10 ms·

First LED cinema screen in the U.S.A. officially opened

39 points by adrian_mrd 9y ago

mtgx 9y ago
Hopefully they won't sell too many of these before they can build Rec. 2100 screens with HDR and much larger color gamut. MicroLED tech would be nice, too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rec._2100 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rec._2100
- amygdyl 9y ago
  According to the page you link, "Rec. 2100 has the same color space as Rec. 2020." This would have been less confusing, because the Recent. 2020 space is already being targeted by the highest end displays.
SuperNinKenDo 9y ago
why would I want to go watch a TV screen at the cinema?
- NotHereNotThere 9y ago
  Because it's still a huge screen with high quality audio? Why would you care how the image gets on the screen of it ends up looking better?
  - matt-attack 9y ago
    On the contrary, the audio is horrible (Yes, I've heard it). Movie screens are perforated to permit "screen speakers" to be positioned directly behind the screen. LED screens do not allow such positioning. The center channel (i.e. where most dialog emanates) is positioned above the top of the screen. This has the effect of disassociating the voice from the speaker and breaking the suspension of disbelief.
    - zaarn 9y ago
      I doubt this will break the suspension of disbelief that easily. People have no problem listening to Movies on crappy stereo or mono on their laptop's display speakers or using crappy 3.5mm earplugs (sometimes with only one plug in the ears).
- TomMarius 9y ago
  Because of its size and because of the sound system, and also because movies are released to cinemas earlier than you can watch them at home?
- ThoAppelsin 9y ago
  This comment implies that the conventional cinema screen setup is more preferable over a TV screen when it comes to watching movies, and I have to agree. Maybe not for other content, but staring against any more powerful illuminating surface in a dark room for 2 hours would strain the eyes too much to be pleasurable.
- ozmbie 9y ago
  This is different to “LED TVs” at home. It’s closer to an OLED TV since each pixel in this cinema screen is individually lit.
- amygdyl 9y ago
  Because with the vastly greater luminance dynamic range, the display reproduces orders if magnitude more distinguishable colours.
skynetv2 9y ago
wont LED screens cause more stress on the eyes than a projection? I hate 3D movies, my eyes feel very tired from the constant refocusing. I think LED screens at this size and in a dark environment would have the same effect.
- modeless 9y ago
  No, why would they?
  - sathackr 9y ago
    Most LEDs have their brightness controlled via PWM, which essentially switches the LED on and off many thousand times per second. You can see this in most LED car taillights if you move your eyes while paying attention to the light -- it will create a 'strobe' effect, a trail of images along the path that it traveled in your field of view. Some people are sensitive to this flicker. A similar thing happens with most DLP projectors.
    - LeoPanthera 9y ago
      Most people could barely perceive the flicker of 60Hz CRT televisions. The kHz refresh of LEDs is not perceptible.
      - sathackr 9y ago
        There are plenty of people[1] that can perceive whatever PWM frequency is typically used in vehicle LED taillights. Like a few the people in the linked forum, the switching in the vertical Cadillac tail lights are particularly visible to me. I agree that when viewed directly, it's quite unlikely anyone can perceive a switching frequency in the thousands of hertz. But if you sit in one of the closer seats, your eyes will be darting back and forth across the screen, which would be enough for that strobe effect to bother me if the frequency is anywhere near what is used in the taillights. [1] https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=45126.0 https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=451...
diminoten 9y ago
The article seems to pitch LED screens as something to upcharge for, which makes me think there isn't really any/enough cost savings for the theater from a "no projection booth" standpoint, but that does surprise me a little. Obviously the costs of paying a person to run the booth isn't high, but perhaps the lower likelihood of something going wrong has its benefits as well. I could see a marketing push for the, "New LED Screen!" but if cinemagoers aren't generally able to notice a substantial difference (or if it's a worse experience, even), then I don't really think people will opt in. After all, even the 3d push has basically died, and that's a substantially different experience.
- TomMarius 9y ago
  Regarding 3D - a lot of people have slightly (or completely, for example me) different eyes. For these people, 3D movies cause headache and it's not a pleasant experience overall - the last time I visited a 3D cinema, I wasn't even able to look at the projection without my eyes hurting, thankfully it was just a short educational sketch.
  - sathackr 9y ago
    What gives me a headache is not being able to control the focus. Normally you can choose to focus on something close or far away. With a 3D screen, the focal point is always the same. Something that's not in focus on the screen can't be brought into focus. The problem is the same for non-3D screens, but they don't bother me(probably because I've been looking at 2D screens my entire life). The added 3D effect is what seems to trigger it for me.
- thrusong 9y ago
  The 14-screen theatre I used to work at as a projectionist doesn't employ anyone to run the projectors anymore- it's all automated.
carlob 9y ago
> which is 14 foot-lamberts (a measure of luminance in cinema). In comparison, the LED screen has a peak brightness level around 300 nits (a measurement of brightness) in case anyone is wondering: https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=300+nits%2F14+footlambert https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=300+nits%2F14+footlamb... more than 6 times the brightness per unit area
- maxerickson 9y ago
  It's mentioned as 88 foot-lambert in the next sentence or 2.
- ThoAppelsin 9y ago
  > [...] which Samsung estimates could display roughly 88 foot-lamberts. Without WA and with more of the article, 88 / 14 approximates 6.29.
- plaguuuuuu 9y ago
  Nice. So now, in addition to being deaf after watching movies at the cinema, I can also be blind as well.
rmason 9y ago
Surprised nobody is pointing out the possible labor savings. No more projectionists. One or two people will be able to remotely run 20,000 screens because it will be mostly automated. Once they fully automate the vending of tickets the only people needed will be those running the concession stand.
- rurban 9y ago
  That's already done. It's called multiplex. The projectionist controlls the 6-35 digital screens in his theatre complex, and the money comes from the foodstand. Since the studios demand too high fees for the movies, theatres have to stay profitable by selling food and drinks. Quality of the movies and the projections sink, but interestingly the quality of the food is rising.
  - chii 9y ago
    > quality of the food is rising. unless you're buying some gold class dining ticket (which tends to cost upwards of 100 dollars), the food (or snacks) is terribly overpriced and quality isn't getting better.
  - antisthenes 9y ago
    Perhaps one day the quality will rise to the level of 'barely adequate for human consumption'
- zaarn 9y ago
  Cinema Projector Rooms are basically fully automated now, there won't be much labor savings. The only labor that goes on in there is when the intern brings in new harddrives with movies once a week.
- tallytarik 9y ago
  This is already true - sort of. Not to the extent that one person can run 20,000 screens, but that also wouldn't be solved by this new LED screen. I'm the lead projectionist for our local 8-screen cinema but there are no times at which I'm specifically 'the projectionist' sitting up in the box, because we run entirely digitally and everything is automated - rather, I'm one of many trained staff who can resolve issues when they arise. The issues that do arise most commonly are related to the media server that play the digital cinema files, and rarely do we have issues with the actual projectors. If we were to use this LED screen, I would assume the rest of the hardware would remain the same, and the new screen would just act as the projector replacement, so I don't think this would solve any of the software issues for which we currently need trained projectionists onsite.

39 points by adrian_mrd 9y ago

mtgx 9y ago

Hopefully they won't sell too many of these before they can build Rec. 2100 screens with HDR and much larger color gamut. MicroLED tech would be nice, too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rec._2100 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rec._2100

amygdyl 9y ago
According to the page you link, "Rec. 2100 has the same color space as Rec. 2020." This would have been less confusing, because the Recent. 2020 space is already being targeted by the highest end displays.

SuperNinKenDo 9y ago

why would I want to go watch a TV screen at the cinema?

NotHereNotThere 9y ago
Because it's still a huge screen with high quality audio? Why would you care how the image gets on the screen of it ends up looking better?
- matt-attack 9y ago
  On the contrary, the audio is horrible (Yes, I've heard it). Movie screens are perforated to permit "screen speakers" to be positioned directly behind the screen. LED screens do not allow such positioning. The center channel (i.e. where most dialog emanates) is positioned above the top of the screen. This has the effect of disassociating the voice from the speaker and breaking the suspension of disbelief.
  - zaarn 9y ago
    I doubt this will break the suspension of disbelief that easily. People have no problem listening to Movies on crappy stereo or mono on their laptop's display speakers or using crappy 3.5mm earplugs (sometimes with only one plug in the ears).
TomMarius 9y ago
Because of its size and because of the sound system, and also because movies are released to cinemas earlier than you can watch them at home?
ThoAppelsin 9y ago
This comment implies that the conventional cinema screen setup is more preferable over a TV screen when it comes to watching movies, and I have to agree. Maybe not for other content, but staring against any more powerful illuminating surface in a dark room for 2 hours would strain the eyes too much to be pleasurable.
ozmbie 9y ago
This is different to “LED TVs” at home. It’s closer to an OLED TV since each pixel in this cinema screen is individually lit.
amygdyl 9y ago
Because with the vastly greater luminance dynamic range, the display reproduces orders if magnitude more distinguishable colours.

skynetv2 9y ago

wont LED screens cause more stress on the eyes than a projection? I hate 3D movies, my eyes feel very tired from the constant refocusing. I think LED screens at this size and in a dark environment would have the same effect.

modeless 9y ago
No, why would they?
- sathackr 9y ago
  Most LEDs have their brightness controlled via PWM, which essentially switches the LED on and off many thousand times per second. You can see this in most LED car taillights if you move your eyes while paying attention to the light -- it will create a 'strobe' effect, a trail of images along the path that it traveled in your field of view. Some people are sensitive to this flicker. A similar thing happens with most DLP projectors.
  - LeoPanthera 9y ago
    Most people could barely perceive the flicker of 60Hz CRT televisions. The kHz refresh of LEDs is not perceptible.
    - sathackr 9y ago
      There are plenty of people[1] that can perceive whatever PWM frequency is typically used in vehicle LED taillights. Like a few the people in the linked forum, the switching in the vertical Cadillac tail lights are particularly visible to me. I agree that when viewed directly, it's quite unlikely anyone can perceive a switching frequency in the thousands of hertz. But if you sit in one of the closer seats, your eyes will be darting back and forth across the screen, which would be enough for that strobe effect to bother me if the frequency is anywhere near what is used in the taillights. [1] https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=45126.0 https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=451...

diminoten 9y ago

The article seems to pitch LED screens as something to upcharge for, which makes me think there isn't really any/enough cost savings for the theater from a "no projection booth" standpoint, but that does surprise me a little. Obviously the costs of paying a person to run the booth isn't high, but perhaps the lower likelihood of something going wrong has its benefits as well. I could see a marketing push for the, "New LED Screen!" but if cinemagoers aren't generally able to notice a substantial difference (or if it's a worse experience, even), then I don't really think people will opt in. After all, even the 3d push has basically died, and that's a substantially different experience.

TomMarius 9y ago
Regarding 3D - a lot of people have slightly (or completely, for example me) different eyes. For these people, 3D movies cause headache and it's not a pleasant experience overall - the last time I visited a 3D cinema, I wasn't even able to look at the projection without my eyes hurting, thankfully it was just a short educational sketch.
- sathackr 9y ago
  What gives me a headache is not being able to control the focus. Normally you can choose to focus on something close or far away. With a 3D screen, the focal point is always the same. Something that's not in focus on the screen can't be brought into focus. The problem is the same for non-3D screens, but they don't bother me(probably because I've been looking at 2D screens my entire life). The added 3D effect is what seems to trigger it for me.
thrusong 9y ago
The 14-screen theatre I used to work at as a projectionist doesn't employ anyone to run the projectors anymore- it's all automated.

carlob 9y ago

> which is 14 foot-lamberts (a measure of luminance in cinema). In comparison, the LED screen has a peak brightness level around 300 nits (a measurement of brightness) in case anyone is wondering: https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=300+nits%2F14+footlambert https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=300+nits%2F14+footlamb... more than 6 times the brightness per unit area

maxerickson 9y ago
It's mentioned as 88 foot-lambert in the next sentence or 2.
ThoAppelsin 9y ago
> [...] which Samsung estimates could display roughly 88 foot-lamberts. Without WA and with more of the article, 88 / 14 approximates 6.29.
plaguuuuuu 9y ago
Nice. So now, in addition to being deaf after watching movies at the cinema, I can also be blind as well.

rmason 9y ago

Surprised nobody is pointing out the possible labor savings. No more projectionists. One or two people will be able to remotely run 20,000 screens because it will be mostly automated. Once they fully automate the vending of tickets the only people needed will be those running the concession stand.

rurban 9y ago
That's already done. It's called multiplex. The projectionist controlls the 6-35 digital screens in his theatre complex, and the money comes from the foodstand. Since the studios demand too high fees for the movies, theatres have to stay profitable by selling food and drinks. Quality of the movies and the projections sink, but interestingly the quality of the food is rising.
- chii 9y ago
  > quality of the food is rising. unless you're buying some gold class dining ticket (which tends to cost upwards of 100 dollars), the food (or snacks) is terribly overpriced and quality isn't getting better.
- antisthenes 9y ago
  Perhaps one day the quality will rise to the level of 'barely adequate for human consumption'
zaarn 9y ago
Cinema Projector Rooms are basically fully automated now, there won't be much labor savings. The only labor that goes on in there is when the intern brings in new harddrives with movies once a week.
tallytarik 9y ago
This is already true - sort of. Not to the extent that one person can run 20,000 screens, but that also wouldn't be solved by this new LED screen. I'm the lead projectionist for our local 8-screen cinema but there are no times at which I'm specifically 'the projectionist' sitting up in the box, because we run entirely digitally and everything is automated - rather, I'm one of many trained staff who can resolve issues when they arise. The issues that do arise most commonly are related to the media server that play the digital cinema files, and rarely do we have issues with the actual projectors. If we were to use this LED screen, I would assume the rest of the hardware would remain the same, and the new screen would just act as the projector replacement, so I don't think this would solve any of the software issues for which we currently need trained projectionists onsite.