Although this past year saw the continued evolution of both Kodak and Fujifilm’s motion picture stocks and the emergence of additional DV capture formats such as HDV, the watershed news may just be on the exhibition side.

Under specifications outlined last summer by Digital Cinema Initiatives – a consortium of the studio majors including Disney, Fox, MGM, Paramount, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Universal and Warner Bros. – there has been a flurry of D-cinema rollout plans for 2006.

DCI’s primary purpose, according to its mission statement, is to ‘establish and document voluntary specifications for an open architecture for digital cinema that ensures a uniform and high level of technical performance, reliability and quality control.’

While it took three years for the announcement of its D-Cinema white paper, it was a matter of months before both Christie/AIX and Thomson inked deals with major studios from Disney to Sony Pictures that could see digital projection systems in potentially 20,000 screens across North America over the next 10 years.

Perhaps the most important recent event was the commitment made by the U.S.’s third-largest exhibitor, Carmike Cinemas, to a conversion to 2K DCI-compliant Christie DLP Cinema projectors beginning in January 2006, with plans to be in 2,300 theaters by Oct. 31, 2007.

None of this, of course, means film is going anywhere. A quick scan of the accompanying chart reminds us that both Kodak, with its additions to the Vision family, and Fujifilm’s unveiling of the Eterna stocks have kept the motion picture manufacturers the providers of choice for image capture.

From big-budget tentpole features such as The Chronicles of Narnia to high-profile Quebec shows like Maurice Richard and C.R.A.Z.Y., to Canuck series This Is Wonderland, Kodak film stocks were the weapon of choice.

The astonishing detail, textures and complex motion of Weta Digital’s CG King Kong could not have been married seamlessly back into a film negative without the qualities of the Vision stocks.

‘The Vision 2 products are designed to work within the digital space,’ notes Johanna Gravelle, sales manager, origination for Kodak Canada. ‘[They’re meant] for the hybrid approach – meaning the capture on film, going through a [digital intermediate], and then out to film again. So we’re already well positioned for digital projection because we believe that the best capture medium is film. If you have the information [on the negative], you can pull out of it whatever you choose to.’

Similarly, cinematographers chose Fuji’s Eterna family for a variety of projects, from George Romero’s Toronto-shot zombie pic Land of the Dead to the fourth installment of the remarkably durable Les Boys franchise.

‘We developed Eterna for a multitude of reasons: ultra-fine grain, additional DI characteristics, and outstanding color balance, from highlights to shadows,’ says Graeme Parcher, Fujifilm Canada’s senior director, sales, motion picture, professional magnetic and computer media products. ‘There was a pent-up demand for improvements to these characteristics – primarily driven by our competitor Kodak’s success with their Vision 2 lineup.’

With all the Kong mania over the holidays, it’s easy to forget 2005 also marked the final chapter in George Lucas’ Star Wars saga with the Revenge of the Sith, shot on the Sony HDC-F950. That was also the camera of choice for Robert Rodriguez’s adaptation of Frank Miller’s graphic novel Sin City, while the Sony/Panavision Genesis takes flight in Bryan Singer’s Superman Returns, due for a June release.

Panasonic continues to be a popular choice for reality shows, with the AJ-SDX900 being used on The Bachelor and S.O.S. Beauté, and while the debut season of Canuck drama series Robson Arms used the same camera, the producers plan to go HD for season two. Meanwhile, the AG-DVX100 line got a big brother for Christmas in the much-anticipated AG-HVX200 with its tapeless HD option (see story, p. 20).

Hollywood directors Michael Mann and David Fincher continue to be the main evangelists of the Thomson Grass Valley Viper FilmStream digital camera, and each has high-profile projects in the production pipeline. Mann revisits his 1980s series Miami Vice in a feature, with Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx bringing Crockett and Tubbs into the new millennium. Fincher has test-driven the Viper on a number of commercial spots, but he’s sure to put it through its paces on Zodiac, a feature-length thriller based on the Zodiac killer murders in San Francisco in the 1960s.

KODAK STOCKS
Feature Films
Bon Cop, Bad Cop
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
Un Dimanche à Kigali
Fido
King Kong
Maurice Richard
Skinwalkers
TV Series and MOWs
Degrassi: The Next Generation
Instant Star
The Man Who Lost Himself
Slings and Arrows
Terry
This Is Wonderland

FUJIFILM STOCKS
Feature Films
Les Boys IV
Cake
The Cleaner
Horloge biologique
In the Land of Women
Land of the Dead
TV Series and MOWs
Deadly Water
Doomstown
Earthstorm
The Hades Factor
Killer Instinct
Masters of Horror
Secret Santa

SONY
Feature Films
Scary Movie 4 (HDCAM SR, Sony/Panavision Genesis)
Sin City (HDC-F950)
Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith (HDC-F950)
Superman Returns (Sony/Panavision Genesis)
TV Series and MOWs
Battlestar Galactica (HDCAM)
The L Word (HDCAM)
Last Mysteries of the Titanic (HDW-F900)
Lost Innocents (HVR-Z1U HDV)
The Lynching of Louie Sam (partly shot on DSR-PD150)
Smallville (HDCAM)
Whistler (HDCAM)

PANASONIC
TV Series and MOWs
The Bachelor (AJ-SDX900, DVCPRO50)
Baise Majesté (AJ-SDX900)
The Dresden Files (AJ-HDC27 Varicam)
Histoire de Bernard Landry (DVX100)
Melo Maniac (AJ-SDX900)
Missing (AJ-HDC27 VariCam)
Négotiateur (AJ-HDC27 VariCam)
Ricardo (AJ-SDX900)
S.O.S. Beauté (AJ-SDX900)
Sangay (AJ-HDC27 VariCam)

THOMSON VIPER
Feature Films
Domino (partial; also 35mm)
Highlander: The Source
Miami Vice (principal photography; also using Sony HDW-F900 and 35mm)
Zodiac
TV Series
Everybody Hates Chris
Terminal City

www.thomsongrassvalley.com
www.Kodak.ca
www.fujifilm.ca
www.panasonic.ca
www.sony.ca