Looking back on the year past - and ahead

Much like the Japanese man who survived 24 days in a mountain forest, Deluxe goes into a state of semi-hibernation over the holidays. Cinemas will still be showing Deluxe mastered and distributed digital films, not just in US but across the world, throughout Christmas and New Year. A small dedicated team of Santa's Little Helpers will still be manning their posts at Deluxe's Hollywood HQ. The call-centre will still be operating 24/7. But there will be well deserved rest too for my colleagues who have worked so hard this year.

Modesty prevents me from crowing about the achievements of my US colleagues. But having started from practically nothing in March, they have now surpassed everyone else in the
digital cinema mastering and distribution field. Hopefully the statistics will be published next year to show by just how much, but hats off to them for now anyway. This had little to do with technology and everything to do with all the terrific people that Deluxe has assembled. All of them deserve a special mention, but I will just single out Jim Whittlesey, the Isambard Kingdom Brunel of digital cinema.

Our achievements in UK/Europe have been more modest by comparison, but achievements they are nonetheless. We distributed the first Hollywood feature in JPEG2000 i Europe (Ice Age 2 in Denmark in April) and the DCP of 'Casino Royale' playing in Japan right now was made here in London, in the very room that I'm typing this from. We have even distributed films to the UK Film Council's DSN ('Life & Lyrics'). But for most of the year we have been gearing up for the big launch next year, when we expect the DSN to open up and for significant digital cinema installations to appear all over Europe.

I look forward to seeing you all and working together with many of you in 2007. Digital cinema is and remains a team effort, not just within Deluxe but for all of us.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holiday and a Great New Year to all of you.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly - European consultants roll out D-Cinema proposals

I was unable to attend the recent Europa Cinemas conference in Paris, where I was due to talk about the NORDIC project, due to family reasons. This is a shame, as it turned out to be a very interesting conference with a lot of important things said. Mike Gubbins did a terrific job of summarising the even in Screen International's November 24th issue, though sadly, Screen Daily does not appear to have that article available in electronic format. For one thing, the conference seems to have decided once and for all that different European digital cinema standards would not be a good idea and that the DCI specs/SMPTE standards are our best hope of having a unifying standard.

As the UK Film Council's Peter Buckingham was quoted in the article:

"For the smaller players [multiple standards] would be a nightmare and I cannot see how on God's earth that would benefit diversity."

Well put. Sadly, not everything else that got said and presented there was equally well informed or level headed. Two consultants reports dominated discussions; the previosuly published Daniel Goudineau's "FAREWELL TO FILM? What is at Stake in Digital Projection? and a specially commissioned report by Thomas Pintzke and Kim Ludolf Koch of Rinke Medien Consult. From what I can tell these overshadowed a presentation from the European Investment Bank by Patrick van Houdt.

The first of these (Goudineau) accepts DCI/SMPTE but wants additional capabilities for digital cinema systems (i.e. MPEG-2) and proposes that vulnerable cinemas be helped by nationalising the KDM (security key) handling, making it the responsibility (nay, exclusive legal obligation) of a government body, at least in France. If these are the 'ugly' years for digital cinema, then this proposal would in my personal opinion make it the downright unwatchable digital cinema years. Litterally. Because the screen would all too often be black.

The second is written in very bad English and I'm not convinced by the thinking behind it. On page 18 it assumes a fixed VPF of €800 per DCP. That's just over $1,047 at today's exchange rate. The author's are obviously assuming that the Hollywood distributors are goin to be exceptionally generous when it comes to help fund digital cinema in Europe. I'm also not convinced about their thinkingg about how digital cinema equipment will wear out.

This just leaves the EIB report. Whoever works it out (and it's not rocket science) has the best chance of dominating digital cinema deployment in Europe. It won't be Deluxe, because we've always said that we will not get involved in deployment. It makes life easier for us and means that we have no hidden agenda or gate keeper aspirations. Lastly, David Hancock of Screen Digesr did his usual brilliant job of providing the best overview of the digital cinema situation out there in the market today. Why didn't they hire him to write a report, I wonder. Though like I said, I wasn't there, so all I have is the Screen Adrticle and the reports on-line.

Is Australia copying UK Film Council's DSN?

While I have some big news about the UK Film Council's Digital Screen Network (DSN), I cannot reveal them just yet to protect my sources. So instead I'll share with you some news that has reached me from the other side of the world. From Australia, to be precise.

The Australians are setting up something called the Regional Digital Screen Network (RDSN), where digita projectors around the country (continenet?) will be used to promote the greater access to and distribution of Australian films. Here is a snippet from the article I heard about it from (thewest.com.au - Albany to get digital movies):

Albany will be one of eight towns around Australia to get a digital cinema in a bid to bring more Australian content to country audiences.

Among other benefits, the Regional Digital Screen Network will allow country audiences to watch films they would have previously had to wait several months to see.

The Australian Film Commission will oversee Australian programming for the network, including first-release movies, festival programs, documentaries, shorts, programs for schools and other local works from a digital content database.

The scheme will install digital cinema systems by early next year in eight independent venues in Albany, Port Augusta in South Australia, Yarram in Victoria, Katherine in the Northern Territory, Devonport in Tasmania, Hervey Bay in Queensland and Wagga Wagga and Singleton in New South Wales.

Does this remind you of something? It's a lot like the UK Film Council's Digital Screen Network, isn't it? Here is the original press release setting out the project: AFC’s Regional Digital Screen Network takes Australian films to more Australians. No word on whether this is set at a DCI level or even 2K (if you have insights - leave comment, or even crack a joke about Crocodile Dundee in digital).

Had I still been at Screen Digest, I would most likely have spotted this months ago, as indeed my colleagues have done already: Australia establishes regional digital centres, where they also note the "echoes" of the UKFC's DSN. Well done Charlotte and David.

Hollywood d-cinema titles for China dry up

There was great hope for digital cinema in China for many years. The country topped the Asia-Pacific league of digital installations; digital cinema was seen as a way of both beating piracy and showing more Hollywood films than the foreign film quote would otherwise allow and rolling out digital is always easier when you can write it into a Five Year Plan, as I joked. But based on the first day of CineAsia, things are apparently no longer going so well.

At least, that seems to be the message of this article from Screen Daily (China’s digital loop stymied by lack of US product):

The Chinese government started to develop the country’s first digital cinema circuit in 2002 with an initial investment of $25m. Local cinema owners then began to lease equipment - mostly from state-owned China Film Digital - which has been sourced from global digital cinema service suppliers such as Barco, Christie and Panasonic.
...
However, few digital cinemas in China are compliant with the Digital Cinema Initiative’s 2K technical standard announced in July 2005. Therefore the US studios have stopped distributing digital versions of their films in China even though such films bypass the country’s import quotas.
...
Barco and GDC Technology are business partners with Guangdong Dadi Cinemas and have supplied its six cinemas and 14 screens with 2K - 4K resolution equipment.

But as the US studios say there are not enough screens to make it worthwhile releasing any digital versions.

It appears that no major Hollywood film has been released since Dreamwork's Shark Tale in April 2005. That's over a year without a digital titles from Hollywood! And that's not the only bad news:

Separately from d-cinema expansion in China’s major cities, China’s Film Bureau is rolling out cheaper, lower-resolution e-cinema in smaller cities and rural villages.

Good news for small villages, as long as they don't want to watch Eragon or Bond, but not good if you want a global digital market based on one standard.

CineAsia 2007 moving to City of Sin and Vice

I did not make it to CineAsia this year, nor have I ever been to one, but if ever there was a time to go it, it will be next year. It was nothing to do with cinema or digital and everything to do with the location. Of the three major Sunshine conventions, spot the odd one out for locations: Las Vegas, Amsterdam and Beijing. That's right, Las Vegas has gambling and prostitution (though latter only outside Clarke County city limits), Amsterdam has drugs and prostitution, while in Beijing, such things are verboten even in the Forbidden City.

But as of next year CineAsia is moving to Macau, according to this article in the Hollywood Reporter ( CineAsia could move to South China resort ). Macau is well known for gambling, there might be prostitution, though I doubt that they are the sort of 'coffee shops' that you would find in Amsterdam. The official reason is that it will make travel for exhibitors from Taiwan easier, as well as impose less restrictions on the organisers than holding it in Beijing does. This year, apparently, a digital trailer that was supposed to be shown on the opening night was held up. But a contact also told me that mainland Chinese exhibitors aren't interested in going to Beijing, but want to get away from home for this type of convention. To quote from the article,

"For networking, we must go where the exhibitors want to go and I would bet that when they're making their December plans in October, they'd rather go to Macau than Beijing. It's more fun," said Rieder, CineAsia's Distributor of the Year."

Not that any of us at Deluxe go to ShoWest or CinemaExpo for 'fun'. It's hard work and lots of it, I will have you know. And before someone leaves a comment about ShowEast disproving my theory that these conferences are only located in areas of major vices, I have one word for you: golf.

In another article about shooting Chinese films in digital, we are told that:

Digital shoots may be increasingly, popular but digital distribution is still underperforming. The country's rush to a digital cinema future has slowed over the past year or so; there are fewer than 200 digital screens, and compliance with international standards is still a major issue.

Don't expect China's two-tier system of having a digital equivalent of 16mm projectors to go away any time soon.

Deja Vu all over again as Kinepolis rolls out digital opening night red carpet

It's been a while since I heard from my friends at Kinepolis, maybe because they are still trying to resolve with Technicolor and Dolby how to manage to circuit-wide switch-over to digital.

In the meatime, Kinepolis is hosting a real-time screening of celebrities walking down the red carpet for the opening of the Tony Scott thriller Deja Vu to cinemas in belgium and France. This is what the Hollywood Reporter article French filmgoers to get taste of red carpet had to say about it:

Footage of cast members arriving at the Kinepolis Le Chateau du Cinema in Lomme next Wednesday, will be beamed to more than 5,000 filmgoers in Mulhouse, Thionville, Metz, Nancy, Nimes, Brussels, Liege and Antwerp.
...
Next Wednesday's gala event will be introduced by a journalist from popular Gallic cinema magazine STUDIO and a bilingual hostess will interview the stars in English with a concurrent French broadcast via direct video transmission on Kinepolis' various screens, the company said.

It will only cost you eight euro to see this event in France and Belgium. For those of you getting a feeling of deja vu about it, yes, this has been done before.

Four years and two days earlier to the day (8 December 2002 to be precise) Regal CineMedia hosted a red carpet digital projection of the opening of Maid in Mahattan. You can cast your mind back with this article Regal CineMedia to feature 'Maid' premiere and this letter from Kurt Hall to someone complaining about adverts in cinemas.

For those of you looking for a more refined experience, the unstoppable Marc John has secured the live transmission of the Magic Flute from the New York Metropolitan Opera House to City Screens all across the UK. Read about it in the newsletter from the York Picturehouse.

The event was made possible bacuase Met Reaches Groundbreaking Agreements with Unions and Develops Range of Media Partnerships, a press release tells us. Would you know, National CineMedia (nee Regal CineMedia)and its Canadian partner, Cineplex Entertainmen, are also doing it (“Metropolitan Opera: Live in HD” Now Playing at a Theater Near You”). Tickets went on sale on Nov 18th in the States and I'm sure your local City Screen is also touting them now.

I know it will be great because not only has Julie Taymore directed it, but the wizard in the control booth is my friend the great Mark Schubin, who is now also available as a podcast. I look forward to his take on this.

Sweden falls for Unique's digital charms

My old colleagues at Unique Digital have done good, very good in fact, to have won the contract to digitise Swedish cinemas in what amounts to the largest digital screen advertising network in the world outside of the US. You can read the full press release on DCinemaToday.com (Unique Digital selected to digitise Swedish cinemas for advertising network):

Unique Digital Ltd. has won the contract to build and operate the digital screen advertising network for Sweden's SF Media, the largest cinema advertising company in the Nordic region. The deal was announced after an 18-month long evaluation of different digital advertising solution systems and providers, which was aimed at selecting the most advanced technical solution available. Unique's system will replace 35mm advertising in the cinemas that are part of SF Media's country-wide exhibitor partnership, with the entire digital network in operation by early 2007. Unique Digital is installing digital advertising in a total of 426 cinema screens. Together with its other installations across Europe the new deployment will make Unique Digital the world's largest independent digital screen advertising operator.

The number of screens may have grown to more than the 426 mentioned above, due to the near collapse of Sweden's second largest exhibitor (Astoria), where SF stepped in and bought/rescued many of the at-risk cinemas.

And a little bird tells me there is yet more news to come from Unique.

Night of the Long Knives at QuVis

News reaches me that there has been a major "reorganisation" at QuVis; the euphemism for a lot of good people getting the sack, in this case. It seems like some of my oldest and dearest colleagues, such as Jim Graham and Joel Schiffman, are no longer part of the new QuVis (www.quvis.com). This is sad because QuVis was a great pioneering company that did a lot of good, particularly in the early years of digital cinema. Obviously there is no press release heralding this change, so I go on the word of people with good contacts, though I have not spoken to anyone at QuVis.

Such a change will obviously have major impact on the UK Film Council's Digital Screen Network, now more than half way through its deployment. Does this make the upgrade to USB 2.0 interface more or less likely to come soon? If anything, I would think that Fiona et al at Arts Alliance would be digging around for Patrick Zuchetta's business card to see if he would be prepared to cut them a deal for 100 Doremi units, with a possible swap out of the old QuVis units down the line. I am not saying that this is what they should do. I am simply speculating about what they might want to do.

It is too soon to write off QuVis. The company still has a strong foothold in Korea, Japan and the UK, but they lost out in the early race in the USA to Doremi when AccessIT selected the French server maker for it's Christie/AIX network. Not upgrading fast enough to USB 2.0, lateness in implamenting watermarking and other issues meant that there many of Deluxe's clients were in no rush to supply content to their servers. It was common knowledge that there were too many server makers pushing into the small digital cinema market, but I had not anticipated that QuVis would the first to stumble. I do wish both QuVis and the ex-QuVis guys good luck.

Tis the season...for not much happening

Actually, the headline is not quite true, at least not for Deluxe Digital Cinema Europe (DDCE). We are currently what I would describe as out 'swan' mode, which is that we appear to glide along slowly and effortlessly on the surface, while below, there is furious paddling going on.

Right now I'm sitting in between two stacks of boxes (hard drives from WD and casings from Addonics) and I have even screwed together a few myself. They will either be the founding cornerstone of DDCE, or the ones that fall aprt first as we realise that my strength was never electronic assembly. But I do like to get stuck in.

Congratulations to our friends at Sony Pictures Entertainment as Casino Royale has its royal gala opening tonight in London and will then be screening in hundreds of US cinemas later this week. Having seen bits of it as we've done some work on it, I strongly urge you all to see it. It looks absolutely terrific.

And if it comes down to a fight between Borat and Bond at the box office this weekend, who will win? Why, it's Deluxe, as our US colleagues distributed both. I'm looking forwards to when we will shortly be doing it too.

But now back to furious paddling.

Happy Halloween - a treat for you all

This Halloween, why not treat yourselves to some classic horror films, available to download for FREE and LEGALLY at the PublicDomainTorrents.com site.

Yes, the copyright on these films has lapsed so check out the 'Horror' section of Public Domains Torrents, where you can download and enjoy classics such as Driller Killer, Carnival Of Souls, The Brain That Wouldn’t Die, The Vampire Bat, Nosferatu, and Night of the Living Dead (the original, not the Bunny re-make below) plus many more in Divx, iPod or PSP format.

And as always, don't download copyrighted films - or the MPAA will come and get you!

Post-ShowEast news summary

No sooner is ShowEast over then a slew of news appears in both US and Europe, which I thought could be worth drawing you attention to.

My colleagues at Screen Digest have published a report that I strongly urge you to check out. This came a day after another digital cinema report from a consultancy that I can't say has ever impressed me (methodology, what methodology?). The Screen Digest report is focused on the very clever Digital Cimema Conversion Index. The Hollywood Reporter was so impressed that it devoted an entire article to it. New system advised for digital theater. In other European digital cinema news European film agencies call for speedy action on digital cinema, according to Screen International. I agree that action is called for but the article itself does not seem to clear on precisely what action should be taken.

Meanwhile back in the US there is certainty of sorts now that the Digital Cinema Lab is re-locating from the Pacific Theater. USC d-cinema initiative set for new digs, says the Hollywood Reporter. It's the end of a short but important era in the history of digital cinema and I was glad to hear that Charles Swartz was able to attend the recent 2K-4K demonstration. He , plus Thomas MacCalla and Paul made that place what it was. I wonder if Jack Warner's ghost will rest more peacefully with all the digital equipment gone. Finally, Sony feel they are on a 4K roll after the recent tests went well and the showcase in Orlando was positively received. 4K camera screened by Sony an article in Hollywood Reporter tells me that then goes into detail about how well it will look with the 4K projector which, "met or far exceeded every Digital Cinema Initiatives specification from color and contrast to resolution," the article (or Sony) claims.

Digital Fear and Loathing in Orlando

I was not able to make it to ShowEast this year as there was simply too much going on back in Europe to take time out. Things are storming ahead, I am feeling very optimistic, we got an AMAZING price on hard drives, plus there is some exciting news to come from Norway/NORDIC.

However, there has been some fireworks in Orlando and fortunatelly Variety was there to capture the moment. Apparently our friends at Technicolor got beat up pretty badly on the digital cinema panel, at least as recounted in the Hollywood Reporter article "Panel: Cooperation key to digital future" where it says:

Technicolor president of theatrical services Joe Berchtold, who is launching a beta digital program in theaters, parried with competitor Chuck Goldwater, president of digital theater provider AccessIT Media Services Group, over the failure rate of current digital projection.

"Up to 5% of digital screens have problems where you miss one or more show a day," said Berchtold, though Goldwater and others disputed that number.

20th Century Fox senior vp and general sales manager Chris Aronson said his company had a 99.5% success rate, and Rave Motion Pictures CEO Tom Stephenson cited a 1% failure rate.

Berchtold added that digital cinema needed to become less complex and that there needed to be more accountability from suppliers.

"We are accountable," Goldwater said. "We started before everyone else, which is why we are where we are today. We began with no conflicts and no legacy in the business we're seeking."

Ouch! Once again I'm glad we at Deluxe decided not to roll-out digital equipment, not least as our help line is nevertheless sorting out equipment and integrator problems in cinemas that have nothing to do with the DCPs we make and send out.

In other news, there were details on the Beowulf digital 3D screening (An epic 3-D bow for 'Beowulf' - THR; 'Beowulf' gets 3-D bigscreen bow - Variety) and news about how well Sony's SXRD performed in the test with the DLP 2K, which resulted in a both a press release (Sony SXRD 4K Technology Gains Major Studio Support Following Industry Technical Assessment) and an article (Sony 4K projector gets go-ahead from Hollywood), though no sign of Disney or Universal joining the 4K party still yet. All this AND Rocky Balboa. But like I said I did manage to get a top deal on hard drives in the meantime.

Exclusive view of DFS's Perivale centre

Feast you eyes on this! Here is a look at DFS's facility for prints out in Perivale. It reminds me of the last scene in Indiana Jones, though that was achieved with false perspective canvass scenery. This is the real thing.


This gives you a glimpse of the industrial efficiency with which new prints are handled. But like I said before, the real genius is not renting a large hangar and filling it with prints, but the quality of service, physical and electronic infrastructure that no photo will do justice.


There is a rumour that Perivale was chosen because it was a sufficient distance from central London, so that if the Luftwaffe - who knew that tons and tons of highly flamable nitrate prints were stored here - bombed it, there would not be the mother of all firestorms created as a result. It survived the war undamaged.

Turning a hangar into a digital hub - quite easy!

It's been a while since I provided an update of my digital cinema activities here at Deluxe and frankly, its the routine of it all that keeps me from doing it more regularly. Every day is a variation of the routine formula of meetings with distributors and others, working on staffing and building issues, installing and testing technology, planning future feature releases and so on. Of course, we do have 'Alcazar' keeping us extremely busy at the moment, but that is so top secret that I cannot write anything about it. Sorry. But you WILL like it.

Instead I will share with you my first trip to the Deluxe ETS distribution facility in Perivale, at the western outskirts of London, out towards Heathrow airport. I had already visited the DFS (Deluxe Film Services) facility in Van Nuys in Los Angeles that handles both 35mm and digital, so I knew roughly what to expect. I did not bring a camera, so instead make do with a photo of the famous Hoover building (now a Tesco supermarket inside), which our facility is located behind.


The Deluxe ETS handles over 100,000 prints per year for almost every single UK & IE distributor. No wonder they are situated in an aircraft hangar size building with the equivalent of four floors of 35mm print on pallets stacked high. There's half a wall full of just one particular boy wizard's latest celluloid outing sitting in storage. The efficiency is breathtaking and anyone who thinks that simply because it is 35mm it is all analogue is wrong. They have an ingenious software Web tool for cataloguing and tracking every single film print anywhere in the UK. Pulling up an example at random, I can exclusively reveal that the 35mm copy of "Superman I" sat in storage between 2001 and 2006 and I even know which two cinemas had it in those years, the dates and more, though it's too confidential for me to reveal anything further.

This is the basis on which Deluxe Digital Cinema Europe's distribution services will be built. Why re-invent the wheel when there is a fully functioning film distribution service that nearly everyone is using already? My task is thus made that much easier thanks to the hard work and development that Nigel, Chris and everyone at ETS had already been doing for years.

Of course, substituting 35mm film prints for hard drive is not a complete one-for-one, which is where service and support (primarily the call centre) comes into play. But again, Perivale is already ready for this expansion, though I'd rather invite you over and show you around once it's all set up, rather than to bore you with the details here.

Ulimately this is the USP of DDCE. The people you have booked film copies replacation with before (Deluxe), who do the subtitles and versioning for you (Capital FX) and who make sure that it gets sent out and lets you track it in real time (Deluxe ETS) are the same people who will do it for you in digital. Not that we are complacent about it, far from it, we just want to make this a seamless transition rather than a new set of headaches.

BARCO 6th BAFTA Digital Cinema event

Doremi (sponsors of the event)

Doremi have a staggering 90 per cent market share of JPEG2000 server market, having been "first to market" in July 2005 with player and mastering system. Herve goes into technical detail. He goes into details about Mastering and I realize that my presentation will be a breeze because I will only have to summarize what all the speakers before me have said. DMS-2000 specification (read it on their website).

Over 40 films have been mastered using the Doremi, including several European films. One is Norwegian - Uro, the first in Scandinavia - which will be screened here and was also be showing in the NORDIC project's partner cinemas in Norway. Details about Paris Je T'Aime. Standard Powerpoint.

UIP - David Kerr

"A man who can trace his roots back to the projection room," we are told. What do we need? Why do we need it? What if we don't get it? Those are his three Questions. Q1A - Conformed elements, complete elements, creastive elements. Talks about problems and costs with localizing title and insert sequences. Q2A - Release dates in over 50 countries, multiple versions and making/shipping 10,000 prints. What if they don't get it - the consequences are too horrible to recount here.

So what should UIP do for digital? Set up infrastructure, get post up to speed on what's required, educate film makers. "Final question - is the bar open yet? If so, mine's a pint." Short and straightforward presentation. Raises questions and provokes thought, rathen then lecturing the audience. Good.

Fraunhofer

Talks about specifications, standardization and interoperability. Background to DCI and FFA specifications provided. Gives detailed diagram of workflow. Animated diagram of an ideal distribution workflow - a little neater than my real world one. Tools and Standards. This presentation would have worked better as a handout. Testprocedures and Interoperability test for digital cinema. DCI / Fraunhofer Compliance Test Proceedure. EDCF test project with NORDIC and CST. Also lists their developments and software tools.

Ascent

Paul talks about DI and the workflow to digital cinema. Too much graphs and text to summarize. Again, would have worked better as a hand out.

Éclair

"Paul has just said everything we need to say," Gwendal jokes. He is much to humble. They started same time as EFILM in US and were the first to create DCPs of European films - corrects himself - "continental films." 'In JPEG2000', I'm guessing he should add, unless you discount XDC's MPEG efforts. Talks about their project in Denmark. Outlines their experience, closely linked to Doremi. Talks about the experience of working on Paris Je T'Aime, which he calls the first European film to play at the Entertainment Technology Centre (hang on, didn't March of the Penguins and Harry Potter both play at the DCL? Maybe I'm nitpicking the definition of "European". Let's agree it's the first foreign language title to do so.). Time for creating 4K DCP of Paris was 10 days, same as for Da Vinci Code at Deluxe, as Gwendal quotes Jim Whittlesey on.

Talks about the problem of the fragmented European market. Good speech from Gwendal but presentation very heavy on text. I'm tempted to tell him that he is too good to need it, but going cold turkey on Powerpoint has to be an individual's choise. (Yes, I've now fully signed up to Tufte's anti-PPT movement).

HDDC

Peter Wilson talks about the business model of digital cinema mastering. Goes into issues such as active picture selection. Too technical for me, I'm afraid, and I'm also mentally running through my presentation in my head at this stage to fully focus.

Deluxe

I do my presentation as a show-and-tell, as it is Friday and also because I'm the last thing standing between the audience and the Doremi sponsored beer and nibbles. I use just one PDF image illustrating the workflow at Deluxe and the industry in general.

A look at some recent digital cinema news

As one of Lasse Svanberg's great achievements was to be founder, editor and writer for the magazine Teknik & Människa (Technology & Man), I thought that the most fitting tribute would be for me to get on with relaying news in the digital cinema world. Lasse is also remembered on the homepage of the Swedish Film Institute (in Swedish) and I'm sure the EDCF will follow soon.

I read in the Hollywood Reporter that Deluxe's sister company Panavision has just bought digital camera rental company Plus 8 Digital ("Panavision zooms in on Plus 8"). It seems like a smart move, though I don't know what if any impact or synergies it will have with Deluxe. We might have security guards employed by a MacAndrews & Forbes company (Allied Barton Security Services), but we don't get any discount on Revlon cosmetics.

There's been a few interesting developments, not least AccessIT's announcement that Christie/AIX has now installed its 1,000th digital cinema system. Congratulations and hats off to Chuck, Bud, Dave and all our other friends for this historic milestone and hope to see them rolling out in Europe as well soon, now that they are 1/4 of the way to achieving their US goal.

In-Three has been granted three new patents for their Dimensionalization(tm) process. The press release does not seem to have been put up on their website, so here is the first paragraph from it:

In-Three, Inc. is very pleased to announce that it has just been granted 3 additional patents covering its proprietary 2D to 3D conversion technology. In-Three’s unique 2D to 3D conversion process, called Dimensionalization®, can convert any full-length motion picture into high-quality 3D regardless of the age or origination of the image source. Using its Dimensionalization® process In-Three can convert any 2D image content into fully authentic and believable 3D, whether it was derived from live photographic action, cell animation, CGI animation, computer effects, in color or black & white, and is fully resolution independent.

20th Centry Fox, always one of the most new thinking studios, is setting up a distribution operation for Christian-themed films. An article called "20th Century Fox wooing faith crowd" pokes fun at the fact that this is the same studio that brought you "Temptation Island" but ends by noting that Carmike expects to have converted 2,200 of its 2,400 cinema screens by this time next year, so Deluxe might very well be supplying these films as well for Fox in digital before too long.

And finally I would end with a recomended reading from Film Journal International, where the always-readable Andreas Fuchs looks at how the World Cup played out in digital cinemas across the globe, called "The FIFA Code - Fan Celebrate World Cup at the Movies." (The fact that I and Unique Digital are mentioned in it in no way swayed me to recommend and praise this piece.)

If I get time will upload a review of the "Paris Je T'Aim" digital demonstration that I have neglected to complete for over two weeks now.

In Memoriam: Lasse Svanberg (1937-2006)

My colleague, friend and mentor Lasse Svanberg died last night after a long battle with cancer. He did more than anyone else to educate and bring digital cinema to the forefront of the Swedish film and cinema industry's mind, as well as being a major force for unifying the many voices and views of Europe when it comes to preparing for the digital future. A promised land that he helped lead us to but was destined not to enter himself. I will miss him terribly, miss arguing with him, miss sitting through his thoughtprovoking if sometimes repetitive overhead slide presentations (he never succumbed to PowerPoint), miss his raspy voice and above all miss how he combined an understanding of cinema as an art with a firm grasp of tecnology, but never let either overshadowed by his humanity and warmth.

Jag kommer att sakna dig enormt, Lasse, och jag är ledsen att jag inte fick tillfälle att ta farväl av dig och säga hur mycket du har betytt för mig.

SI DC conference: Peter Wilson chairs panel on DCI compliance

Talks about whether DCI specifications would work in a "fair" way for Europe. He gives background to DCI, SMPTE and Fraunhofer. One bullet point reads: "Are you willing to pay for the DCI compliance police and if so, how much?". This should be an interesting panel.

Etienne: we don't want a two speed cinema in France, so CST will probably use the DCI specification.

Sven Andersen, gives overview of discussions underway in Germany. Exhibitors have hit the breaks on deployment, wanting distributors to pay for it all. German screens can't afford 'DCI screens', at least at €80,000 each. Maybe they would go for a sub-set of DCI.

Rickard Gramfors: shares the Swedish experience, ending with an impassioned plea not to let Internet piracy destroy a whole generation when it comes to forming the habit of going to the cinema.

Dave Monk: Can you afford NOT be DCI compliant. Rickard points out that there has been no leakage from their digital network. Kevin Wakeford asks "what is affordable?". Sven says €30K-40K is discussed in Germany. Rickard says that they rent from XDC, so similar price point to that. Etienne says it should be same as 35mm projector.

Conclusion: small exhibitors would like to be DCI-compliant but can't afford it.

SI DC conf: The French Connection

No, not a digitally re-mastered version of the Gene Hackman classic but the presentation from CNfilms by Etienne Traisnell on D-Cinema roll-out in France. Gives overview of cinema situation in France. Mentions Daniel goudineau's report that might or might not decide roll-out in France: stake of Universality, (ransparancy and Solidarity. Projector minimum 2K. Server JPEG2000 and MPEG2 (!!) "Recommendation: do not exclude any system but encourage polyvalance." (I am not familiar with that word, but guessing it means plurality).

Recommends that by 2009 all French films be made available for digital distribution. Outlines various strategic choises for technology. I'm still reeling from the fact that it seems France appears to be endorsing MPEG2 as an alternative to JPEG2000 for feature films. Talks about economic choices: European is leasing (XDC), public funding (UKFC) or European cinema subsidy, vs. US VPF model. "Reinforced selective support for the most vulnerable theatres."

SI DC conf: Afternoon business panel

Chuck Goldwater (AccessIT), Tom Cotton (Technicolor), Kevin Wakeford (Sony), Paul Collard (Technicolor).

Chuck reviews what Christie/AIX has been doing. Lots! LOTS! From digital roll out to faith-based movies for Fox. Discusses options for rolling out internationally. Doesn't mention any territories specifically. Paul - Ascent are global content service provider, he tells us. Doesn't give practical examples of experience in this field (or mention that Ascent have a 'For Sale' sign on its front lawn), but Paul is a nice guy and I've always had a lot of respect for him. Tom talks about three main areas: roll out, content preparation and screen advertising solution (in the US). His role is mainly in the roll out. Kevin represents manufacturing arm of Sony, he makes clear, not Sony Pictures.

Q from Mike - why is Europe lagging and what are the problems. Paul: in one word, "fragmentation". Mike semi-baited Chuck with a question about US-centric approaches to digital conversions in Europe. Chuck gives a good reply that each country needs its own approach. Tom, "we're not trying to rail road anything through." It will take more time to move in Europe, adressing specificities of the European market. Kevin: everyone is looking to economies of scale for driving prices down, hence need for a single standard.

Tom: we've been testing all the equipment since January in a controlled environment, now moving it into beta phase in the US (but says nothing about Europe or Kinepolis deal). Paul talks about small and independent cinemas being sqieezed in the digital future, citing Anders Gertsen's statistics on a small number of cinemas accounting for 90-95 per cent of box occfice revenue. Chuck talks about dealing with problems and communicating with exhibitors. Tom: our model doesn't exclude anyone. Paul: we need to reduce the unpredictability of the process. Kevin, stressing the importance of testing.

Q from GE Capital points out that financial markets have been under writing the roll out, based primarily on cash flow, which won't be the same in Europe. Tom thinks that it's still doable. Chuck: it's not an impediment but another issue in the pay-for-play model. Kevin talks about the importance of 4K, particularly in the long term.

Jason Powers (Dolby) asks about the significance of the Kinepolis announcement of converting all of its cinemas. Tom thinks that this is a good move.

SI DC conf; Steve Perrin (UK Film Council)

Overview and update of Digital Screen Network. 88 installations in place. Very few technical problems. Retrofitting of Cine-link 2, JPEG2000 completed and makes committment to upgrades of watermarking and USB 2.0 ingest when they become available. Over 30 niche films distributed in DSN, compared to 6 "Hollywood films" played so far (mainly Disney).

Discusses indicators of success to date. Too early to say if audiences have grown. Issue is 'not enough screens'. Problem is not enough films, ie can't be moved between different screens in a multiplex as usually only one screen is digital. Talks about problems with improperly graded films (at least two high profile releases did not go ahead because of this).

Discusses barriers to be overcome, such as establishment of standards and need for cost of hardware to come down further. Could DSN be a publicly funded model for Europe? Stresses that DSN model is "aimed at world film, rather than just local productions." Stresses that ultimately it is about audiences rather than technology.

Concludes a trio of very good presentations. In terms of use of Powerpoint (my recent pet peeve) I rate Julian's the highest, though David's had lots of useful statistics that could not have been presented any other way other than maybe as a hand out (or buy the report!), while Steve is a such a good (nay, terrific) speaker that he really didn't need the ppt.

SI DC conf: David Kerr (UIP)

David talks about the international release of M:I:III. Decision to release it in digital took place just three weeks before the opening date. MPEG release but only to 2K. (Why not JPEG?). 106 screens in 11 countries/versions. Previous films released in digital was Shrek 2, shark Tale and Madagascar.

Apparently there were technical compatibility problems that forced Technicolor to drop the JPEG2000 version (aha, that's why). There were also issues with renewing keys. Doing the key re-generation in Los Angeles meant that they lost half a day for Europe. Cost them more to do it digitally and it did not save them any money.

Conclusion: "Production [of DCPs] cannot take place in Los Angeles, but must take place in Europe and regionally." (Amen to that - come to Deluxe Digital Cinema Europe!!). Slide: "The End (see I told you it would be quick)". Anders Gertsen asks about the re-use of hard drives. Yes, there is a process in place. Q from Mike Gubbins: will it change release patterns? Not just yet it seems.

SI DC conf: Tim Richards (Vue)

Vue have 30 digital cinema installations, mainly thanks to UKFC's DSN. Lists lots of questions facing the industry. Bollywood productions exceeded UK productions this year! Should Vue follow NCM model, go with third party or go it alone? Lists barriers to entry from a very practical perspective and demonstrating good understanding of the issues.

Discusses recent Vue initiatives and these range from music and sports to corporate and gaming, as well as digital 3-D. "Cinema auditorium is perfect sound stage, with a screen in front of it." Queen HD cinema release with the band members present, with sound re-mixed for cinema. "Massive occupancy rates.".Green Day, Morrisey and Pink Floyd plus others lined up. Impressive trials of gaming. Over 9,000 admits for the free World Cup screenings this summer. New products launches, which has a "promising future". 3-D; Chicken Little and Monster House 3-D, with Tim Burton's A Nightmare Before Christmas lined up next. Word-of-mouth has strong effect on long-term (week three and four) attendance for 3-D screenings.

Good powerpoint in terms of use of images, only conclusion heavy on text.

Screen Int'l DC Conference; David Hancock (Screen Digest)

David jokes about always being the second speaker after the leynote and delivering numbers, research and overview after the flashier presentation.

Headline figures on digital cinema growth. 1,474 digital screens 1H 2006, Sept is closer 1,800. (Same figures as IBC I'm guessing.) 264 per cent growth, 84 per cent J2K screens. Echoes Karagosian's point that we are still in the "early phase" with US growth down to spike of one large exhibitor. Growth 1H05 to 1H06 US was 687.8%, but Korea close behind. Seoul (52) tops London (25) for cities with most installations.

Debate "not as far advanced" in Europe as in US. Policy makers starting to wake up to what DC might mean. However, "worrying quietness" about what DC might mean. Presents Digital Cinema Conversion Index. US and UK tops, while Norway and Finland languish near the bottom, though David highlights the "X Factor" of the Norwegian gov't's initiative in the digital cinema field. Very interesting explanation of the breakdown of factors and how they quantify factors. "Single broad model may work I as long as differentiated by market." Also, gov't intervention may be required.

David's slides appear to have been screwed up as lines drop off the page and numbers overlap. Discusses the potential role of government in digital cinema roll out. Conclusion; "Questions remain!!" but get started now.

Also a very good presentation. Even better than the IBC presentation he gave a few weeks ago. Sets the bar high the rest of today's presentations and panels.

Screen Int'l DC Conference - Julian Levin keynote

Chair Mike Gubbins is running late because of delayed train so we launch straight into Julian's keynote.

Juliam opens by talking about the importance of one standard. "Organized chaos" is best description of current state and will stay that way for 12 months, he says. Jiulian gives overview of digital cinema workflow, stressing role of KDMs. Talks about the role and achievments of DCI. (I'm hoping we will get on to Fox soon and not be shy about how they have pioneered the release of JPEG2000 DCPs in Europe more than any other studio to date). Stresses that added capabilities such as HD and MPEG are not precluded.

Now talks about VPF. Gives a theoretical example of how VPF could pay off an installation in 9 years. Talks about third-party entities (Christie/AIX and Technicolor) and exhibitors (Rave, NCM and others), dicussions going on in Europe (no deals just yet) but says that VPF may not be around forever. Gives a statistical example from Screen Digest report (go David and Charlotte!).

Now on to 'Challenges'. Fraunhofer and the issue of compliance training and requirements. Beta testing underway in US but need for it in Europe too, particularly re; subtitling. VPF model will vary depending on the territory. "Digital cinema is the future...and the future is now." - finishing slide.

Q&A covering security/IP theft ("piracy"), exhibitor contributions, 35mm print recycling and how it affects VPF, the challenge from home entertainment, Fox support of JPEG2000 installations, and more.

Excellent speech with detailed overview of the entire digital cinema landscape. The conference is off to a good start!

Post-IBC analysis, EDCF's new president and more exciting d-cinema news

Apologies for not getting around to writing any kind of summary of the digital cinema events at IBC sooner as there's been a lot to get on with immediately afterwards internally.

In my view, this was the year that IBC truly became a digital cinema event that was not to be missed. While there had been many previous years with good session, this was the first time that everything was so consistently good as to make it a definitive must-attend event.

A large part of the credit goes to the organisers for pulling together a great selection of speakers in a very good mix of panels. Hats off to Dave Monk in particular, the panel chairs and everyone who worked hard behind the scenes. There were lots of worthwhile events showcasing everything from digital stereoscopic cinema (SPE's "Monster House", with lines literally forming around the block) to various 4K equipment demos. Hats off here to Phil White, Rex Beckett and everyone in the projection booth. There were also plenty of interesting digital cinema-related stands to visit and meetings to be had on the IBC show floor.

Without taking anything away from the organisers, though, it could also be that digital cinema is maturing as an industry, though it is still in its starting blocks. (Perhaps we should see everything that went on before as the training and warm-up for the main event, i.e. something that should not be skipped over, even though to the un-initiated outsider it's a bore to wait for the race to get underway.) I'm not saying that everything was perfect or that everyone got everything right - I know one colleague who will now never forget that DCM stands for 'Digital Cinema Master' and not 'Digital Cinema Material' - but even the best of events should have scope for improvement, and this year IBC set the bar fairly high for itself next year based on the really good quality of this years conference and show.

One of the good elements of IBC as the EDCF meetings. I know that there were a few raised eyebrows when it was announced that John Wilkinson of the CEA was replacing Ase Kleveland as President of the EDCF. But John more than delivered in what was an inaugural presentation that mixed the right level of insight, humour and realisation of what is needed for the EDCF to move ahead. Having the head of a cinema industry association leading the EDCF is a very important step in engaging the exhibitor community and it turns out that it being Mr Wilkinson he understands the EDCF and the priorities it should have (such as engaging at the right level with Brussels). So hats off to him and the EDCF board too. (Remember, I wore both a Deluxe hat and a NORDIC hat at IBC, so I've got plenty of hats to raise). It wasn't fireworks, but that's not what the EDCF needs right now, rather quiet determination to make it work in this critical phase.

I don't want to get too navel gazing about the blog, but as many of your took the time to offer comments, feedback and constructive criticisms, it's only fair that I acknowledge it here. I will be the first to put my hand up and say that I have not found the right tone for it yet. I know what it isn't (E-Cinema Alert Mark II), but I'm still not 100% sure what it is. A way to keep you informed about the digital cinema industry, including what Deluxe is doing in it, is the best description I can think of.

Some said I wrote too much or had comments that were slightly too barbed or just not funny. Perhaps. But having commented on this industry since 1999 I have more respect for everyone still hanging in there than you might guess and even admire the achievements of our would-be competitors. (Cue harp playing and a golden halo appearing over the head of yours truly).

On the specific charge that I shouldn't be the first to throw stone, particularly correcting other people's Powerpoint spelling errors when my own blog postings are littered with them too. Fair 'nuff, up to a point. I type out these in a rush, often on a tiny Blackberry keyboard in dimly lit spaces, as opposed to having prepared them in advance and shown it several times at international conferences. And if you must get a name wrong, it's particularly unfortunate if it happens to be that of one of the greatest and most famous European directors alive and working today. But enough of a solipsistic introspective self-critique.

Interesting news reaches us from AccessIT, which has made three senior appointments as the company continues its break-neck growth. "ACCESSITÂ’S CHRISTIE/AIX UNIT ANNOUNCES THREE EXECUTIVE HIRES" Chuck Goldwater is absolutely right when he says that "Christie/AIX is the clear leader in the deployment of digital cinema in the United States" and I'm glad I got a chance to catch up with him at IBC (you too can meet all Digital Cinema All-Stars at next year's IBC, but book now if you want to find an affordable hotel!). All three executives have solid groundings and I hope to meet them myself when I'm in Los Angeles next. It might be worth mentioning that Deluxe and AccessIT have a very good working relationship in the US, where Deluxe has supplied their growing chain of installations with more films in digital than anyone else, thanks to the digital push of our partner studios. If/when AccessIT roll out in Europe, which I am sure they will do, I hope that we too in Deluxe Digital Cinema Europe (DDCE) will get to extend that co-operation to our shores. See managed to work a relevant plug for Deluxe into that piece of news. I'm learning, I'm learning.

IBC DCD live blog: fourth session (misc)

We get to see the 'History of Digital Cinema' reel put together by the ETC.

Thomas Hoegh (Arts Alliance) - Gives what comes across as the afternoon keynote, but it's the same one I've heard before. Given that he has delivered it several times at previous events, I'm surprised that it is not more polished. Also, someone should point out that in the slide where he shows the programming of a digital multiplex of the future (the one where a film called "Gay Western" seems to play a lot) that several of the screenings are marked as "New Almoldovar". As Steve Perrin, who uses the director of 'Volver' a lot as an example, could tell him, there is only one 'L' in the Spanish director Pedro Almodovar's surname.

Thomas apologises for re-using the "Zone of Contention". Says "Harry Potter" films will grow but mediocre films will get squeezed out. I'm not sure about the tact of using the latest Adam Sandler film as an example of the latter when Al Barton is in the audience and it was SPE that released "Click". Now he talks about turning a Henrik Ibsen poem into a conceptual show in Japan. People are scratching their heads at the digital cinema relevance of this. Apparently digital projectors were used. Small Quicktime file shown. Five swirling vortexes on the screen and what sounds like an angry Japanese voice on the soundtrack. This goes on for the better part of a minute. Very strange. Then it's over. He said he would talk more about the other Norwegian project, but it was just the slide at the start. Ho-hum.

Kevin Wakeford (Sony Europe) - Will talk about the role and view of Sony and show "Poseidon" clip. With Danish subtitles. No powerpoint (well done!) and good historical prediction. Must ask him for a copy of it. Lists "Four reasons for 4K" - Emotional, Quality, Experience and Financial (I think. Sorry. I'm typing notes from previous session due to Vodafone problems with instant e-mail). We watch the "Poseidon" clip. Looks good, though I'm too far back to make out any detail. But why are clips heavy on CG footage done in 2K used so often for presentations of 4K? It was the same with the "I, Robot" clip that now appears to have been retired.

Neil Feldman (In-Three) - Good presentation on Dimensionalization (important note, this is a trade marked In-Three term, although the likes of James Cameron apparently uses it freely as a generic verb). He stresses that their process does not involve planes (layers) as they are in control of every aspect of the image. Calls the result "surround sound for the eyes" rather than gimmicky theme-park ride or headache-inducing Imax-like experience. Good presentation. Can't keep up with the typing. Stresses that their content works both with active glasses and passive (polarized) glasses. Small sop to Sony - 3D has to be part of the package. Calls it the 'killer application' of digital cinema.

Andrew Robinson (Harkness Hall) - Why screen technology matters, talk. Light loss and issue both for active and passive 3D. Can be as much as 50%. Explains each method. "Passive systems are clearly preferred rout in cinemas." Silver screen considerations. More inclined to hot spot and narrower viewing angle (25-30 degrees). Still thinks that silver screen is the way forward.

Matt Cowan (Real D) - talks about how much more "Chicken little" and "Monster house" earned in 3D. Talks about Real-D deployments. Lists future 3D films. Apparently there is rumours of a U2 concert in 3D (Bono - coming at you!!) He explains the technology behind the system. Second eye apparently only requires 15% extra bandwidth. Glasses are circular polarized for no ghosting. Lots of content promised for demo, Meet the Robinsons trailer will be only new one for me. Thanks given to Christie, QuVis and Harkness Hall.

IBC DCD live-blog - session three (business plans)

Steve Perrin (UK Film Council) - We're here to talk film, not technology. Two issues - standards (DCI is not end but beginning of end) and who's going to pay.

Chuck Goldwater (AccessIT) - newly promoted, Chuck refreshingly did not claim "DCI compliance" (he is much too smart, not least having been Mr DCI) but "designed to conform to the DCI Technical Specification." Gives overview of their US exhibitor and distributor deals. From 2300 screen chains to 8 screen single multiplexes. Interestingly they are now also signing up independents on the distributor side. "Who will pay?" EVERYONE - in proportion to benefits. Stressed that there is no luxury of learning on the job any more. Finishes with three humble observations, last of which is - take the first step, the water is getting warmer.

Denise Hsu (Technicolor) - Realises that people are not in the mood for another TDC hard sell. Instead has several slides about print issues and total cost of ownership for diggtal cinema, done in the sort of text-heavy style that Edward Tufte rightly critisizes for burrying important information and being unreadable. I'm sorry to say that she then she goes back into hard sell mode. Apparently Technicolor is the "only company that can handle both 35mm print and digital distribution." Riiiiiiiight...... At least she didn't re-use the slide claiming Technicolor is rolling out digital cinema in the US with an exhibitor that doesn't exist any more.

Bernard Collard (XDC) - presents "Draft 1.0" of Who will pay for Europe. Gives examples of different distributors for the same films in different European territories. 41 countries in Europe, of which XDC has installed 240 screens (1.3K and 2K), which accounts for 80% of installs in Europe. 170 movies have been "peocessed" and over 200,000 screenings held.

Gwendal Aufret (Eclair) - Talks brifly about a VPF-based plan for 2,500-4,000 screens in FIGS and Scandinavia. Apparently the former stands for France, Italy, Germany and Spain. Talk about ambitions of truly Napoleonic proportions! It will be an interesting one to follow.

Nothing too interesting emerged in the Q&A session.

IBC DCD live blog; second session (global overview)

David Hancock; Gives scene setter by providing statistics on digital deployments. Quality Screen Digest data as always. US and Christie dominate deployment, for obvious reasons. No mention of Norway. NORDIC won't be counted until 2H 2006.

Zhu Zhu (China): Perspective on D-Cinema deployment in China. 100 film studios, 260 features in China in 2005. BO was Euro 2bn. Overseas BO income 1.6bn Euro. 55 multiplexes with 272 screens built. Over 3500 smaller screens in countryside 34/149 mux/screens in first half 2006. Good joke about not rushing into China. At least not until you understand SARFT, CFGC, BIRTV. Next trailer of Chinese films. Lots of martial arts historical films but also some car racing. Average ticket price just Euro 0.10 but in big cities two to five Euros. US box office is 70x Chinas. Warner plans to have 170 screens by the end of 2007.

Milestones for d-cinema in China. Too many to re-type here. "Chyna" first all-digital end-to-end film (5 min long). 2006 China will build 1,500 digital small theatres. Barco 47 2K projectors in China. Has a deal in place for total of 100 with CFGC. CCTV have ordered two Dolby systems. China is thus one of the fastest growing digital cinema countries in the world. China has produced 52 digital movies, though she does not explain if she means DI, MPEG DCPs or J2K DCPs. Digital Movie mobile Playing System using MPEG4 developed. Montage Digital Player (Jindian Group). "Shops will sell digital cinema products." (???)

Kiran Reddy (India) - Sathyam Cinemas experience. 13,000 cinemas 26,000 owners. Hollywood BO is just 5 per cent. 450 e-cinema installations in India. 1st and only commercial D-Cinema installation in India. Barco, Christie, Qube and GDC used. RDX. "10,000 MTBF? Unlikely!". Lots of technology problems. Replacement parts an issue. They have played 11 Hollywood films to date. Some local content related issues. Brand and charge it as a premium experience. (10-15% higher ticket price). $85K plus 36 per cent in taxes. Operational cost $5000.

Talks about VPF, advertising and ODS. 3D content - "We hate silver screens." No one will watch cricket on big screen for five days. F1 will cannot compete with sold out films on Sunday night. E- and D-cinema not competing but there is threat that E-cinema might muscle into premium screening venue.

Michael Karagosian (USA) - MKPE. X-Men 2 $85m 1st week, X-Men 3 $120m, latter 51 less screens than former. So how do you explain the 50% bump? Interlocking! Nice PPT slide of articles about D-Cinema on the rise. BUT peak was last Sept when Carmike committed. Shows Technology adoption Currve from Geoffrey Moore's Crossing the Chasm. Maps D-Cinema adoption onto this. (I am very impressed already, and not just because Michael dedicated the presentation to me. So far I'm still breathing). Micheal sites the section from the DCI spec that it's up to each studio to decide whether to stick to it and in what way (John Birchell Hughes is nodding in agreement). Smart exhibitors are holding off. Lists what exhibitors want to see, apart from just lower cost.

Mentions National CineMedia. One to watch. 14,500 screens. With Cineplex 15,750, that's 40% of US cinema screens and two-third of US BO. NCM will be the Early Majority. Europe may be the Late Majority. Says manufacturers have more work to do. Business issues to be solved. NCM say it will take off in 2008.

(I'm still breathing!)

Nico Simon (Luxembourg and beyond) - Utopolis' (utopian?) perspective. 30 out 100 screens sigital with XDC. Luxembourg 10 screens 100% digital. Digital projectors don't fit into all projection booths. List of films and ODS. Word-of-mouth of football in HD grew audience for World Cup on big screen in Holland (or did he say France?). Didn't work in countries that didn't qualify for the games. Some European films. Says 2K is better than 35mm. Calls it "learning investment". Tech problems, Content problems and Cost problems. Keys were a problem. Seems like keys were not issued for all screens in a particular cinema. Cost problem is THE problem to solve. Calls for European Business Model. Everyone should pay a fair share.

I put a (slightly provocative) question to Nico about when he will upgrade to JPEG2000 so that Deluxe Digital Cinema Europe can start supplying him content from our clients. He replies, "when XDC upgrade to their next-generation hybrid server", which it looks like it will not be until 2007. It's a pitty, but I'm guessing that SPE won't supply him with "Casino Royal" and 20th Century Fox won't give him "Eragon". JBH retorts that the European market is fragmented and we need to take account of that.

Monk asks the panel if any regrets getting involved in digital cinema. No one regrets it.

IBC DCD live blog; first panel (standards)

Mark Kimball (Disney) - Talks about DCI's role in establishing standards. Explains DCI organization. Jerry/Uni will assume Tech part responsibility for the post-DCI organization. More than 88 errata published since DCI closed. Most for clarification. Fraunhofer reading led to most of the errata (including correcting their English!) Now moving on to SMPTE process. Compliance testing proceedure being put in place. DCI will not certify equipment. It will be up to each individual studio to decide what is and isn't "DCI compliant".

Wendy Aylsworth (WB) - Talks about DC28 Charter. Pays tribute to Charles Swartz for reminding us that motion picture industry only took off when 35mm standard became universal at the turn of the last century. Reminds us that cinema is a niche market, compared to for example broadcasting. In 2005 DC28 added Stereoscopic WG. 16 core documents published. 428 Suite - D-Cinema Distribution Master, gives example of how standard sub-sections can be published bit by bit.

Siegfried Fossel (Fraunhofer) - Talks about two projects, DCI compliance test procedure as well as FFA Recommendations and Guidilines being wrotten for German Federal Film Board. Latter has recommendations for work-flow and other issues. Guidelines for both film producers and theatre owners. The document will be available in Jan 2007. This will be followed by test installations. Hope is to introduce D-Cinema in Germany from 2007 onwards. Lots of interesting things, too much to be typed on the Barbie-sized keyboard of my BlackBerry.

Thierry Delpit (CST) - Talks about ISA platform. It's a complete digital chain stretching from post house-to-projection booth in line with DCI/SMPTE specs and standards. One of the goals is to help French companies - surprise, surprise, given the French state's involvement. Full list of the eight partner companies. It's the same companies that will be at the ETC in Hollywood next week. No mention of the French digital cinema standrads.

PvS (Deluxe) - The point of my presentation is PowerPoint= bad, NORDIC = good (for the industry).

Denise Hsu (Technicolor) - Denise stands in for Curt Behlmer, she is responsible for Technicolor's digital roll-out strategy. Updates us on what TDC has been doing in testing and evaluating equipment. Talks about offering "a complete portfolio of entertainment options" to their cinema clients. Interoperability Test Center (ITC) opened in January 2006. ITC is also being used to develop Theatre Management System for Technicolor. They have developed "Killer Test Patterns" (yo, bro, sounds wicked!) 240-300 screens in 30-35 sites is deployment plan for the US. Also 130 screens with Kinepolis in Belgium. "DCI compliance to be achioeved by the end of Beta" (2007). Extended Technicolor sales pitch ends her speach. (Is it just because I'm now with Deluxe that I'm somewhat put off by this kind of hard sell?)

Looks like we are about to finish on time, but I'm having problems sending e-mails from my BlackBerry and hence the blog posts are not going up on the website.

IBC D-Cinema Day live-blog; Jerry Pierce keynote

Jerry's speech is called "Good, Bad and Ugly; Technology to Business" and I will refrain from speculating which one of my colleagues these epitaths are aimed at until I hear what Jerry has to say.

The whole day D-Cinema session has moved to the big Auditorium, though I doubt we will pull in as large a crowd as "Pirates 2" in digital pulled in last night. I saw that it crossed $1bn, so no wonder Mark Kimball was skipping and smiling this morning.

Universal has ramped up the digital releases lately. Dambusters re-make in digital for sure? Let's see what Mr Pierce has to say.

9:10 - Still waiting for session to start. Reasonably good turnout for this time in the morning. Dr Sandbank is bending Wendy Aylesworth and Craig Todd's collective ears. Dr Monk now apologises for slightly delayed start.

9:15 - Theme Day producer Dave Monk reading out Jerry's bio. It's long. Jerry says its nice to see an audience where he knows half of us by name. (It's not that small, is it?). "Roll-out is real," he says. Major reason to do it is to control cost and improve quality to bring audiences back to cinema. "Best image on earth." Jerry is thrilled for Disney that Pirates 2 made a cool billion. No really. OK, through grtted teeth. But the quality was great, he admitted. "But when digital fails, it's a disaster." Howard Lukk is sitting behond me and mutters "thanks Jerry."

9:25 - 80% of Uni titles go DI. "Don't forget trailers" which JP calls the forgotten part of digital cinema. Shocker - all-but-one Univ titles have gone out digitally in 2006. ("Idlewild" was too small to merrit digital release). Miami vice went out to 69 screens. 185Gb. "Black Dahlia" going out Friday. Smaller film but 69 copies ie the digital cinema network has grown.

9:30 Uni strategy is crawl-walk-run; start domestically (US and DCI package only), move to few territories (next step), wide support (next couple of years).

9:35 - Having digital theatre is not enough to guarantee you a Uni digital film. Business agreement has to be in place too. Ultimately it is about the movie, not technology, says Jerry.

9:40 - Basic Business slide, last point, "No NEW MIDDLE MEN". Next one: VPF is seen as a short term way of contributing to the conversion of equipment. Long term no VPF. Europe may have a variety of business models.

9:45 - A look at 'Side Show' issues, delivery, 3D and ODS. 35mm delivery cost just $45 for 6-9 reels of 60lbs. For digital? "No clear long term solution at this time! (Maybe never)." Jerry thanks Wendy for recognising his quality chairing work on the transport committee. Next - "Show Me the 3D Money!" $10m extra cost of making 3D film and $50m to convert a screen. Extra expenses can only be covered in the first (theatrical) window. 3D doesn't sell extra on DVD. ODS, you will first need to train/condition audiences to come and watch football and other non-film content in cinemas.

"Frank, direct and no-holds barred" presentation, is jow Monk describes Jerry's speech. Worth schedule running 20 min late.

Not enough time before IBC, War Against Hand-Cream and Dolby goes to China

I seem to have less and less time for blogging the longer I'm here, but I'm determined to keep it up, if only to not confound your expectations of how soon this venture will see me with my foot in my mouth. Not yet, as such, but then it's only been a handful of postings so far.

The reason for the lack of time is that I'm starting the serious round of meetings with distributors and exhibitors to introduce myself and tell them about Deluxe's plans for rolling out digital cinema in Europe. Some of them we are already deep into the planning, dating from way before I joined the company. But even these now get the chance to meet me with my Deluxe hat on (actually, it's a rather fetching baseball cap). No fewer than six meetings fitted in today with another half a dozen slotted in for tomorrow.

Thanks to everyone who have been getting in touch about meeting up in IBC. So far these people have all kindly managed to find time for me, but I still need to reach out to some, such as QuVis and Kinepolis. But there's still a few days before the plane takes off for Amsterdam from London City Airport. I urge you all to avoid Heathrow as all costs if you can in these dark days of the War Against Hand-Cream:

An innocent victim of the War Against Hand-Cream, one-legged New Zealand sprinter Kate Horan was, reports the Dominion Post, a prime medal hope at this week's Paralympic World Athletics Championships in Holland. Until she was told in transit at Heathrow that her $10,000 running leg couldn't be carried as hand luggage. And then in Amsterdam that British Airways had lost it. Words, frankly, fail us.

Meanwhile in the news, Dolby has secured a deal to supply digital cinema servers to China Central Television (CCTV) for their new state-of-the-art screening rooms. So now Dolby digital cinema servers can be found everywhere from Reykjavik to Beijing. (Memo to self: must get hold of one of their boxes myself for our own state-of-the-art screening room QC facility at Deluxe London). But Dolby aren't doing half as well in China as a Canadian company, if the following press release is to be believed. The title says it all "Section Rouge Média Inc. signs an option for the development of a digital cinema multiplexes chain in the People's Republic of China in link with its strategy to develop access to the Chinese market".

In cinema events news, SmartJog are inviting to an event at Hollywood's ETC/DCL on 20 Sept and Barco will have its digitala cinema event at London's BAFTA on 6 Oct, though I don't have links for either invite, which only arrived in my inbox in the past few hours. See you there for both. Now that I finally have my BlackBerry there's apparently a way to update blogs directly by e-mail, so come and watch me blog my way into trouble in real-time.

Being co-operative, Kinepolis profits and who's the digital Daddy in Venice

I must confess that my exposure to the London post-production industry has mostly been limited to hanging out in the Blue Post and assorted other Soho pubs, listening to war stories by the likes of Mitch Mitchell, Kevin Phelan, Jon Thompson and whoever else was in the bar at that time. [LATER EDITION: I am in no way implying that hanging out in pubs is all the these three outstanding examples of Soho's post-production excellence.]

Although I got an inkling of it then, I've had it confirmed to me in the brief time that I've been in the building housing Deluxe, as well as EFILM London and Capital FX, the tremendous degree of co-operation that goes on between companies that you would think are at-each-others-throats competitors. The truth is that subcontracting, sharing and semi-necessitated co-operation is the order of the day, both in post-production and digital cinema. This is not a peacenik "let's all love each other and be friends" but a facto of survival in a small industry based on relations and trust.

In that spirit, I was glad to read about the three-digit record profits at Kinepolis (456% to be precise), which is in the process of using some of those profits to roll out digital cinema together with Thomson, Barco and Dolby. Whether it is Technicolor, Dolby, Arts Alliance or Deluxe rolling out digital cinema, we all stand to benefit from it at this stage.

In other news Doremi stakes a claim to the Venice Film Festival with the press release "Doremi Plays in Venice". This seems to somewhat contradict the claim that QuVis was the "preferred digital cinema player at the 63rd VFF, through a press release headlined "QUVIS PREFERRED DIGITAL CINEMA SYSTEM PROVIDER TO VENICE FILM FESTIVAL".

What is for me personally more interesting is that the title that people in this building have been working hard on, smart sci-fi thriller "Children of Men", has been feted by critics and even called the best entry in the festival so far, according to this review in The Guardian. Fingers crossed, it might have a digital release as well. Watch this space and little co-operation might do it.

IBC looms large and a friend drops by

I had an unexpected visitor today, though I won't go into who or why he's here just yet. We've got to keep some of the mystery of this place.

Instead the large part of the day has been devoted to the logistics surrounding IBC. Having the luxury of a dual perspective on IBC as an attendee and as a member of the Conference Committee I can complain to myself if there is anything I don't like. But this year I can't even complain about the hotel as I've been very kindly put up in the NH Grand Hotel Krasnapolsky by Deluxe.

IBC looks like it will be the usual mixture of trade show and meetings, followed by the conference and EDCF. There is quite the contingent coming over from Deluxe, both UK and US, so expect to see several familiar faces. As always I never have time to see everyone and everything that I would like, which is particularly bad when I'm wearing a new hat and handing out new business cards. Hopefully they will have arrived by then. BlackBerry is said to be driven down from Denham to London today. As for my MacBook, I had to wait so long that I ended up canceling my order. According to an article In Guardian's Technology blog there is a strong lilelihood that a new MacBook featuring the Merom (64-bit Core 2 Duo) chips will appear 12 September, so I'm just as happy to wait until after IBC to get my hands on it.

Other than that I can recommend Leon, an award winning fast food place at the top of London's Carnaby street, where I had lunch today. My friend, who travels too much and admits that hence he doesn't always eat as well as he should, rated it highly. It certainly beats anything they serve at the RAI. Memo to self: complain to myself about Dutch catering ahead of next Conference Committee and work it into Digital Cinema Theme Day. To paraphrase Napoleon, even a digital cinema army marches on it stomach.

How "corporate" is Deluxe, plus things we WON'T be doing

I had a long and interesting telephone conversation with my contact, friend and occasional panel sparring partner Owen Thomas today. When he is not a producer for his very talented wife May Miles-Thomas through their production company Elemental Films, he has been spending more time thinking about the realities and future of independent film in the UK than anyone else that I know. While he won't use the c-word abut himself ('consultant', that is) he is not only very knowledgeable but also living proof that you don't have to be based in London to be an authority in these matters, seeing that he is recently transplanted from Glasgow to Edinburgh.

Moving on from the over-used and over-wrought 'long tail' concept for niche films, he challenged me over whether Deluxe was right to focus purely on the theatrical market (Rank sold off the DVD replication business in a separate deal from Deluxe), with sister companies ranging from Panavision to Capital FX all focused on the up-stream film service market. Surely, he said, he and I had agreed on a number of conferences and panels that the money was in the ancillary platforms for film.

I agree and disagree. From a producer's perspective he is absolutely right that the money is downstream, but while we personally both love the cinema experience, I would go one step further than him. I would defend it by speculating that while the current booking practices of one title having 3-4 screenings per day for 1-2 weeks will soon die, there will be more variations of films through a phrase that I'm trying to coin, which is, "the one screen digital multiplex." That way cinema will survive and Deluxe Digital Services will prosper.

He touched a more raw nerve when he asked me whether not Deluxe was "too corporate?" Too corporate for me, ex-journalist and honorary digital viking that I am, but more to the point, too corporate for small producers. He made the valid point that the Deluxe website is US-centric and gives no indication of the UK/European/ROW operations, unless you dig your way down to the "Contact Us" section.

There is some truth to this (help, I'm turning into Scooble in no time) but it would be a shame if this gave the impression that we do not care for or want to work with smaller projects than the $100m Fox and Paramount ones. We do. Passionately. As do our sister operations EFILM and Capital FX. No project is too small for us to consider, as we would not rather sit and twiddle our thumbs waiting to get to make the DI for the 22nd Bond film than work with local non-studio production outfit. And there's nothing stopping us from juggling several different size balls/projects at once. To paraphrase the inscription on the Statue of Liberty, 'Bring us your poor and needy projects.' And when you do, ask for me or Liz.

Owen is more correct in that Deluxe will not be streaming content to your mobile phone or doing a video-on-demand deal with film distributors any time soon.

The best goat curry in town and NCM heads north

It was back to the future for me today as I was invited out to lunch by the company that got me started in the digital cinema space in the first place. That's right, Screen Digest treated me to lunch to celebrate my appointment at Deluxe, without any hard sell about what reports or services we should be buying from them. The lunch venue near the Screen Digest office in north London's Camden was The Mango Room, which serves 'traditional and modern Caribbean cuisine' (and not a pirate in sight). I could not resist the 'Camden Famous Curry Goat', nor starter or desert, so just as well that we stuck to water for this celebration.

As we swapped notes on Screen Digest and Deluxe it dawned on me that I'm making a habit of leaving companies just as they are taking off. Not only has Screen Digest's incredibly detailed on-line 'business intelligence' database services been a success beyond anyone's expectations. But they also picked up the digital cinema ball after I left and rather than trying something pointless like keeping the E-Cinema Alert going, they have made digital cinema a proper statistical and analytical field of study. Their recent digital cinema report is terrific and still selling well, their digital cinema installation base is the best and most up-to-date one in existance (sorry Elisabeta and Bill) and David Hancock and Charlotte Jones will be putting in appearances at IBC and the Venice Film Festival respectively. Hats off to them, and, yes, I'm ever so slightly miffed that I proved not to be irreplaceable.

Unique is also about to take off big time, though I can't go into detail about it now, so I will have to take some credit for that after the fact. But third time lucky, sticking it out with Deluxe until it has made a success of digital cinema in Europe. If not, I will eat a whole goat, I promise.

Across the Atlantic, there is now a strategic alliance between National CineMedia and Canada's largest exhibitor Cineplex Entertainment. The 130-odd cinemas and 1,300+ screens in Canada will join the digital cinema advertising, testing and ultimately buying power of NCM in the US. Given how closely the US and Canada are release wise for Hollywood films it makes sense for this type of cross-border co-operation. [Mental note, must find out what Deluxe's Toronto branch are doing cinema wise, if anything, at this stage.] No jokes about thawing moose delivered ice-encrusted hard drives, please, I've been Toronto and it is a lovely and warm place. Though I still like Montreal better. Once you too have been to Ex-Centris you too will not forget it in a hurry.

Mental (re-) organisation and the digital cinema gods answer prayers

I had prayed to the gods of digital cinema to send us a special digital cinema project, partly because I'm too lazy and scared to go out and hunt for one this early on, and they have responded. It may yet turn out to be one of those "be careful what you wish for, for you might get" type of projects. But for now I am happy to have something to sink my digital baby teeth into.

Of course, there were a whole bunch of other digital cinema projects, ranging from small to large clients, lined up for Deluxe even prior to my arrival. (And did I mention that they handled the first European DCI-flavour JPEG2000 release when they did "Ice Age 2"?) But this one arrived in my Deluxe mail box in my first week on the job and I'm expected to deal with it. Let's see what if anything comes of it.

After the deluge weekend backlog of digital cinema news yesterday, nothing much to report today. Instead, this item from The Guardian's Diary section about a Pentagon initiative that must have been dreamt up by someone who never saw the USO Playboy Bunny show scene in Francis Ford Coppola's "Apocalypse Now":

Finally, visit purrfectangelz.com for hot shots of the California-based dance troupe the Pentagon has just thoughtfully dispatched to Baghdad and (can this be right?) Haditha to entertain US troops and advance its ongoing effort to win hearts and minds in this staunchly Muslim nation. If they can't beat the insurgency, we don't know what can.

I'd check out the website myself, but the (not-so smart) SmartFilter in our office blocks it for 'Nudity', so I'm guessing that's it's not just 'Charlie' that "don't surf" sites like that.

New office space, plus lots of news and statistics.

"Blog well and blog often." That was the advice from my colleague Sheigh Crabtree at the Hollywood Reporter. I can't hope to match her award-winning quality of writing, but I will follow her advise. My excuse for not writing yesterday is that Monday was a Bank Holiday in the UK.

New week in the office and George politely kicks me out of his office, but into a much nicer corner office (!) on the second floor, which may become my permanent office when the music ends and the game of musical chairs here at Capital FX/EFILM London/Deluxe Digital Europe is over. It's spacious, bright and one where you expect to find people who do IMPORTANT WORK, though in fairness, most of the people here at CFX are slaving away much harder than I. (Currently putting the finishing touches on "Children of Men", which I'm not violating any official Secrets Act. I'm sure, by revealing that it's has been the big DI project here.) With an office like this you're not expected to just do a 9:30 to 5:30 shift, unless we're talking 5:30AM, but that's OK because I've got plenty enough on my plate.

Based on the number of news and announcements it also seems like we are coming out of the quiet summer lull. The big announcement has been Technicolor signing a major deal with National Amusements to deploy digital installations in some major US cities as of this autumn, though there are no details on whose projectors or servers they will use, other than that they will be in line with DCI-specifications. Elsewhere, there is also an article about the digital plans of the Cinema Buyers Group in the US and how AccessIT's Brooklyn cinema has been used to test the digital waters for the company, both from the Film Journal. QuVis' servers will be used in the Venice Film Festival, making an inroad into the Italian market largely dominated by Dolby. There is a press release celebrating XDC's distribution of 25 digital features in Sweden in its first 12 months. One of the interesting things about XDC, other than their insistence that MPEG is a perfectly acceptable distribution format for Europe, is how they distribute they prepare and distribute the content and the key:

XDC processing includes the preparation of the content for physical distribution based on encrypted files, the quality control and the archiving, as well as the dubbed Swedish version for some films where the Original Version is not a Swedish one. Regis Raway continues "XDC is the only digital cinema operator to offer a generic media, this disk is particularly well suited for the Swedish market, because it can travel from one screen to another and play successively. In this case, the key is placed on the disk, which means that the movie can move from one site to another, but that the movie can only play if the disk is plugged into the server." As a consequence, the number of producers and distributors who entrust digital distribution logistical services to XDC are continuously increasing.

I know that on the past XDC used tapes, but I can't quite work out from this whether that is still the case or whether hard drives have replaced this. Given that LAN-connected HDD, which is what DCI has specified, aren't going into widespread use just yet, we will see a lot of different physical distribution solutions for a while.

To finish off, my old employer Screen Digest published an interesting two-page mini report in their July issue, which was re-printed in the SAWA newsletter sent out today. True to their data-centric and heavily analytical roots, they have worked out a Digital Cinema Conversion Suitability Index, by which they compare and contrast different European territories. They have come up with "10 wholly quantitative measures, attributes ranking points to 18 European territories and the US so that the most suitable territories can be identified, with the US acting as a benchmark."

UK comes out top, perhaps not surprisingly, closely followed by Ireland. The bottom though is, however, perhaps not equally obvious. "At the bottom end of the DCS Index is Finland with a suitability measure of 33.9 per cent. The bottom territories also include Greece(35.6), Sweden(36.7), Italy(37.2) and Norway(38.9)." I'm not disputing this, on the contrary, but take note that it is perhaps because they have more of a digital mountain to climb that we have projects such as NORDIC going on in Norway and some Swedish cinemas are pressing ahead agressively with XDC. In time, there is no escaping Deluxe having to also service these most difficult of all the European territories. I just don't see us setting up a Finnish or Greek call centre this year.