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Small town cinemas...out of business. How RED/we can help!

Michael Alessandra

Michael Alessandra

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Not sure if I should have posted this "off topic"...but I thought this would be a good "RED" discussion...so I posted it here. Anyway, not sure if this has been a topic on here or not... But I was just thinking the other day about the RED RAY and PROJECTOR...and that the price was said to be for 10k or less... What does this mean for small town cinemas? Well... instead of them paying hundreds of thousands of dollars (which they don't have, thus why they are going out of business) to upgrade their projectors...now they can buy RED!!! Most owners of small town cinemas don't know about RED and this new affordable technology... What can we do? Play a small part and spread the word about RED. Couldn't hurt...right? I'm gonna call some theaters in my area tomorrow. Thoughts anyone?
 
It's a nice thought. But even though the cinema projectors are getting cheaper/better so is the home stuff. People have just about the same content and screening possibilities at home as small theaters does. So I think they will be hurting no matter what, kind of like the internet cafe's are not doing so well lately. Or the public phones that got hit by cellphones. Most likely small movie theaters are next to fold right after the video rental stores. I think soon even the big theaters will fold. Screening goggles (maybe something for Jim to jump on) will be the immersive viewing option quite soon I think. Sitting in a big theater, all together, all watching the same content might be appealing to some. But I think kids will soon laugh when we tell them about movie theaters, just as the do if we tell them about how to make a mixed music cassette tape unfortunately :(
 
Also, the 'under 10K' version of the RED projector is for a projector bright enough for home use...I don't recall anyone mentioning yet what the theatrical sized projector would cost...there's a big difference between the light output necessary to fill a 'large' home theater screen and a 'huge' theater screen.
 
Not sure I remember the dimensions properly, but I think the home projector is viable for screens up to 15' in size while the "Crimson" theatrical version will fill up a 40' sized screen, or maybe larger.

And yes, I agree this could save a lot of small hometown theaters. When you can gather with others to watch a 4k movie instead of having to pay the price for a home projector, they will come.
 
i'm looking at outdoor, greek amphitheatre and cinematic troupe' stuff... the experience is key. so is beer, the crafted stuff. and local food/vending. then it gets into a whole nother ball game of course, but that's really where it has to be.

the cheap (expensive) box that you go into with your cheap (expensive) box of popcorn to stare at a cheap (expensive) box of hollywood... yeah, forget that.
 
I was thinking about that too. I lived next to couple of very tiny old time Indie theaters for a long time. People actually went there (not in great numbers, of course) right up until they ended 35mm projection and went out of business because of the digital upgrades cost. Then I read this article and thought "well, yeah. it's not that simple after all". I guess, the owners now rent the property for private parties or some nonsense like that. I went there last time in 2007 (I think) and it was so nostalgic, man. The movie was shit and old projectors were on the deathbed for sure, but I loved that lil theater, all the people there, they were so sweet... That place was sooo not like giant modern multiplexes or mega-malls today. I miss that feeling.

If Red laser projectors, Redrays and Odemax digital distribution could be used in part to save or resurrect some of those Indie venues, that would be so cool. Though, I don't think there's much of old fashioned lads out there mental enough to get involved or sustain such kind of business in the modern times... But one still can dream.
 
i think it was mike most who had looked into the numbers and business of all this stuff at some recent point... maybe he can chime in with some helpfulness. it's definitely a bit of a risky venture that would take some balls to really pull off, i'm not at this second trying to get myself pinned down to a particular location by opening a business, but i'm thinking about it. in any case, we have some beautiful bonanzas in my backyard.
 
I don't know much about theater tech and equipment but it seems there is more to digital projection than just the projector. There are servers and audio and gadgets (really showing my ignorance here) for displaying DCPs etc. I'm sure the costs to go digital are still pretty high even if the Crimson is less than a Christie or Sony.
 
Mark Andersen said:
I don't know much about theater tech and equipment but it seems there is more to digital projection than just the projector. There are servers and audio and gadgets (really showing my ignorance here) for displaying DCPs etc. I'm sure the costs to go digital are still pretty high even if the Crimson is less than a Christie or Sony.
Click to expand...

Basically reds comming projector, a sound system and a screen... then you should be good to go, the player is included... as from what I have read here.
 
Crimson will most likely not be priced in the same range as the current projectors used in theatres. I think that for a big theatre owned by a small company would have enough money to buy a crimson.
And speaking of resolution, in those theatres there will not be a need for 8K or higher, there's no need and 3D is passive, so these small theatres will have to invest in a Crimson and I don't think they need to invest in much mroe other then distribution formats. But if Red really kicks in with RedRay and a codec good enough for theatre, then it will most definitely save small theatres.

But it's hard, I think that creating a good camera and a revolution on the production side is far easier then revolutionizing the distribution and consumer side of the industry. There are too many negative forces holding technology back both among consumers and distributors.
 
Crimson and Redray will deliver .RED files to the screen but small theaters that show second run films will need to access DCPs. Their customers want to see main stream movies because that's what Hollywood tells them that they want to see. Not sure if all first run film will get delivered as .RED files. Today, most small second run dollar theaters are projecting film prints, the future is gonna get tricky for them but will provide opportunities to others.
 
Small town theater. Get a Crimson projector. Get your stuff from Odemax and sell wine, beer and better food. That's how you are gonna make your money. You are now a restauranteur, not a simple theater owner. Screw the day old popcorn and over irradiated hot dogs. I've watched a theater here in Austin start off small doing this and flourishing. Now everyone in town is copying them.
 
^^Alamo Drafthouse wouldn't last with the cut Odemax takes. 30% is waaay below industry standard for cinemas. Restaurants operate on thin margins as do cinemas, and combining the two doesn't change that. Removing 20% of the ticket sales that normally go to a cinema pretty much cuts out the entire margin of a typical cinema.
 
Björn Benckert said:
It's a nice thought. But even though the cinema projectors are getting cheaper/better so is the home stuff. People have just about the same content and screening possibilities at home as small theaters does. So I think they will be hurting no matter what, kind of like the internet cafe's are not doing so well lately. Or the public phones that got hit by cellphones. Most likely small movie theaters are next to fold right after the video rental stores. I think soon even the big theaters will fold. Screening goggles (maybe something for Jim to jump on) will be the immersive viewing option quite soon I think. Sitting in a big theater, all together, all watching the same content might be appealing to some. But I think kids will soon laugh when we tell them about movie theaters, just as the do if we tell them about how to make a mixed music cassette tape unfortunately :(
Click to expand...

Couple of things you can't necessarily get at home:

Good acoustics (a valuable thing that is part of the recipe of movie magic IMO; presuming no headphone system) and light treatment of the viewing environment (matte walls; moot with retinal projection)
A sense of scale (something that retinal projection will do I guess). That's unless houses all get special entertainment rooms.

Two big ones:

A communal experience, a social experience. Why do people go to live music when the audio quality is never as good as a recording? It's the human element. Anyone who goes to a repatory cinema to watch a classic movie will know the feeling, like singing along to David Bowie at an exemplary presentation of Labyrinth (admittedly not all movies are sing-along) or throwing spoons at the screen during late night 'The Room' showings. Just the sense of focus when you know the whole audience is sympatico.

A changed environment. Getting out isn't something that will get old. Moving around in meatspace will hold its charm. Especially with the addition of good food nearby/at the cinema.

A focused environment. It's all to easy to be distracted when your viewing system is online. TV is kind of designed for 80 percent focus +- 20 percent, whereas movies are designed to take you by the lapels and not let go until the credits (and even then). Though there is a convergence happening there too.

I think the new brands like Alamo Drafthouse which are not just a cinema chain but a philosophy, are the way forward. A cinema chain should become like the ultimate friend's living room to go over and watch a movie. The multiplex thing though, with 16 yo's kicking your seat and talking and playing ocean music with their wrappers the whole time - that will die out. Movies with a capital M will become more immersive and more like theatre and orchestra, which I will point out are still around.

Sci fi time: then you will eventually get a convergence down the line as physical modeling make physical instruments redundant, as the net converges with reality (google glass 2.0). But that's mid-late 21st century stuff I think. That's when we start becoming the stories as movies and games converge.
 
AndrewThomas said:
^^Alamo Drafthouse wouldn't last with the cut Odemax takes. 30% is waaay below industry standard for cinemas. Restaurants operate on thin margins as do cinemas, and combining the two doesn't change that. Removing 20% of the ticket sales that normally go to a cinema pretty much cuts out the entire margin of a typical cinema.
Click to expand...

Odemax should take _more_ than 30%? Wouldn't that make it worse rather than better? Perhaps you have it around the wrong way. Odemax takes 30%, right?
 
Brett Harrison said:
Odemax should take _more_ than 30%? Wouldn't that make it worse rather than better? Perhaps you have it around the wrong way. Odemax takes 30%, right?
Click to expand...

Per Jon Farhat

50% Content Owner
30% Theater
20% Odemax

typically theaters end the year close to 50/50 splits, so moving to 30/70 split is pretty rough.
 
I've noticed the second run cinemas need to be made aware of it. I'll make sure to send some emails. Because frankly, the filmstock they use looks terrible. If I didn't know better I'd think Looper was a grindhouse film. So, I'll be in there soon and I'll stick around and try and talk to someone.
 
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