Atlab Image & Sound Technology will demonstrate Dolby(r) 3D Digital Cinema with the first-ever Australian preview of U2 3D – the eagerly awaited 3D film of classic rock band U2’s Vertigo concert tour – at ICAA 2008, the Independent Cinemas Association of Australia conference, on Wednesday 27th February.
Dolby(r) 3D Digital Cinema is projected using a standard digital projector that can also be used for conventional 2D presentations. Unlike other 3D systems, Dolby(r) 3D Digital Cinema does not require a silver screen for projection.
Furthermore, no corrective pre-processing or additional colour correction is required for Dolby(r) 3D Digital Cinema, and so distributors benefit from the ability to master and distribute a single digital file that can be played in both 3D and 2D sites.
Leading 3D and Digital Cinema supplier Atlab Image & Sound Technology will install the projection system especially for this event. The screening will be introduced by Ben Wilson, AI&ST’s National Sales & Marketing Manager. The film, supplied by Roadshow Films, will be played on a Dolby(r) DSS/DSP100 server, and projected at full DCI-compliant 2K resolution on a Christie CP2000 digital projector fitted with a Dolby(r) filter wheel controller.
U2 3D is recognised as the world’s first feature-length, all live action production to be presented in Digital 3D. With impeccable sound quality (full Dolby(r) 5.1 Digital surround sound), cinema has never been so immersive. One review reports that ‘While still offering plenty of footage of the rapturous crowd, the film puts you exactly where you want to be at a concert: as close as possible to the performers.’
More than a hundred hours of footage of the rock band was shot for the film, using eight stereo pairs of Sony CineAlta F950 digital cameras. Concerts at seven different South American venues during the group’s 2006 Vertigo Tour were filmed including one audience-free session staged to film band close-ups. Two separate shows were filmed in Melbourne purely for crowd shots.
U2 3D is set for general release in Australia on 10th April.
3D Digital Cinema is the fastest growing section of the cinema market world-wide, with 21 D-cinema sites now in Australia and New Zealand, all of them 3D capable. The first Dolby(r) 3D site was at Reading Courtenay, Wellington New Zealand, and additional Dolby(r) 3D sites will soon be supplied and installed by Atlab Image & Sound Technology in Sydney, Perth and New Zealand.
Atlab Image & Sound Technology is working with Greater Union on a project to fully digitalise all screens in GU’s flagship cinema in George Street, Sydney.
Atlab’s Director of Digital Cinema, Paul Johnson, said, ‘with the large number of 3D releases coming through in late 2008 and 2009, this technology is really set to enhance the audience’s cinema experience.’
Atlab Image & Sound Technology has a long record as the leading cinema supply company in the region, providing first class solutions to the exhibition industry in Film Cinema with technical services in every state in Australia and New Zealand: it continues to lead the industry in Electronic Cinema Digital Cinema and 3D portfolios.
[release from Atlab]