be Alternative Content, (or ODS as the punsters like to say – Other Digital Stuff, and perhaps odious for the purests) or as the new group in the EU calls it: Event Cinema. Tim Cooks speaks to how they are doing it well. Picture house in London do too. See Event Cinema Association

Exhibitor News

Immersed Soundly | Laser Precision | CinemaCon 2015

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Digital Cinema comprises an enormously broad sweep of technologies. The amount of nuance that must be de-layered to make intelligent decisions is daunting. A simple example: the fact that the new laser projectors can create 3D movies on low-gain white screens (paragraphs of nuance in just that phrase alone), means that woven screens can be used which would also benefit the audio from the speakers behind the screen.</p>

<hr id=”system-readmore” />

<p>Yet again, the industry is at a transition. In past transitions, when a company was able to show that an up-until-then unachievable standard could be met, the studios clamped down on the deliverables that went to the older equipment. MPEG was ubiquitous, then JPEG was shown and within a year the MPEG deliverables were verboten. The change in security keys, the anti-ghosting prints….</p>

<p>Wouldn’t that be something if the studios said, “At this time next year, all DCI movie prints will be mastered at the SMPTE standard level of 48 candela per square meter.”</p>

<p>Post-Digital Era indeed~!</p>

<p>The laser systems at CinemaCon will have the new pitch of being commercially installed. Both Barco and Christie have their super ±60,000 lumens systems in the field, with announcements for many more. NEC launched their 6,000 lumen system for the smaller screens to similar success.</p>

<p>The amazing angle on new projector installs is that they are being made – except for rare cases – without the VPF deal. One manufacturer made 20,000 cinema-centric digital sales in 2014 according to their yearly prospectus.</p>

<p>Last year at this time Christie was still using a screen that had shakers attached to the rear to de-harmonize speckle. It will be interesting to see how they have progress from that technology. They also seemed to back away from the pitch that there would be any electricity savings due to the costs of cooling the lasers. Enquiring minds…</p>

<p>Christie’s laser links come from this sentence of their promo:</p>

<p style=”padding-left: 30px;”>The Christie Freedom laser illumination system platform includes the <a href=”http://www.christiedigital.com/en-us/cinema/cinema-products/digital-cinema-projectors/Pages/Christie-CP42LH-3DLP-RGB-Digital-Cinema-Laser-Projector.aspx” target=”_blank” title=”Christie CP42LH”><strong>Christie CP42LH</strong></a> for Cinema, the <a href=”http://www.christiedigital.com/en-us/business/products/projectors/3-chip-dlp/Pages/Christie-D4KLH60-3DLP-RGB-Digital-Laser-Projector.aspx” target=”_blank” title=”Christie D4K60LH”><strong>Christie D4K60LH</strong></a><strong> </strong>for Pro Venues, and the <a href=”http://www.christiedigital.com/en-us/3D/products-and-solutions/projectors/Pages/Christie-Mirage-4KLH-3DLP-RGB-Digital-Laser-Projector.aspx” target=”_blank” title=”Christie Mirage 4KLH Promo”><strong>Christie Mirage 4KLH</strong></a> for immersive environments.</p>

<p>Christie also wants to be regarded for their contributions to the Dolby Laser Projector offering.</p>

<p>It might be that Barco will try to immerse their laser pitch with evolutions of the Auro and pre-auditorium entry and full surround systems that they showed last year. Instead of brisking people back and forth they will be showing several features in several different of the Caesars Ballrooms. As a line from their PR says:</p>

<p style=”padding-left: 30px;”>Visitors will be treated to hands-on demos of the world’s only laser projector capable of showing 4K 3D content at 60 FPS, Barco’s multi-screen, panoramic movie format, Barco Escape (powered by Alchemy-enabled projectors), and other innovative sight, sound, and engagement solutions designed to fascinate audiences while driving increased profitability for exhibitors.</p>

<p style=”padding-left: 30px;”>http://www.barco.com/en/News/Press-releases/CinemaBarco-brings-magic-and-showmanship-back-to-the-movies-showcasing-next-generation-theater-wide-.aspx</p>

<p>DTS will be making presentations of their DTS:X MDA system at the theater at the Palm. The pleasure of being Open Source will continue to be as compelling as the fact that the systems works for the companies who loathe to make hundreds of ‘prints’ for each movie release.</p>

<p>And that leaves the elephant in the room. With several pre-show announcements for their complete cinema package and a willingness to allow the chains to continue with their branding in association, Dolby is also ready with a working message about a working set of products.</p>

<p>Good luck to us all. Sounds like a lot of perfection will be on hand, and a lot of nuance to dig through to see it work its magic in a mutually beneficial manner.</p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p>For years the standard for light levels of movies was set at 48 candela/square meter, which is about 14 foot/lamberts. The tolerance is ~10 candela or 38 total, which is about 3 foot/lamberts or 11 total.</p>

<p>Meanwhile the amount of light coming through the usual 3D system was said to be 3 or 4 foot/Lamberts or 11 candela/square meter. And, typically in the technology biz, cool and clever solutions often come at the tail end of a transition. The argument in this case is that MasterImage has a new and very intelligent light/mirror system and RealD has new screen technology that removes some of the problems inherent with high gain screens.</p>

<p>Systems like these can bring the light to levels approaching the lowest levels of the standard, which looks best only if the print was mastered for the level measured at the eyes.</p>

<p>There are some who will say that 8 foot-Lamberts is enough for 3D for some magical reason (pointing to an ISDCF demo done in 2005), but it is untested, and pointedly, that isn’t the standard either. Demonstrations of Hugo and other movies at 48 candela/m2 are brilliant, but not too brilliant.</p>

Exhibitor News

Immersed Soundly | Laser Precision | CinemaCon 2015

Leave a comment

Digital Cinema comprises an enormously broad sweep of technologies. The amount of nuance that must be de-layered to make intelligent decisions is daunting. A simple example: the fact that the new laser projectors can create 3D movies on low-gain white screens (paragraphs of nuance in just that phrase alone), means that woven screens can be used which would also benefit the audio from the speakers behind the screen.</p>

<hr id=”system-readmore” />

<p>Yet again, the industry is at a transition. In past transitions, when a company was able to show that an up-until-then unachievable standard could be met, the studios clamped down on the deliverables that went to the older equipment. MPEG was ubiquitous, then JPEG was shown and within a year the MPEG deliverables were verboten. The change in security keys, the anti-ghosting prints….</p>

<p>Wouldn’t that be something if the studios said, “At this time next year, all DCI movie prints will be mastered at the SMPTE standard level of 48 candela per square meter.”</p>

<p>Post-Digital Era indeed~!</p>

<p>The laser systems at CinemaCon will have the new pitch of being commercially installed. Both Barco and Christie have their super ±60,000 lumens systems in the field, with announcements for many more. NEC launched their 6,000 lumen system for the smaller screens to similar success.</p>

<p>The amazing angle on new projector installs is that they are being made – except for rare cases – without the VPF deal. One manufacturer made 20,000 cinema-centric digital sales in 2014 according to their yearly prospectus.</p>

<p>Last year at this time Christie was still using a screen that had shakers attached to the rear to de-harmonize speckle. It will be interesting to see how they have progress from that technology. They also seemed to back away from the pitch that there would be any electricity savings due to the costs of cooling the lasers. Enquiring minds…</p>

<p>Christie’s laser links come from this sentence of their promo:</p>

<p style=”padding-left: 30px;”>The Christie Freedom laser illumination system platform includes the <a href=”http://www.christiedigital.com/en-us/cinema/cinema-products/digital-cinema-projectors/Pages/Christie-CP42LH-3DLP-RGB-Digital-Cinema-Laser-Projector.aspx” target=”_blank” title=”Christie CP42LH”><strong>Christie CP42LH</strong></a> for Cinema, the <a href=”http://www.christiedigital.com/en-us/business/products/projectors/3-chip-dlp/Pages/Christie-D4KLH60-3DLP-RGB-Digital-Laser-Projector.aspx” target=”_blank” title=”Christie D4K60LH”><strong>Christie D4K60LH</strong></a><strong> </strong>for Pro Venues, and the <a href=”http://www.christiedigital.com/en-us/3D/products-and-solutions/projectors/Pages/Christie-Mirage-4KLH-3DLP-RGB-Digital-Laser-Projector.aspx” target=”_blank” title=”Christie Mirage 4KLH Promo”><strong>Christie Mirage 4KLH</strong></a> for immersive environments.</p>

<p>Christie also wants to be regarded for their contributions to the Dolby Laser Projector offering.</p>

<p>It might be that Barco will try to immerse their laser pitch with evolutions of the Auro and pre-auditorium entry and full surround systems that they showed last year. Instead of brisking people back and forth they will be showing several features in several different of the Caesars Ballrooms. As a line from their PR says:</p>

<p style=”padding-left: 30px;”>Visitors will be treated to hands-on demos of the world’s only laser projector capable of showing 4K 3D content at 60 FPS, Barco’s multi-screen, panoramic movie format, Barco Escape (powered by Alchemy-enabled projectors), and other innovative sight, sound, and engagement solutions designed to fascinate audiences while driving increased profitability for exhibitors.</p>

<p style=”padding-left: 30px;”>http://www.barco.com/en/News/Press-releases/CinemaBarco-brings-magic-and-showmanship-back-to-the-movies-showcasing-next-generation-theater-wide-.aspx</p>

<p>DTS will be making presentations of their DTS:X MDA system at the theater at the Palm. The pleasure of being Open Source will continue to be as compelling as the fact that the systems works for the companies who loathe to make hundreds of ‘prints’ for each movie release.</p>

<p>And that leaves the elephant in the room. With several pre-show announcements for their complete cinema package and a willingness to allow the chains to continue with their branding in association, Dolby is also ready with a working message about a working set of products.</p>

<p>Good luck to us all. Sounds like a lot of perfection will be on hand, and a lot of nuance to dig through to see it work its magic in a mutually beneficial manner.</p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p> </p>

<p>For years the standard for light levels of movies was set at 48 candela/square meter, which is about 14 foot/lamberts. The tolerance is ~10 candela or 38 total, which is about 3 foot/lamberts or 11 total.</p>

<p>Meanwhile the amount of light coming through the usual 3D system was said to be 3 or 4 foot/Lamberts or 11 candela/square meter. And, typically in the technology biz, cool and clever solutions often come at the tail end of a transition. The argument in this case is that MasterImage has a new and very intelligent light/mirror system and RealD has new screen technology that removes some of the problems inherent with high gain screens.</p>

<p>Systems like these can bring the light to levels approaching the lowest levels of the standard, which looks best only if the print was mastered for the level measured at the eyes.</p>

<p>There are some who will say that 8 foot-Lamberts is enough for 3D for some magical reason (pointing to an ISDCF demo done in 2005), but it is untested, and pointedly, that isn’t the standard either. Demonstrations of Hugo and other movies at 48 candela/m2 are brilliant, but not too brilliant.</p>

Societies

Technology Summit on Cinema | SMPTE/NAB2015

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Technology Summit on Cinema | SMPTE/NAB2015Kicking off the yearly SMPTE program at NAB is a symposium with Bill Mead and featuring Tim Reed of Alamo Drafthouse, David Pflegl of Carmike, Steven Tsai or Sony Pictures Entertainment, Sean Romano of Deluxe Digital and Wendy Aylsworth.

Covering the entire breadth of the history and ending with, “Has the Industry done a good job?”, Digidia has presented all the YouTube videos on their site at:

Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) and

NAB sponsored Technology Summit on Cinema

Societies

Technology Summit on Cinema | SMPTE/NAB2015

Leave a comment

Technology Summit on Cinema | SMPTE/NAB2015Kicking off the yearly SMPTE program at NAB is a symposium with Bill Mead and featuring Tim Reed of Alamo Drafthouse, David Pflegl of Carmike, Steven Tsai or Sony Pictures Entertainment, Sean Romano of Deluxe Digital and Wendy Aylsworth.

Covering the entire breadth of the history and ending with, “Has the Industry done a good job?”, Digidia has presented all the YouTube videos on their site at:

Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) and

NAB sponsored Technology Summit on Cinema

…Like Tangents In Rain