San Francisco—Dec 15, 2004
Dolby Announces More Than 500 Successful Digital Cinema Screenings
Seven Major Motion Pictures Mastered in DCI-Specified MXF File Format
Dolby announced today that it has made
significant accomplishments this year in digital cinema, having successfully
completed more than 500 Dolby® Digital Cinema presentations at multiple
commercial theaters in the Bay Area. Dolby Digital Cinema is the company’s
implementation of the Digital Cinema Initiatives’ (DCI) specification. The
company also announced that it has now mastered seven feature films in the
DCI-specified MXF file format.
During the last quarter of 2004, Dolby conducted demonstrations of its Dolby
Digital Cinema system to major studios and exhibitors. At the same time,
multiple beta sites were installed close to Dolby headquarters in San Francisco.
Dolby’s system was used to screen the DCI Standard Evaluation Material (StEM) at
CineAsia this week.
Dolby continues to lead initiatives within the motion picture industry designed
to facilitate the implementation of digital cinema in theaters across the globe,
as well as to ensure that vendors abide by DCI specifications for
interoperability.
To that end, Dolby has been actively involved in the MPEG interoperability
initiative, which has the goal of ensuring that all vendors are MXF capable by
the first quarter of 2005. The MXF file format was established as an industry
standard, set forth by DCI for mastering digital films. Dolby is the first
vendor to date that can play movies in this format.
Also part of digital cinema is the image compression component of digitally
mastering films. Recently, Dolby compressed seven major feature films for
digital cinema presentation, including The Incredibles, The Polar Express,
Alexander, Shark Tale, Ocean’s 12, THX 1138, and the upcoming The Phantom of the
Opera.
“We’re extremely pleased with the advancements Dolby has made this year for
digital cinema,” said Tim Partridge, Senior Vice President and General Manager,
Professional Division, Dolby Laboratories. “As a leading proponent of the DCI
recommendations, we’re confident that studios, exhibitors, and audiences alike
will benefit from our system, which is of extremely high quality and easy to
use.