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Selling 4K projectors without 4K source is cheating the Ticket Buyers

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REDHKSC

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I aware two current 4K projectors vendors are trying to deploy their 4K seads into the D-Cinemas soil in ASIA but not having a 4K content no matter it comes from 4K Telecine or 4K Digital Camera like Dalsa or RED ?

I am strongly urge some investors to be aware of the 4K display investment deals. Do not trust the vendors if they only have 4K display !!!

Stewart
 
You can use me as a projector. I project at any resolution, invented or not. I can also fly, and I make a fab omelette.
 
REDHKSC said:
I aware two current 4K projectors vendors are trying to deploy their 4K seads into the D-Cinemas soil in ASIA but not having a 4K content no matter it comes from 4K Telecine or 4K Digital Camera like Dalsa or RED ?

I am strongly urge some investors to be aware of the 4K display investment deals. Do not trust the vendors if they only have 4K display !!!
Click to expand...

I guess nobody should buy HDTV monitors, since none of those actually yield full resolution either.

And, just for the record there is no such thing as a 4K telecine. Nor is there any current way to distribute 4K material other than a digital cinema package. And there are very few pictures actually being done that way.
 
mmost said:
And, just for the record there is no such thing as a 4K telecine.
Click to expand...

Sure there is. Cintel's Ditto is the lowest cost 4K data scanner, and at the other end of the scale Filmlight's Northlight2 scanner scans to 8K natively. There are others in between that scan 4K from 35mm negative. Negative is scanned to 4K for heavy VFX all the time, and in some cases even for a full 4K DI.

It will be happening more and more, and films will be delivered to 4K ready digital cinemas in full 4K resolution. Theatre operators are getting geared up, that's all.
 
The DCI spec requires all systems to be able to read 2K and 4K. Whether you opt for 2K or 4K projection is optional. What concerns me a bit is the specs for 'scope at 2K gets down around 850 pixels of V res, there's no anamorphic projection.
 
Michael Lindsay said:
Telecine (Video) and data scanning are seen as different... I think mmost is saying there is no 4k telecine not there is no 4k scanning...

regards

Michael

ps isn't the ditto a 3k scanner?
Click to expand...

This is the latest I got from Cintel regarding the Ditto.

I would like to take opportunity to bring you up to date with the latest developments on diTTo – our 2K/4K 16mm/35mm film scanner.

Firstly, please see the attached Press Release regarding exciting news on a partnership between Cintel and Kodak.

The partnership gives diTTo the unique benefit of incorporating Kodak Color Science. Every diTTo will soon be fully calibrated to Kodak Film Targets and every diTTo will have the option of Kodak’s Display Manager built-in.

Remember, diTTo is the only high resolution data scanner using the patented D/SCO technology. D/SCO (Dust/Scratch Concealment Option) uses technology based on the renowned OLIVER system to fix the majority of Dust and Scratches optically at the point of scanning – a “solid-state wet-gate” that does not require down-stream, costly licensing.

diTTo is the fastest pin registration scanner in the world outputting 4K scans at over 3fps and 2K up to 13fps.

diTTo includes a simple to use but powerful built-in User Interface that is fully equipped to import EDL’s and auto-DMIN calibrate from Keycode.

diTTo doesn’t use old fashioned gas-discharge light bulbs as a light source – it uses very high intensity, extremely stable and long life LED’s. (MTBF 100,000 Hours)

diTTo is being successfully used for Digital Intermediate motion picture scanning, Special FX, Commercials, Archive and Restoration at facilities around the world.

Check out our website for the latest case studies. www.cintel.co.uk/readnews.asp?ID=29

And diTTo is affordable and available today. There are a number of payment options available to allow you to own a diTTo and make money producing what one customer called “the best scans we have ever seen”.

But don’t take their word for it! We will happily produce comparative test scans for you - just send us the film.
 
Michael Lindsay said:
Telecine (Video) and data scanning are seen as different... I think mmost is saying there is no 4k telecine not there is no 4k scanning...
Click to expand...

Correct. A telecine is, by definition, a real time film to video transfer device. Therefore, it operates on video standards - i.e., up to 1920x1080. There is the Thomson Spirit Datacine, which operates internally at up to 4K, but when running as a telecine, outputs standard or high definition video. When run as a scanner, it outputs as a series of DPX files. All other scanners operate in less then real time and do not record to video formats.
 
REDHKSC said:
I aware two current 4K projectors vendors are trying to deploy their 4K seads into the D-Cinemas soil in ASIA but not having a 4K content no matter it comes from 4K Telecine or 4K Digital Camera like Dalsa or RED ?

I am strongly urge some investors to be aware of the 4K display investment deals. Do not trust the vendors if they only have 4K display !!!

Stewart
Click to expand...

Showing a 6 week old print with scratches, and splices is also cheating the ticket buyer.

Though a 2k image shown on a 4k projector isn't the same cheating.

When you watch content on your nice HD tv, and the source is 1280x720, are you still feeling cheated?

I don't think the audience will notice.
 
4K scans and DIs will be the new standard very soon.
 
Tom said:
4K scans and DIs will be the new standard very soon.
Click to expand...

That's easy to say, especially if you don't happen to work in the post production end of the industry. The problem is that it's not true. 4K scanning takes a lot more time, and 4K color correction is not even done interactively (every facility I know of uses 2K or even 1K proxies for "4K DI" work, and that includes both EFilm and Technicolor, the two largest DI vendors). The additional cost of 4K vs. 2K for DI work is very, very significant, and thus basically unaffordable to all but the largest studio pictures. This is not changing any time in the near future unless someone comes up with a 4K scanner that costs less than $100,000 and works in real time, and someone else comes up with a recorder that can shoot 4K at least twice as fast as any current recorder. Or unless clients decide it's worth the additional cost, which is even more unlikely. I don't know of any independent production that can seriously think about affording 4K based on current costs, particularly when most of them can't really afford 2K either. The cost of film output is much higher than most people here seem to realize. Stock and processing costs alone are often more than most independents seem to believe the entire DI process should be. If one wants to speculate on higher resolution finishing in the future, one should talk about non-film release formats, such as digital cinema. In that scenario, the concept of affordability changes considerably.
 
Hi '4k hub'

Did as you said and had a look...

Scanning System
3K Area Array CCD camera
Oversampled "super" 2K
4K output
Auto "D-MIN" Calibration
Super2K at 4 frames per second

Seems like its really 3k... The fact there isn't a 3k standard is probably why they offer (and this is very recent I think) the 4k output....

2k out of and old spirit looks great and that wasn't really 2k so I'm sure the ditto (a dedicated scanner albeit a cheap one) looks amazing!

regards

Michael

ps Cintel used to have a white paper on there web site that showed that you could compress 4k images quite hard and they held up in a way that HD could not... Maybe red read that paper?
 
'diTTo is the fastest pin registration scanner in the world outputting 4K scans at over 3fps and 2K up to 13fps'

that reads (if read quickly) as it scans at 4k... but you have to be careful with marketing material... (I accept I may be wrong and it is I miss-reading)

There are sound reasons to scan at higher resolution than the final file.. Hence Northlights... '8K CCD line arrays provide true alias-free 4K resolution'

Cintel argued as much when the announced the Ditto with its 'Oversampled "super" 2K'

regards

Michael
 
Michael Lindsay said:
'diTTo is the fastest pin registration scanner in the world outputting 4K scans at over 3fps and 2K up to 13fps'

that reads (if read quickly) as it scans at 4k... but you have to be careful with marketing material... (I accept I may be wrong and it is I miss-reading)

There are sound reasons to scan at higher resolution than the final file.. Hence Northlights... '8K CCD line arrays provide true alias-free 4K resolution'

Cintel argued as much when the announced the Ditto with its 'Oversampled "super" 2K'

regards

Michael
Click to expand...

Yeah, marketing materials are notoriously unreliable. We opted for the Northlight in the end, but Filmlight themselves have developed a business plan to put two Northlight2's in S.A., one here in Jo'burg and the other in Cape Town.

They are proposing running them as standalone scanning bureaus, independent of any one facility until the scanners are paid off, then they would run independently of Filmlight themselves.

We have a bit of a standoff with them at the moment because if we buy one, they are going to shelve thier plans, but I don't know whether it will be better to finance the thing ourselves and get the business from other facilities, or to pay per job to a independent bureau along with everyone else.

Either way it will be the first Northlight2 on the continent. I just remembered the advertised "4K output" of the Ditto from seeing it a while back and assumed it was at least native 4K, sorry, I was wrong.

We are developing a 4K production/post/vfx facility to be built here in Johannesburg that according to the numbers we have crunched, should give a U.S. or European 2K DI a run for it's money, and if you have shot RED and thus don't need scanning, our pricing to end client should work out substantially less than a typical 2K DI. We will be grading 4K real time, but at this stage only with 2K monitoring, and with one of our DI theatres having a 4K projector, we will be able to export a project to 4K at any stage from Scratch almost real-time, load it up onto the server and playout to client at full 4K for a preview within a few hours notice of thier arrival.

The trick for us is to convince people to outsource, and that may be tough, but the costs for us here in South Africa definitely favour our business model.

In the end, we want to be able to offer the "indie" low to medium budget producer the opportunity to DI at 4K whether they have shot 35mm or RED without breaking the bank. That may not be possible in the U.S., but it is possible in South Africa.

Time on the other hand, as was pointed out, is another issue. The two time killers are scanning and printing. If you shoot RED and don't need to scan, that cuts time and cost (i.e. you won't be helping to pay off our Northlight), you are still stuck with printing though, and at 4K that's neither fast nor cheap.
 
The Future

The Future

It is an idiotic statement to say that theaters should buy 2k projectors because right now all that is going to be available is 2k sourced material. I have seen 2k material projected on a 4k projector and I personally thought that it was superior to the same material on a 2k projector.

The biggest stumbling block for the adoption of digital projection is the necessity to future proof the projector to the most degree possible. 4k projectors would cover the needs of the theaters for at least 10 years.

My concern is 3-D digital projection; there are too many competing standards.
 
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