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Frustrated By No 4K Digital Cinema Projection in Commercial Theaters? Then READ T


Paul Korver

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I am admittedly a film geek who has been annoyed by the fact that I live in Hollywood, 4K projection has been available for a few years now... and yet are no theaters in LA that are screening in 4K (everything is 2K which is basically HD and I see that at home all the time). For instance, the recent release of "Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" was as you all konw shot RED camera and finished at 4K resolution and was distributed as a 4K digital film print. You'd think you'd be able to find a theater in LA that would be showing it at 4K. Think again.

 

The thing that's most frustrating is that there are a lot of 4K projectors out there (18,000 and counting according to Cioni). The problem is that if they were Sony SXRD 4K projectors which hit the market a few years back (but are sub-par to the new DLP 4K) then in order to do 3D they must be physically changed over to 3D mode. And theater owners / projectionists are too lazy to change them back to screen 4K content so they just keep them at 2K assuming the public won't care. This is the case with Pacific Theaters Culver City which boasts "Sony 4K Projection" but all they show is 2K content. I don't know about you guys but I'd rather see 4K than 2K 3D any day.

 

I know that this bothers a lot of you guys too (see this recent RED USER thread: http://www.reduser.net/forum/archive/index.php/t-69351.html)

 

If you'd like to see your movies in 4K then like this facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/TRUE.4K.CINEMA

 

Let's get the word out and try to influence the commercial cinemas to show 4K... or at least be honest when they do.

 

Best,

 

Paul

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Although it makes sense for cinemas to screen 4k in a HDTV world, there has been an expensive investment in 2k projection in recent years and theatre owners are unlikely to switch until they've made a return on their current investment. It took a lot of pushing for the change over to digital, so I suspect many sub flagship theatres won't be upgrading in the short term, especially since audience figures have dropped and they may be still paying off the old 2k projectors. Regardless of the owner's wish to upgrade to 4k, I imagine getting finance could be a problem in the current economic climate.

 

I don't 4k projection alone will have an impact on the figures, the studios will have change the films they're putting into production. If they don't have the stories that engage the audience neither 3D or 4k really matter, because there won't be won't be anyone there to see any difference.

Edited by Brian Drysdale
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The Apollo in Lower Regent Street where the BSC club screen showings have 4k Sony Projectors ,before Xmas i went to see a screening of mostly film school end of year films , they were all from Blu-ray pumped into the Sonys and i must say i was very ,very impressed with what i saw on a large screen .

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