How are digital movies played back in the theaters? Disc or hard drive?

[yoda313]

My local amc theater has the sony 4k screens and they are very nice.

So I was wondering how are digital movies played back in theaters these days?

Are they on some specially formatted optical disc or are they on a hard drive of some type?

Obviously it would all be proprietary and drm'd like crazy but I was wondering how the movies are transported and played back when you aren't using a reel of film anymore.

I'm sure I could google it but I thought I check here first from those in the know.

[yoda313]

So do I have to go to google than to get the answer?

I guess I will if nobody is going to offer one......

[Hoser Rob]

Not 100% but I think it's on an HD. Makes more sense to me. You'd need multiple br's and they're slow.

Have you noticed in all the talk of 4K there's almost zero talk of a new disc medium for it? That's because they aren't really working on one.

[yoda313]

Yes a hard drive would make the most sense. Encryption and durability would be the main positives and storage space.

How large is a digital movie for a movie theater these days? Are we talking about terabytes?

Also does it make it a larger movie file size wise if its 3d or imax 3d? Is a 4k digital movie larger than a non 4k digital movie?

[El Heggunte]

Digital media playback of hi-resolution 2K files has at least a 20 year history with early RAIDs feeding custom frame buffer systems with large memories. Content was usually restricted to several minutes of material. Transfer of content between remote locations was slow and had limited capacity. It wasn't until the late 1990s that feature length projects could be sent over the 'wire' (Internet or dedicated fiber links).

On June 18, 1999 DLP CINEMA projector technology was publicly demonstrated for the first time on two screens in North America (Los Angeles and New York) for the release of Lucasfilm's Star Wars: Episode I: The Phantom Menace. On January 19, 2000 the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers, in North America, initiated the first standards group dedicated towards developing Digital Cinema. On February 2, 2000 : Philippe Binant (Gaumont) realized the first digital cinema projection in Europe (Paris) with DLP CINEMA technology for the release of Toy Story II.

In December 2000, there were 15 digital cinema screens in North America, 11 in Western Europe, 4 in Asia, and 1 in South America.

Digital Cinema Initiatives (DCI) was formed in March 2002 as a joint project of many motion picture studios (Disney, Fox, MGM, Paramount, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Universal and Warner Bros. Studios) to develop a system specification for digital cinema.

In April 2004, in cooperation with the American Society of Cinematographers, DCI created standard evaluation material (the ASC/DCI StEM material) for testing of 2K and 4K playback and compression technologies. DCI selected JPEG2000 as the basis for the compression in the system the same year.

[ From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_cinema ]

[Baldrick]

I would also like to know this.

No one that works in a digital cinema?

And I guess they don't need that much staff now when they can automate everything. One guy control all projectors remotely from home. .

[yoda313]

Thanks el heggunte. It still doesn't exactly explain the delivery method. I did see something about fiber optic listed in there - I can't imagine these are distributed over some kind of intranet are they? surely they are done on a physical medium of some type.

@baldridck - And I guess they don't need that much staff now that they can automating everything. One guy controll all projectors remotely from home.

But wouldn't the projectors still need some kind of manual manipulation? What about caring for the bulbs and stuff - don't they have to be heated up or something? Or am I wrong about that? - or is at all lcd/led stuff now?

[Baldrick]

I have read they can do most stuff from one control room. But they still have to manually check so the volume and sharpness is correct now and then.

[yoda313]

I have read they can do most stuff from one control room. But they still have to manually check so the volume and sharpness is correct now and then.

Don't get me started on volume at movie theaters - mainly the trailers. They are always ten times louder then the movies and drive you nuts.

I'm in my thirties so don't think I'm some old fuddy duddy who just doesn't like anything at all. But I mean come on enough already! I know they are supposed to be loud and in your face to get your attention but to be ear splitting and crazy loud makes me cringe......

Usually the movies themselves are at a good volume level its just the trailers.

Oh and interesting about the control room - didn't know that.

[El Heggunte]

Just more fuel to the bonfire

https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/345431-4k-and-5120x1600-video-playback

4k Digital Cinema distribution is by the Digital Cinema Package (DCP) which consists of encrypted JPEG2000 MXF video and linear PCM MXF audio files distributed on Linux EXT2/3 partitions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Cinema_Package

There are several Digital Intermediate formats used for production. Red Epic has a 5k x 2k acquisition format.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_cinema

The main issue is in what format are the source files generated an are you looking for standard or proprietary distribution formats.

Companies that specialize in monitor/projector 4k wall splitters are EMS, Extron,EyeVis and others.

http://www.ems-imaging.com/online/products/Xtreme4vs.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xE8WMkdeyDg

Matrox and NVidia have monitor wall solutions
http://www.nvidia.com/docs/IO/40049/NV-Quadro-SVS-Jul10-final-lores.pdf

Serval companies sell 4k projectors including Sony, NEC, Christie, JVC and Barco.