Hong Kong—Sep 9, 2009
Working Title Choose GDC Server for New Screening Room
Working Title, a leading UK producer, has opted for GDC Technology (“GDC”)’s SA-2100A digital cinema server for its new screening room facility in London’s Marylebone theatre. The installation marks the completion of the 45-seat screening room, which features both conventional 35mm and modern digital cinema.
The theatre was designed and fitted out by London-based Future Projections, who has produced similar rooms for Firmdale Hotels, The Courthouse, Curzon, Empire, Picture House cinemas, and many others. In addition to GDC’s SA-2100A digital cinema server, Kinoton’s FP30D film projectors and a Barco DP1500 DLP were adopted in this project. “The room at Working Title was a challenge – fitting in film, D cinema and 45 seats without any compromises meant pushing the boundaries of both the room and the technology. We’re delighted with the results,” said Future Projections’ Peter Hall.
“The GDC is far more intuitive to use,” said Working Title’s Tony Reid, technical manager for the new theatre. “The operator screen is (at last!) decent sized, the menu structure straightforward and the unit incredibly stable and robust. Features such as hot swappable drives, inbuilt loading slot and DVD interfaces give the unit not only more flexibility but also a reliable recovery mechanism to prevent loss of shows in the event of a drive failure”.
The choice of GDC was brought about by a newly forged relationship between GDC and Future Projections, who will offer first line support as well as the location of service exchange units in London. “We have always liked GDC – great product, competitive pricing, but most important of all, excellent support – Dr. Chong and his team are really pro active; on top of providing technical support, they are actively involved in sharing the long- term experience together with their customers”.
Another GDC installation in the pipeline is the new Curzon HMV joint development in London’s Wimbledon, designed to be fully automated and remotely programmed. “Storage here was the key,” said Mick Steven, technical manager for Curzon. “Alternative options offered us only minimal storage per screen, meaning that we’d be loading and reloading DCPs often. The 2Tb per screen and 8Tb show library offered by GDC eliminate this need altogether. Adding this to the user-friendliness of the units, the strong UK support and the keen pricing offered by Future Projections, the choice of GDC was an obvious decision – they are even providing us with a complete spare server for the first few months’ of operation”.
GDC is one of the top digital cinema server manufacturers with more than 2000 servers installed to-date. “GDC is pleased to add high profile Future Projections to our growing list of high quality cinema dealers,” said Dr. Man-Nang CHONG, founder and CEO of GDC Technology. “We are grateful to London-based Future Projections for being one of GDC’s earliest resellers in UK. GDC is fully commitment to high-quality manufacturing and continuous innovation in bringing advance features to the digital cinema industry; we look forward to many years of rewarding partnership with Future Projections in the future.”
