ICAS / ACES Presentation - Fail

[Michael Panfeld]

Last night was supposed to be the PGA National Capital Chapter's presentation of the 2012 ICAS (Image Control Assessment Series) and the new Academy ACES 4K workflow. It was a technological failure. The irony of a presentation on the state of 4K cinema cameras and, the ACES 4K workflow failing at the 4K distribution stage is not lost on me. The reason for the failure is that the theater's alleged 4K projector actually had a 2K chip inside. Attempts to use a 4K 3D projector and a 2K projector failed as well, under the press for time. After waiting for over an hour, we left unfulfilled. I feel sorry for the presentors and the PGA.

I am wondering if others have seen this presentation and can share the insight gained (we were told that, if projected in 4K, the differences in the camera's would be apparent in certain areas of the frame).

The 5 cameras compared were the Epic, Alexa, F65, F5, and C300.

I am also wondering if this presentation might be shown in other cities. If so, I may try to catch it there.

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

Ouch

Ouch

Thanks for the report Michael. I would love to find an entity with enough interest in promoting 4K to put me on salary as a 4K field implementation tech.

IMO the 4K rollout is in serious need of engineering expertise. I would hit up my peeps at RED for a gig, but they are promoting an integrated solution that should not require such point of use assistance. The way I understand it once you have the RED laser projector and load a .RED file onto it Bob's your uncle (not counting calibration, etc).

Hopefully the bigger theater chains will make it a priority for their top technical people to institute protocols to ensure true 4K presentation of 4K source material, then actually market 4K to the public. I have often wondered why exhibitors would lay out the coin for 4K projectors then not use that as a marketing point. If I can see the same movie at several area theaters but one of them is offering true 4K while the others aren't, wouldn't that potentially get me as a consumer to spend my money at their box office instead of their competitors'? IMAX, THX and other promises of better quality have been used for marketing - why not 4K? Are they just waiting for more 4K DCPs? Just trying to avoid the cost of upgrading servers and chip sets?

Cheers - #19