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IMAX vs. IMAX 70mm: The difference between these two cinema formats

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Re: IMAX vs. IMAX 70mm: The difference between these two cinema formats

#91

Post by gamblor956 »

MetaWhirledPeas wrote: post #78
derbOac wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a complaint about your post but this stuff about film formats and aspect ratios has always had me scratching my head. For years I heard people arguing that wider aspect ratios were preferable because they afforded a wider view, and that narrower aspect ratios were too restrictive horizontally. This always seemed confusing to me because theoretically they should allow for more vertical space for the same width. No…

> For years I heard people arguing that wider aspect ratios were preferable because they afforded a wider view > Now we're being told the opposite. I agree with you, but I must also make a special case for IMAX 70mm. It's about the seating position. What we call IMAX 70mm now, was once just "IMAX" and its gimmick was a floor-to-ceiling wall-to-wall screen with a relatively close seating position, such that the viewer…

Nolan used Imax 70mm cameras to film some scenes in the Dark Knight Rises, like the plane scene to open the movie. Dunkirk and Interstellar used 65mm IMAX cameras.

Re: IMAX vs. IMAX 70mm: The difference between these two cinema formats

#92

Post by drob518 »

tshaddox wrote: post #75
derbOac wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a complaint about your post but this stuff about film formats and aspect ratios has always had me scratching my head. For years I heard people arguing that wider aspect ratios were preferable because they afforded a wider view, and that narrower aspect ratios were too restrictive horizontally. This always seemed confusing to me because theoretically they should allow for more vertical space for the same width. No…

Aspect ratio by itself tells you very little about the theatrical viewing experience. What really matters is the "angular image size," i.e. the horizontal and vertical angle that the image fills in your field of view. This is determined by the aspect ratio of the image, but also critically the size of the screen and the distance from the screen to the viewer. 1.43 IMAX screens are really really big and fill more of y…

I chuckle at the thought of going back to letterboxing with people arguing that “we need to see the top and bottom of the frame, like the director intended!” What’s old is new again. Are hemlines up or down this year? Skinny jeans or baggy?

Re: IMAX vs. IMAX 70mm: The difference between these two cinema formats

#93

Post by gamblor956 »

In the LA area, both Regal and AMC have a number of IMAX 70mm theaters. Universal City AMC and Irvine Spectrum Regal both have the biggest IMAX screens. TCL in Hollywood has the next biggest. The downtown Regal and Burbank AMC are in the third tier (bit still very large).

All of these theaters have IMAX 70mm film projectors.

Re: IMAX vs. IMAX 70mm: The difference between these two cinema formats

#94

Post by BuildTheRobots »

KaiserPro wrote: post #85
qingcharles wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

18K seems high. I did some tests for Universal once and we pulled 10K from some 70mm IMAX ride prints. 8K was solid, 10K was very borderline.

I'm trying to remember what resolution we rendered two face for when it went into imax. This was using 32bit renderman, and it was constantly OOM'ing because we were really pushing it. I seem to recall that we rendered out at 7k, even though the optical resolution was meant to be 12k.

I wonder if the render resolution was actually determined by the output resolution of the film recorder being used to get the sfx out onto film for display? I can't obviously find a film recorder that offers more than 8k on 65mm/15-perf.

As I've not seen anyone else mention it, I feel the need to point out that Digital IMAX (which is the vast majority of screens and showings) maxes out at 4K.

Re: IMAX vs. IMAX 70mm: The difference between these two cinema formats

#95

Post by akamaka »

lemoncookiechip wrote: post #6

This is purely my opinion. I see 70mm as mostly a movie scam to extort exorbitant amounts of cash from a ticket for something that's vaguely noticeable outside the aspect ratio itself. Note that I'm not disputing that there is a visual difference, there is, the image is clearer, shaper, with better darks, but the entry fee paired with how out of the way 70mm is, it's just ends up feeling like FOMO. My opinion doesn't…

I feel the opposite way. Seeing movies in IMAX is the only reason I still go to the cinema, and it’s maybe the best $20 I spend each year.

Re: IMAX vs. IMAX 70mm: The difference between these two cinema formats

#96

Post by musictubes »

mariusmg wrote: post #29

>To understand IMAX, it helps to know how movies are captured in the first place. Many are shot digitally, as it's cheaper and more convenient than using film. However, many filmmakers still want, well, film The illogical part about this process is that they convert the shot film to digital, they add CGI and color correction and then they print back the digital version to....film. So the whole point of shooting a Hol…

Shooting film is a different production process than digital. Shot times, color reproduction, dynamic range, the size of the equipment, etc. all impact how movies are shot. Even acting is impacted due to each take having tangible costs. Limitations on how many cameras you can use also changes how you go about shooting.

The beauty of analog production, whether cine, still, or audio, revolves around working with and around the limitations of the process. Yes, when all we had was film/tape we dreamed of being set free of the many limitations of the media. Restrictions do force decisions though and many artists feel more inspired working within limitations. All that’s to say that the choice to do things in the analog realm impact how things are made and therefore has an impact on the final product even if post and display are done digitally. Cinema as an art form is due in no small part to how you work with film.

Re: IMAX vs. IMAX 70mm: The difference between these two cinema formats

#97

Post by KaiserPro »

tshaddox wrote: post #84
dbspin wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every film is colour corrected and graded digitally (in addition to all the special effects and compositing work), and this is in fact one of the cheapest parts of the process. So no, it's not remotely a consideration.

Not every film. It was widely reported that Oppenheimer was color graded photochemically, and the 65mm film physically spliced (the editor of course worked in Avid with digital film scans). This means that 70 mm screenings were projecting a fully analog end-to-end pipeline. The exception, of course, is the visual effects shots, which went through a digital intermediary. The same seems to be true of The Odyssey, altho…

> It was widely reported that Oppenheimer was color graded photochemically,

So I'm deeply sceptical of this. There was a DI colourist in the colour department and the editorial had a digital conform team and a colourist.

I'm sure there was some photochemcial fiddling. but it was all conformed digitally and lasered out to be finished.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15398776/fullcredits/?ref_=tt_c...

Photochemical grading is hard and really sucks compared to DI. especially if you are trying to put in a butt tone of VFX.

Re: IMAX vs. IMAX 70mm: The difference between these two cinema formats

#98

Post by aulit »

fsh wrote: post #9

IMHO, the only reasons for using 70 mm IMAX are nostalgia and marketing. Digital movie cameras have far better color reproduction, more dynamic range, zero frame jitter, and plenty of resolution without grain. They are also small and silent which allows far more interesting shots than what is possible with a 70 mm monster. Kubrick and Lean used 70 mm because it was the best technology available at the time. Today, th…

Digital cinema projectors are mostly stuck to narrow colour spaces so most often than not people will have better colours on film projections rather than digital. Same thing for dynamic range. Keep in mind that DCP standards have really not been updated since like 2010.

Re: IMAX vs. IMAX 70mm: The difference between these two cinema formats

#99

Post by SirMaster »

davidferguson wrote: post #14

If you want a very in depth technical look at the differences between IMAX 70mm, 70mm and 35mm for _The Odyssey_, I wrote an article about this last month. https://www.theppt.org/rewind/articles/where-can-you-watch-t... But here are my nit-picks from the article linked here. I'm only commenting on the 15/70mm IMAX parts, because I'm not knowledgable enough about the digital IMAX foramats. > The extra resolution, up t…

I am not even sure why the theoretical resolution matters when they seem to have so much trouble pulling focus on the actors on an old film camera like the IMAX cameras they use to where the footage is fairly blurry in a lot of cases.

If they used a 6.5K or 8K digital cinema camera they would get all the advanced autofocus abilities those camera have nowadays to keep the actors sharply focused and would end up with more detail in the end.

Re: IMAX vs. IMAX 70mm: The difference between these two cinema formats

#100

Post by SirMaster »

xdertz wrote: post #48
derbOac wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a complaint about your post but this stuff about film formats and aspect ratios has always had me scratching my head. For years I heard people arguing that wider aspect ratios were preferable because they afforded a wider view, and that narrower aspect ratios were too restrictive horizontally. This always seemed confusing to me because theoretically they should allow for more vertical space for the same width. No…

You can also watch 1.43:1 in a virtual cinema in VR.

Pretty much no movies are released in that aspect except like justice league Snyder cut.
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