CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

jbmeyer13 · Joined: 03 Dec 2010 Posts: 1135

Last night I went to a local theater which has undergone an "upgrade" to all digital projection (Bow Tie Cinema which bought out Clearview) to see Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

I loved the film and thought it was the best of the Marvel adaptations thus far. However, watching this film in digital projection is a sad reminder that "Cinema Black" is dying out. The sharpness and depth of image are wonderful but it lacks that low level punch that film can provide. From looking on Bow Tie's site it appears that they use the moniker "BTX" for their 4K equipped theaters which this was not, therefore I'll assume it was a 2K system. I should add that I have seen some recent films in 4K that looked amazing but the material wasn't suitable for truly evaluating low end performance.

Obviously the mainstream audience doesn't give a crap about this and as time goes on "film black" will be just a fading memory Sad

ecrabb · Posted: Wed May 07, 2014 3:59 pm Post subject:

Not sure what you're comparing to Justin, but "film black" was really never very good. Projected film prints usually only had a contrast ratio of around 10,000:1. That's far, far inferior to even most good home digital projectors now (100k:1 and on up), and massively inferior to a good gamma-corrected nine-inch LC CRT on/off, which is in the 500k-750k:1 ballpark.

What you probably saw was an older 2k Christie or Barco (very few cinemas have converted to 4k, and very little content is being produced in 4k even if it's being shot in 4k). Where it probably went wrong is that it was probably cranked up in dual-lamp mode for 3D, putting 30fL on the center of the screen, and elevating black levels to double where they should have been.

Sorry, but other than seeing pixels if you're sitting too close in a 2k theater (and then you're probably seeing screen perts, too), the experience with digital is much improved over what we ever had with film. That's the honest truth, and that's coming from a photography nut that loved film. I still love slide film and looking at projected slides. But, with motion picture film, in practice the experience wasn't what we romanticize it to be now. There was gate jitter, audio dropouts, film bow (resulting in non-unforum focus between sides and center), and unless you were there on the first couple of days, the print usually had scratches on it.

Cheers,
SC

jbmeyer13 · Joined: 03 Dec 2010 Posts: 1135

jeffslife · Joined: 17 Apr 2010 Posts: 4190 Location: ohio usa

The first day of my first real job (not yard or farm work) was running a PJ in a theatre. The first thing I saw was the original trailer for THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW. It was bright red lips on a total black background, in a dark dark dark room. I will never forget the impact that trailer had on me. I never looked at black the same way again. I haven't seen anything to compare since.

jbmeyer13 · Joined: 03 Dec 2010 Posts: 1135

jeffslife · Joined: 17 Apr 2010 Posts: 4190 Location: ohio usa

The pj was very old, probably from the fifties. It used a welding rod about a half inch in diameter to produce light. It worked amazingly well. I can only imagine what the electric bill was like. The lens was huge.

Spanky Ham · Joined: 22 Mar 2006 Posts: 5643 Location: Comedy Central

Unfortunately, the theaters today have to have track lighting and exit signs which raise the black level. Because of this, no theater will ever be able to get as dark as the best HTs.

jbmeyer13 · Joined: 03 Dec 2010 Posts: 1135

loudmouse2 · Joined: 30 Sep 2009 Posts: 72 Location: Portland, Oregon

I thought I'd add that I was recently watching some films(no, not porn) on an old Eumig dual 8mm home film projector, and the image was absolutely dreadful compared to my Runco IDP980(NEC PG). Back in the day, we used to think home film projectors were fantastic. I guess they were great compared to our 19" black and white tv.