So I arrived in about minus 10 degree weather (Centigrade) (it's always fair weather in my missions
) with plenty of time to do a full recognizance of the place before displaying my suave charm and ready to use Jedi powers if needed (or my trusty black Beretta lightsabre
). At the moment the place was deserted and further inquiries with management confirmed that we had reached our target. Slowly, patrons trickled in as zero hour approached. 5 minutes before curtain time the theater was almost full but not uncomfortably packed as I proceeded to take my preferential seating position of always 1.5x picture height at my empty rsvp seat, cus as you know, nobody does it better ;p. On screen we had a Samsung screen-saver floating in slow motion, almost like a Maurice Binder title. A person sat in front of me and asked me if I was from the movie club. I just said I was a projectionist on behalf of Blu-ray.com come to see and report the Samsung/Magnolia Blu-ray demonstration. The film chap seemed to be impressed with my projectionist/reporter credentials and convinced of my ruse. The mild mannered reporter schtick works even for Clark, so of course it works for me. Then the moment we were all waiting. The manager came and said a brief introductory discourse of what we were about to watch and emphasized this was the first showing of a movie in the Blu-ray Disc format that was being introduced to the the public and that it was being played back directly from the Samsung Blu-ray Disc player. People applauded mildly and politely (We're very polite around here) the lights dimmed and then the screen showed briefly a OSD display saying stuff like "Input: RGB" and other state secrets. And then a Samsung Blu-ray Disc splash screen appeared and the screen went black and not the hourglass, but the horizontal moving colored dots starting doing their dance. An obviously SPECTRE/SMersh spy behind me said to his companion: "And now we'll take 2 or 3 minutes to load cus these Blu-rays take forever". As the words were leaving his Fudermouth, the Blu-ray movie started. I don't think people even noticed the dancing circles as they certainly took less than those "This is X-theaters chain featured presentation:", theater chain pre-credits put ahead of the main feature certainly take much longer. And then there was the movie, err I mean the Blu-ray. The first thing the lasers implanted in my corneas did was try to zero on the screen looking for mpeg or any compression codec noise or artifacts. After all, the main purpose of my life risking dangerous mission was to see how this.. thing, would look on a REAL movie theater screen and how it fared against our usual 35mm fare. No more difficult task had ever befallen on a home video format. So my lasers scanned avidly left to right, top to bottom the 20, or more, feet tall screen. Could it be that I was being duped? Where was the mosquito noise? the lack of detail? the macro-blocking? The baaandiiinggggg??? All I saw was film-like smoothness, where were the jaggies? All I could discern was the faint pixel grid structure of the digital projector on the part of the screen where the image was most focused (remember I sit at the point where you can see every detail on-film clearly (or in this case all the pixels in HD) (Other areas of the screen where projector lens focus curvature occurs, the faint digital projector pattern wasn't noticeable) telling me indeed this was a digital image instead of a 35mm print. Where were the compression artifacts? I couldn't see them.
What I also didn't see were mechanical projector vibrations like jitter or weave nor misaligned projector shutter ghosting. (Just like in any Digital Cinema presentation) The greens were also a little more verdant than in the usual film based projection. But that was it. I don't think a non expert could see this and say: that's not film, that's a a fake!
I'm not gonna lie and say: "This is the best image I've seen in 35mm screens". I've seen better, slightly more detailed images (Specially from true Scope photographed films that cost millions), but of course these have been top notch perfectly focused A class theaters. What I saw last night was basically equal to what I see on normal theaters. Some aspects were slightly lower in quality, some higher than normal film. For example some skin tones seemed a little ruddy in a couple of places and I already mentioned the greens (But I liked the greens, in the sense that I thought they looked more vibrant) Some shots looked softer than film others looked as good as film (I remember a long shot of the city) Some even gave me the impression of more edge contrast than film. And we got enough of Anthony Lapaglia's salt and pepper perpetual stubble/beard
.
Here, let me repeat: Equivalent to most movie theaters.
Also remember this is an Independent intimate film as far as I know. No mega blockbuster production here. One of the things that I would classify as superior was the lack of grain/noise compression artifacts. That was what impressed me the most: the cleanness of the image. After seeing several transfers where you can see compression artifacts galore and grain swimming in slow motion and facial detail blurred every time a character moves his head on some high definition transfers, even some with "advanced new generation codecs" that tout transparency, this to me was transparent. At no time I thought, "mm I'm watching a video, the compression bitrate shoulda been higher".
mmm now that i think of it, I think i've even seen (digitally manipulated?) 35mm trailers of some hollywood films that look worse than this on occasion. That's not to say the "film" (the Blu-ray) was grain-less, it had very fine grain you could see more clearly in flat areas like the sky. Just to give you an idea: This film gave me less impression of grain on screen than lets say 35mm prints of the The Fellowship Of The Ring which i thought grainy specially at the beginning. (Grainy but good of course :-P) (The impression of graininess is usually highest at the beginning of a film as the eye gets used to it as it watches the films and blends it in onto subconscious submission
). So what else can I say? This was supposedly the lowliest Blu-ray player's output (a player that some said looked worse than a DVD up-converted on a Toshiba), from a format that can't be the look and sound of perfect, from a disc from a company that it's no Fox or Universal *cough Spartacus cough* and here I was being pleasantly surprised because I have to confess, even tho I know 1080p is equivalent to VistaVision in some respects, and that I've already seen superb Blu-ray transfers at my demanding 1.5x picture height distance and they had passed with flying colors (the transfers that had been done optimally that is), I had watched those on much smaller screens more similar to the normal large home theater screen sizes. Tho I sat at the same viewing distance proportions (1.5x ph) for those, i was sitting at proportionally much closer distances than from a giant movie theater screen and there was always a chance that some psycho-physical factor might be influencing my perception (the eye is a magical thing) so I kept thinking, uh oh, maybe when i see Blu-ray blown up at a real movie screen, I'll really see al the warts clearly and go home totally disappointed. No such thing happened!
I felt just like the scientist in Starman after talking to Jeff Bridges (The alien) and realizing everything else was trivial
This was a Samsung player with a Blu-ray Disc on a real movie theater screen and it looked as goooood! Home Theater heaven. Here was a $800 BD player with a $20 disc rivaling a Century $$$$$ 35mm projector and $2000 35mm print.
Just look at the stoopid smile on my face
(I know Brian and other Samsunites will be particularly smiling too)
What about the movie? Well I came to steal technical secrets, but I liked it. Not great shakes but it's similar to other independent films with similar pretensions
(or lack thereof). People laughed at moments, there were sad moments, a good star or two, brings social issues, family issues. Not X-Men of course. Now that I've seen it, I'll have to buy it, mm for "technical" reasons, you know, compare, etc, watch parts i really liked, see if i get the same clear image on my home, or even better (Direct view set could theoretically be sharper still) In fact, was I so caught in looking at the cleanness of the image and how well it compared to film, that i even forgot to take note of something! I didn't check or was aware of 3:2 or 24 fps pulldown issues, I totally forgot and if you ask me I'd say it was cus it was in 24p or it was looking so much like film i didn't even notice it wasn't 24p. If it wasn't. So how's that?
(Yes I know the Sammy is not supposed to spit 24p. Future firmware upgrade, or movie theater digital projector inverse telecine? Well that'll remain unanswered for now cus as the credits ended and the FBI logo showed-up briefly before the Samsung was stopped and the OSD came up I was already getting out of a window to randevouz with my Bond girl on her Mercedes C-111 (I leave the Aston to James) who was coming from her successful mission and as we drove down towards the huge lagoon in the night a C-131 came over us and hooked us up to parachute drop us at our current headquarters just one km away (Hey nothing better than pure Bond excess!
)
Exit credits-Bond theme
Deciazulado will return in The EyBeeEsEmpire Strikes Back
__________________
M-16 gratefully acknowledges the graciousness of Landmark Theaters management to have made possible for our man in Blu to accomplish his mission
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