Bill Mead gives d-cinema global overview

For those of you that missed Bill Mead of DCinemaToday fame give his presentation of the state of digital cinema around the world at ShoWest, now is your chance to catch up. An article published in Film Journal International gives a condensed version of the talk. It is worth quoting the first few paragraphs:

By this spring, approximately 3,000, or three percent, of the world's estimated target screens (100,000-plus) will have been equipped with DCI-specified digital projectors and servers. Of the early adopters, approximately two-thirds are in North America, with the rest spilt between Europe and Asia. Significantly, most of the installation occurred in the past 12 months, making 2006 stand out as the pivotal year in the digital conversion timeframe.

Almost 50% of the world's d-cinema installed base can be attributed to one organization, Carmike Cinemas of Columbus GA, who early in 2006 made the extraordinary commitment to equip all of its 2,300 screens with digital projection. Working with Christie/AIX, North America's leading d-cinema systems provider, Carmike has already converted over 1,350 auditoriums to digital. Christie/AIX is a partnership formed in June 2005 between projector manufacturer Christie Digital and d-cinema business provider AccessIT of Morristown, New Jersey.

The United States had an astounding growth in 2006 of over 400%, from just over 500 to over 2,000 installations by year's end. The rapid pace was driven by the maturing and acceptance of digital conversion plans, the convergence of various proprietary formats into the soon-to-be-ubiquitous DCI JPEG2000 MXF format, and an ample supply of U.S. digital titles. By mid-year 2006, virtually all Hollywood studios were making their major "tentpole" titles available in the DCI format, with over 100 titles distributed in the U.S. in 2006.

It gives the facts straight and without editorialising, plus you don't have to put up with the non-working A/C system that those of us who sat through the one hour presentation had to suffer. But it was well worth it.