Category Archives: Alternative Content

Goooaal! Cinedigm Scores With 3D FIFA World Cup Final

Posted by J. Sperling Reich | July 15, 2010 3:08 pm

This past Sunday Cinedigm, a leading North American digital cinema deployment entity, achieved another live event milestone and I was there to witness it first hand. As we reported back in June, Cinedigm partnered with Sensio Technologies to bring the FIFA World Cup Final live and in 3D to theatres throughout the United States and Canada.

Event Details
At the time there was some uncertainty as to how many theatres were to show the FIFA World Cup matches and where they would be located. In total 25 FIFA World Cup matches were shown live in 3D at 475 venues in 33 different countries accounting for 4,500 screenings.

Cinedigm was given permission directly from FIFA to show the matches at 15 locations and theatres in Arizona, California, Florida, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Ontario Texas and Virginia were selected. Another 15 locations were allocated to NCM Fathom.

Originally Cinedigm intended to show both the semi-final matches as well as the championship game, which pitted Spain against The Netherlands. Instead they chose to hold screenings only for Sunday’s final in order to have one marquee event. The feed for the event was supplied by ESPN, which was capturing the match in 3D for its new 3D network.

From what I was told ESPN wasn’t too pleased about the final being broadcast in cinemas.

Posted in Alternative Content
Tagged as 3D, Cinedigm, FIFA World Cup, HL Group, NCM Fathom, Rave Motion Pictures

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Heavy Metal Heavy Weights Hit The Big Screen

Posted by J. Sperling Reich | June 16, 2010 10:41 pm

If you’re into heavy metal music then you’ll be happy to hear that some of the world’s biggest head banging bands will be playing live at a theatre near you. On Tuesday, June 22nd, Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth and Anthrax, otherwise known as the Big Four of heavy metal music, will be sharing the stage at the Sonisphere Festival in Sofia, Bulgaria and will broadcast their concert in high-definition to cinemas in 40 countries.

New York based By Experience is the company producing the event which as been dubbed The Big Four. In press announcements promoting the concerts Metallica’s outspoken drummer Lars Ulrich talked about what he felt was a historic moment in rock music:

“Who would have thought that more than 25 years after its inception, thrash metal’s big four would not only still be around and more popular than ever, but will now play together for the first time.”

The live cinema event will be four hours long, which on a Tuesday night shouldn’t pose a problem for most theatres showing the broadcast. In the United States, NCM Fathom is distributing the concert which will be shown in theatres not only on June 22nd, but also at an encore performance on June 24th in specific locations. Tickets are already on sale for USD $18 at a list of theatres eight pages long.

Posted in Alternative Content
Tagged as Anthrax, By Experience, Cineworld, Megadeth, Metallica, NCM Fathom, Slayer, The Big Four

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Cinedigm’s Partnership For FIFA World Cup Makes Sensio

Posted by J. Sperling Reich | June 10, 2010 5:20 pm

Cinedigm Sensio World Cup.jpg Last week Cinedigm announced a partnership with Sensio that will allow them to bring the FIFA World Cup Soccer Tournament being held in South Africa this month to theatres all over the world. What’s more, the matches will be shown live and in 3D.

The press release sent around to promote the partnership was was pretty standard, but there was one sentence that raised a question for me:

“To kick things off, the companies will use Sensio’s technology and Cinedigm’s theatre technology design to bring select matches from this year’s FIFA World Cup Soccer Tournament in Live 3D to hundreds of theatres around the world.”

My curiosity wasn’t necessarily stirred over which of the matches would be shown, because the release goes on to mention they’ll start with the quarterfinals. Instead, I was left wondering what “Sensio’s technology” actually was and how Cinedigm, a leading North American digital cinema integrator, would utilize it to project a live broadcast of a World Cup Soccer game in 3D. The rest of the press release only served to make me even more inquisitive, especially upon reading:

“…Cinedigm’s extensive experience in bringing live 3D sporting events to U.S. theatres through Sensio 3D format and CineLive technology.”

Posted in Alternative Content, Technology
Tagged as Cinedigm, CineLive, FIFA World Cup, Sensio

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Springsteen, Emerging Pictures Team Up For Art House Cinemas and Cancer Research

Posted by J. Sperling Reich | May 27, 2010 4:01 pm

Emerging Pictures will be offering non-profit art houses an interesting way to make a few extra dollars this June. The company, which runs the largest digital alternative content theatre network in the United States, is making a special version of Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band’s concert film “London Calling: Live in Hyde Park” for special screenings.

Indie film theatres or community culture centers which have official 501-(c)(3) non-profit status will be able to screen the film for audiences up to three times between June 10th and June 21st in advance of the title’s DVD and Blu-Ray release on June 22nd, almost a year to the day that Springsteen performed the concert in London’s Hyde Park.

As a means of offering financial and promotional support for ongoing digital cinema programs, non-profit venues that show the 90 minute film will be allowed to keep 100% of the box office gross. Commercial cinemas are also invited to screen the Springsteen concert film after agreeing to donate box office receipts to The Danny Fund and the Melanoma Research Alliance. The fund was established in 2008 after E Street keyboardist Danny Federici passed away in 2008 due to skin melanoma.

Commenting on the benefit screenings Barry Rebo, co-founder of Emerging Pictures, said:

“With the warm weather just now coming on, it’s especially timely to warn folks about the dangers of the sun. For sheer joyousness, an outdoor Bruce Springstten & The E Street Band experience is perfection.” Read More »

Posted in Alternative Content
Tagged as "London Calling: Live In Hyde Park", Barry Rebo, Bruce Springsteen, Emerging Pictures, The Danny Fund

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Daily Cinema Roundup-Monday 18 May

Posted by Carolyn Giardina | May 18, 2009 8:56 am

regal-entertainment1 –Sony and Regal released a press release this morning, officially announcing that Regal will install the Sony 4K digital projections systems across its entire circuit. (See Celluloid Junkie’s Friday post below on this news).
According to the release, the installation of the systems is expected to take 3-5 years, but the financing is being handled through DCIP. So the question is, when will installations start?
There is still no word on DCIP securing the needed funding to begin its planned wide rollout. DCIP represents AMC, which also plans to deploy Sony technology; as well as Regal and Cinemark.
images1 Sony also reported that approximately 1,500 of the Regal screens will be outfitted for 3D using Sony’s dual-lens adaptor technology.
Amy Miles, Regal Entertainment Group’s incoming chief executive officer, is quoted in the press release as saying: “The rollout of these Sony 4K systems gives Regal the opportunity to utilize the latest technology to provide our patrons the best available presentation. Sony’s state-of-the-art 4K systems produce the highest levels of resolution, contrast and overall image quality.”

–Another example of the growing interest and potential of alternative content, The Financial Times is reporting that a June 25 production of Racine’s Phèdre at London’s National Theatre is to be screened live in 170 cinemas worldwide. Dame Helen Mirren stars in the production, which according to the article is nearly sold out in the d-cinema venues. See the complete article, titled “British Theatre to be Seen Around World,” here

–An interesting feature on CNN Money/Fortune titled “Every Blog Becomes a Cinema” examines a new model of distribution, as well as advertising. SnagFilms aims to distribute documentaries—which have always been challenged to find a theatrical release—on the Internet. The article is here

smpte_logo1 –Call for Papers: SMPTE is seeking proposals for technical papers and tutorials for the 2009 SMPTE Technical Conference & Exhibition, 27-29 October in Hollywood.
The organization is seeking papers on a range of topics including digital cinema exhibition, d-cinema production and post, advancements in film technologies, content security and stereoscopic 3D Imaging.
Interested parties are invited to submit a one-page abstract, no later than June 12. Further details on how to submit a proposal are here

Call for Entries: The Hollywood Post Alliance has issued a call for entries for the Engineering Excellence Award, part of the 4th Annual HPA Awards. The call for entries is now open and will run through July 1. Entrants will be given the opportunity to present their technology during the Engineering Judging Day.
The HPA Awards also accepts entries in categories for compositing, DI/color grading, editing, audio post, as well as for the new Judges Award for Creativity and Innovation in Post Production. For more, see the website here

Posted in Alternative Content, Daily News Roundup, Equipment Vendors
Tagged as DCIP, HPA, National Theatre, Regal, SMPTE, Sony

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Digital Hollywood: Credit Market Starting to Recover

Posted by Carolyn Giardina | May 6, 2009 9:13 pm

A group of 3D industry leaders shared varying opinions on the future of 3D—as well as their latest impressions of the credit market–during a panel yesterday at the Digital Hollywood confab in Los Angeles.

“The market has recovered a little since December,” said James Dix, analyst at Wedbush Morgan Securities. “The credit market is clearly loosening up, although DCIP happening imminently is not likely.”

Cinedigm chairman/CEO Bud Mayo reported: “Cinedigm has already financed $300 million in conversions of digital screens and we expect to start again this summer. The VPFs are a model that is proven and we have the data to support it. Getting our lenders to put up money for a proven model is not that much of a challenge. It is the macro economics that are the challenge.”

Kerner New York’s chairman/CEO Neal Weinstock surprised some while addressed production costs, suggesting that “we think we can get the production budget only about $25,000 higher for 3D than 2D, for episodic TV. Television will be the lion’s share of the 3D business.”

Lenny Lipton predicted that all content would eventually be 3D. “We are seeing the domino effect with 3D. Genre by genre it will become necessary to attract audiences. Animation was the first. It appears that horror will be next.”

Citing the success of 2D blockbuster “The Dark Knight,” Imax’s Greg Foster disagreed, saying “3D is providing a benefit, but I don’t think you have to throw all your eggs in one basket.”

Mayo also doesn’t believe that all movies need to be 3D, but he did promote alternative content. “The opportunity of digital have very little to do with movies–it’s to complement movies. How do you fix the seats that are empty? The opportunity comes with doing other things along with movies.”

As an example, he reported that Cinedigm would be offering concerts as alternative content during the summer.

Foster reported that Imax is up to 90 digital installations. He added that at Imax screenings, the first 15 minutes of upcoming summer release “Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince” would be presented in 3D.

Moderator Marty Shindler of consulting firm The Shindler Perspective offered a screen count update: Over 7,000 digital cinema screens worldwide, 3500 of which are 3D ready.

Posted in Alternative Content, Digital 3D, Digital Cinema
Tagged as Cinedigm, Digital 3D, IMAX, Kerner

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‘Monsters’ Continues to Influence Box Office

Posted by Carolyn Giardina | April 26, 2009 1:21 pm

Dreamworks Animation’s debut stereoscopic 3D title “Monsters Vs. Aliens” raked in another $8.5 million at the US box office this weekend, helping bring its domestic gross to $174.8 million and allowing its international box office to cross the $300 million mark. The film opened March 27 in the US and is the highest grossing film of 2009 to date, both in the domestic and worldwide box office.

A second 3D release, Focus’ “Coraline,” also sits in the US box office’s top 10 for the year so far. At number nine, the Henry Selick-directed stop-motion title has earned just shy of $75 million.

For other recent 3D releases: Lionsgate’s “My Bloody Valentine 3D” has taken in $51.5 million in the domestic market; and Disney’s 3D only release “Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience” earned $19.1 from roughly 1200 3-D screens.

In contrast to the Jonas release, Disney’s 3D “Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus Best of Both Worlds Concert” earned $65.5 million on only 650 screens in 2008. What factor or factors caused this difference? Was it the popularity of Miley Cyrus? Was it the fact that the “Hannah Montana” movie opened the day after the live concert tour wrapped, and was therefore considered more of an “event?”

–In this weekend’s US box office news, Screen Gems’ Beyonce Knowles starrer “Obsessed” led the pack, opening with $28.5 million.

But perhaps more notable is that “Earth”—the debut documentary from Disney’s new Disneynature banner—finished in the No. 5 slot with $8.6 million for the weekend. The movie opened last Wednesday and the five-day cum is $14.2 million. The result seems underscore the potential of digital documentary/alternative content. Disneynature launched in 2008 with a slate of nature documentaries. At the time, Disney chairman Dick Cook said 3D was a possibility for future Disneynature releases.

“Earth” is the first title from producer-director Alastair Fothergill (BBC and Discovery Channel’s “Planet Earth”), who has multipicture deal with Disneynature.

Announced productions under the new banner include “Oceans” and “Orangutans: One Minute to Midnight.” Both are slated for a 2010 release.

Posted in Alternative Content, Digital 3D

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Front Row Report: Beer Wars - A Live NCM World Premier

Posted by Patrick von Sychowski | April 17, 2009 9:59 pm

This report just in from our friend and colleague Jerry Pierce:

Beer Wars - A Live NCM World Premier

Jerry Pierce April 17, 2009

National Cinemedia (NCM) that runs “Fathom” a “live” to the theater network for single play events. They have Concerts, The Met, Performing Arts, Anime, etc. Cinemedia’s main business is advertising for many theaters. But Fathom seems to be their new baby - below is the list of upcoming shows.

Enjoy one of our upcoming shows

MET – The Audition April 19, 2009

This American Life – LIVE! April 23, 2009

Death Note L: change the World – subtitled April 29, 2009

Death Note L: change the World – overdubbed April 30, 2009

Dr. Laura “In Praise of Mom” LIVE May 5, 2009

Dr. Laura “In Praise of Mom” ENCORE May 6, 2009

This American Life ENCORE May 7, 2009

MET – La Cenerentola LIVE May 9, 2009

DCI 2009: The Countdown May 13, 2009

MET – La Cenerentola ENCORE May 20, 2009

Glenn Beck’s Common Sense Tour LIVE June 4, 2009

Glenn Beck’s Common Sense Tour ENCORE June 11, 2009

So I decided to attend the “World Premier” of “Beer Wars” held last night. (Never mind that I am getting involved in Beer Making … that’s a different story.) I attended a CineMark Theater in Northern California at 8 pm. Well, first off it was not LIVE, it was delayed. Not that it would matter much, but if you are attending a live broadcast it should appear to be live. The theater was the same one that housed “Monsters vs Aliens.” Seemed right, the rest of the screens at this location are still film.

So they got a late start - seems the DVR recording of the show didn’t work right and they had technical difficulty - did I mention it was supposed to give the IMPRESSION of being live? Funny seeing the EchoStar’s DVR interface on a 50 foot screen.

They the show finally started. They did not use the big projector! It was the little NCM advertising projector. Not a bad image, but the masking was set for 1.85 and the broadcast was 16:9 (1.77) so the top/bottom was cut off - not even in safe title - many of the titles got lost in the bottom masking. The projector was dim - but not bad. The contrast ratio was muddy to say the least. I mean really, who needs black? I was pleased that the silver screen did not have a noticeable hot spot, then again maybe you can’t have a hot spot with a dim projector (not).

They did show a live question/answer session with the film makers after the show. It was clear the LA premier was sparsely attended and there were about 50 people in my 500 seat theater. Lots of space to spread out. They charged $15 which was a $5 up fee from their normal presentation charge. Did not look like a money maker to me.

Finally, the presentation crashed at the end. Another 50 foot error screen with audio continuing in the background. I didn’t ask for my money back, but if this is their idea of a live, quality event - they had better go back to the drawing board and re-think the experience.

—-

Jerry Pierce

jerry {at} jerrypierce.org

Posted in Alternative Content
Tagged as Beer Wars, Jerry Pierce, NCM Fathom

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Opera Industry Voices Concern Over Movie Theatre Broadcasts

Posted by J. Sperling Reich | February 19, 2009 7:11 am

Many who know me are aware what a big opera buff I am. I’ve held a subscription to the Los Angeles Opera’s annual season for at least the past five years, and when I travel I make a point of trying to see an opera in each city I visit. But when CJ’s co-editor Patrick Von Sychovski forwarded me an article from last Friday’s New York Times about operas being screened in cinemas around the world I was a little ambivalent. Why did we need another article about how wonderful it is operas are reaching the masses through movie theatres? Especially the umpteenth article from the Times about the successful Metropolitan Opera program. We get it; opera is the new black, it’s the greatest thing to happen to movie theatres since the invention of the popcorn kernel. What more could we possibly learn about operas being shown in movie theatres?!

Apparently. . . quite a lot.

In fact, the article by Daniel J. Wakin’s article advanced the story of showing operas in cinemas quite a bit and went deeper than simply rehashing the successful program offered by the Met. Back in June of 2008, at Opera America’s annual conference of opera professionals, several managers and artists actually complained about the Met’s ongoing dalliance with streaming its performances into movie theatres. Wakin’s writes:

The dissenters say that the movement will lead to more conservative programming; that the voice will become subservient to appearance; that listeners will be trained to hear something electronic and lose an appreciation for a live experience.

Some worry that vocal training will change, de-emphasizing the ability to project, and that the Met’s effort is a deal with the Devil, because it will divert audiences from local opera houses to make the easier, cheaper trip to the mall.

Posted in Alternative Content
Tagged as Metropolitan Opera, New York Times, Opera, Opera America, Peter Gelb

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Cinedigm Scores Big With Live 3D Broadcast of NBA All-Star Event

Posted by J. Sperling Reich | February 16, 2009 11:47 am

Cinedigm Live 3D NBA All Star Poster On Satruday evening Cinedigm continued its ongoing effort to bring popular sporting events in 3D to North American movie theatres by broadcasting the NBA All-Star Saturday Night to more than 80 venues in the U.S. and Canada. Since this type of alternative content is all the rage these days I decided it was high time to check out what all the buzz was about. I’m quite happy I did.

Previous Cinedigm live 3D events were allegedly riddled with technical problems. At the Fedex BCS National Championship Game in January the transmission often flipped the left eye and right eye causing theatre patrons to instinctively rip their 3D glasses off so as not to become nauseas. There were tons of walkouts at theatres that chose to show the event.

I would have assumed that Valentine’s Day would have provided stiff competition for Cinedigm in attracting patrons to the event, but at the Mann Chinese 6 in Hollywood, almost every one of the 290 seats were occupied. Tickets for the event were a steep $20, though that didn’t seem to deter diehard NBA fans. In fact, it wasn’t hard to spot fans milling about in the parking lot of the Hollywood+Highland complex on their way into the theatre; they were the ones wearing their favorite team’s jerseys.

Fan Expectations

Though I’m not all that knowledgable about the NBA All-Star game, I was lucky enough to find a seat smack dab in the center of the theatre next to Bradley Bandara, a 24-year-old Portland Trailblazers fan. Bandara learned about the 3D livecast on SportsIllustrated.com and decided to drive the 40 miles from his home to attend. (Others I spoke with drove between 5 miles and 30 miles to get to the theatre). Bandara is such a huge fan of pro-basketball that he used to hold viewing parties of the All-Star Saturday Night festivities when he was in high school.

Posted in Alternative Content, Digital 3D
Tagged as Brad Carroll, Bud Mayo, Cinedigm, CineLive, Live 3D, NBA, Pace, RealD, TNT

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