Paramount no longer using film for movies

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

The back-up is a film copy (ironically).

I imagine that it'll drive Hardoop development forward. I understand that a really big digital film print is 300GB, so archiving the final is not going to be a problem. It'll be the raw footage that will present issues. If they're averaging 150GB for the final and shooting 10:1, then they'll need 1.7PB for a production and three times that for safe backup.

India averages 1,200 films per year overall, and I imagine that the big American studios will be managing a tenth of that each. So it seems to me that they're looking at 500PB per year. Depending on how they go about it, that could cost them no more than they currently spend on physical archiving, when you think about the infrastructure they need to protect film.

What's more, it will only get cheaper, so long as the storage companies keep extending the life of Moore's law.

😉

 

[VertovSvilova]

The back-up is a film copy (ironically).

Kodak introduced a new asset film just a year or two ago: http://motion.kodak.com/motion/Products/Archive/index.htm

Last year I spoke with a friend in the industry in Burbank and she said that "sticking a film master in the salt mine" is still the preferred method and is the least expensive when it comes to archiving a digitally captured motion picture.

Here's an article from 2007: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/23/business/media/23steal.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

Here's an article from 2007

Useful information. However, did anyone notice the following ironic error...

"Much of the resulting data may be no more worth saving that the misspellings and awkward phrases deleted from a newspaper reporter’s word-processing screen. "

😀

 

[Photo_Smith]

Did anyone here notice, that all pictures on this site are delivered digitally? Even those, where the poster states (but without prove), that it had been shot on film?

Film must certainly be dead a long time...

That's factually correct although you should note that even though they may be transmitted digitally they are rendered on a screen though analogue means.
There is no such thing as being able to see a digital photo, it is only digital when stored, if you want to see it it must be converted.

 

[Photo_Smith]

I imagine that it'll drive Hardoop development forward. I understand that a really big digital film print is 300GB, so archiving the final is not going to be a problem.

A 300GB file doesn't sound much, neither does a Petabyte, what is important to realise it isn't the one off cost of the data storage but the on going cost that makes digital archival so expensive.
Some of the new HD 8K systems are using data rates of 20-55Gb/s which will use the 1TB drive you bought from new egg for $50 in a very short time.
Moores law is not applicable to this situation because more is involved than the initial cost of the media, coupled to that the ever changing technologies add expense to long term storage are making the situation harder.

Ask an archivist how much it will cost for:

Storing 10,000 ft of film in a vault to 25 years.

Storing 500Gb of data for 25 years

Report back to us the cost.

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

though they may be transmitted digitally they are rendered on a screen though analogue means.

Are you absolutely sure you want to go with that? 😀

Report back to us the cost.

Yes, you're absolutely right on that. I didn't know about the "salt mine storage" before I looked into it a bit further.

On the other hand, if you're originating digitally, the only way to use the lower cost storage solution is to print the digital frames down to film, which is probably a good idea for the master but what about the out-takes? Still, the world of professional film production is a place where different cost/benefits rule. 😉

 

[willie_901]

How many feet of magnetic tape are required to store a a lossless gigabyte of data?

Would you believe 1 GB/ square inch? And data is more stable with tape storage (in salt mines). With current technology the heads don't even touch the tape. Archiving large volumes digital data is not an issue.

 

[Photo_Smith]

Are you absolutely sure you want to go with that? 😀

Absolutely all the photographs you see, prints on screen whatever have gone though a D/A converter:
http://computer.howstuffworks.com/monitor3.htm

You can't see digital information, it needs to be made human readable and to do that it must be made into an analogue form (as your picture clearly shows)

 

[Photo_Smith]

How many feet of magnetic tape are required to store a a lossless gigabyte of data?

Would you believe 1 GB/ square inch? And data is more stable with tape storage (in salt mines). With current technology the heads don't even touch the tape. Archiving large volumes digital data is not an issue.

How much digital data can you store on film? massively more. You can fit several times that on film storing 1 as a dot and 0 as a 'gap' recorded on a film with a high DQE would mean 160x10 to the power of 6 bits per cm squared.

Magnetic tape is a poor long term storage medium as being magnetic it suffers from time degradation and print through, there is the natural magnetic field of the earth that also complicates matters.
Here is a primer:
http://www.minidisc.org/dat_archiving.html

Medium term storage is fine, tape is also good for incremental back up as it is quote robust in the short term–long term? Well all the DigiBeta mags at the archive I know were transferred long ago.

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

Absolutely all the photographs you see, prints on screen whatever have gone though a D/A converter:

Well, that's not entirely true. I use a laptop and the data remains digital right up to when the LCD pixcel twists on (or off). The same applies with other screens because I use HDMI connectors.

On the other hand, you could argue that there's no such thing as digital because the data on a bus has finite rise and fall times, while data in RAM is dependent on the gap between the capacitor's charge and discharge states.

Of course, a CCD sensor pixcel is an analogue device and you move over into the digital world when you read out the buffer, if you accept that the very act of reading the buffer is a digital process, where the same arguments as above apply.

It all depends on where you draw your many lines, I suppose. 😀

 

[Photo_Smith]

Well, that's not entirely true. I use a laptop and the data remains digital right up to when the LCD pixcel twists on (or off).

I'm afraid your'e mistaken. Even HDMI and DVI go through a A/D converter before they toggle your pixel on or off.
I idea of 0 and 1 toggling the individual pixels in the array is amusing though–that just doesn't happen.
Also you might like to note if you can view it in a human readable form it cannot be digital.

 

[krötenblender]

That's factually correct although you should note that even though they may be transmitted digitally they are rendered on a screen though analogue means.

This is of course also true for film: you never see it as it "really" is, because there is no "really" in that.

There is no such thing as being able to see a digital photo, it is only digital when stored, if you want to see it it must be converted.

And of course you loose some of the original qualities with every conversion between digital and analog.

I think, the point being made here often is, that photographic data is perceptual different when created and stored analog versus digital.

 

[Photo_Smith]

This is of course also true for film: you never see it as it "really" is, because there is no "really" in that.



And of course you loose some of the original qualities with every conversion between digital and analog.

I think, the point being made here often is, that photographic data is perceptual different when created and stored analog versus digital.

Not true for film? I don't understand your point 'you never see it as it 'really' is'
That's nonsense here, just hold it to the light I can see it.

Slides by Photo Utopia, on Flickr

Yes it is exactly as you see it.

And as for losing some of the 'original qualities' of digital when printing or displaying it in analogue form is equally absurd as each time it will exist as a rendering of the original info, what are the original qualities of the digital signal?
Each conversion and each different display will give a different quality.
Have a look at one of your digital images on 20 different screens.

Digital Data isn't perceptual either it is a 0 or a 1 so if you represent it as a hole in a punch card, a black dot on a film it is still either a 0 or a 1.

 

[krötenblender]

Also you might like to note if you can view it in a human readable form it cannot be digital.

Neither can it be analog then... Neurons fire, if they pass a certain level of activation, meaning switching from not active to active (not 47.99% active). Same is true for the light detecting cells in the eye (and of course of the photons, even if you consider their double nature as particles and waves, because even as a wave they have quantum aspects). If you decide to go down the whole information processing pipeline, you finally come down to molecules and atoms. And according to quantum theory after the "measurement" of a state, there is no continuous value, but instead always clearly differentiated "digital" values (discrete to be precise), thus the name "quantum", because there is no smaller step than that or anything between quantum steps.

So all information processing, including viewing a picture (no matter if from a digital LCD or analog Film or directly analog-lasered into your eyes), is a bunch of discrete steps and values, und thus more digital than analog.

😀😎

But... but all this (an LCD being digital or analog, A/D and D/A conversion...) is missing the OPs point, I guess.

 

[krötenblender]

Yes it is exactly as you see it.

You mean, there is no reasonable disagreement possible how it is, when viewing it? Maybe, I'm color blind. Do we see the same thing with the same amount of information then? Maybe, I had the lens of my eye removed, thus loosing a part of the infrared and UV filter in front of my light detecting nerves, so I see a wider spectrum. Do I see it, as it exactly is? Maybe my vision is not as good a yours and you see grain, where I don't. Is it really grainy then? Does the light source behind your slides provide the same spectrum of light as were actual when taking the picture?

Again, the whole discussion is missing the threads subject. But you can't seriously think, that there is such thing as "it is exactly as you see it"...

(And of course, I only see a digital picture of what seems to be something resembling color slides in your post 😉)

 

[Photo_Smith]

You mean, there is no reasonable disagreement possible how it is, when viewing it? Maybe, I'm color blind.

Do we see the same thing with the same amount of information then? Maybe, I had the lens of my eye removed, thus loosing a part of the infrared and UV filter in front of my light detecting nerves, so I see a wider spectrum. Do I see it, as it exactly is? Maybe my vision is not as good a yours and you see grain, where I don't. Is it really grainy then? Does the light source behind your slides provide the same spectrum of light as were actual when taking the picture?

Again, the whole discussion is missing the threads subject. But you can't seriously think, that there is such thing as "it is exactly as you see it"...

Yes there is because if you're colourblind you are seeing it as you see it. It doesn't change state-it will be the processing in your brain that misrepresents the data.

The state of the original film is unaltered, it has an existence if you view it though a different light source or put a blue filter over it it will be perceived as different but your perception is not absolute.

(And of course, I only see a digital picture of what seems to be something resembling color slides in your post )

Which is obviously false as I'm seeing an analogue representation of the transferred digital image as rendered on my screen, no digital data is human readable.

 

[krötenblender]

Yes there is because if you're colourblind you are seeing it as you see it. It doesn't change state-it will be the processing in your brain that misrepresents the data.

You seem to think, that the term "reality" has a meaning without an interpretation of perception. Reality is not absolute.

And of course it does change state. Never heard of quantum theory and that a measurement (which is another term for looking at something) changes the state of the system being measured?

But what has this to do with Paramount...?

 

[krötenblender]

Which is obviously false as I'm seeing an analogue representation of the transferred digital image as rendered on my screen, no digital data is human readable.

You are fun. But I start being bored. So I'm doing something more digital now.

 

[Photo_Smith]

You seem to think, that the term "reality" has a meaning without an interpretation of perception. Reality is not absolute.

Did I say it was?
Do you think that sound exists without your perception of it? If a tree falls 2000 mile from the human ear does your lack of interpretation make that event less real?

 

[Photo_Smith]

You are fun. But I start being bored. So I'm doing something more digital now.

Being bored is a state of perception-go and practice your 0 & 1 thinking somewhere else 🙂
I have no idea what a more 'digital' occupation of you time might take–have a great day! (what's left) Good luck with your binary outlook, some of us prefer a few discrete levels in our views.