Film Technology

The world of film that we once knew is drastically changing.  This year studios are beginning to stop the distribution of 35-millimeters films and will making the official and permanent switch to digital filmmaking.

35mm film has been used in the industry since the early periods of film. However, with advancements in film technology movies that use digital technology are able to present brighter and clearer picture and sound over that of 35mm film, offering a better experience overall for moviegoers.

           35-millimeter movie camera
           Photo via www.sandiegoreader.com

 Even though the studios have made the executive business decision to stop the production of 35mm film, a debate still remains among many famous directors in Hollywood about the use of new digital technology versus original 35mm film.

35-millimeter film reel
Photo via entertainment.msn.com

Christopher Nolan with a 35mm camera on the set of The Dark Knight Rises 
Photo via TIME

Director Christopher Nolan, who’s well known films include Memento, Inception, and The Dark Knight Trilogy, is a firm supporter of preserving the use of celluloid filmmaking.  Nolan’s film and box office success The Dark Knight Rises was filmed on celluloid. 

           Memento Trailer (2000)

Inception Trailer (2010)

    The Dark Knight Rises Trailer (2012)

According to The University of California Institute For Research in the Arts (UCIRA), Nolan had invited many film directors such as Michael Bay, Duncan Jones and Edgar Wright to an exclusive first look at the first six minutes of the film before the film was released but had the ulterior motive of making a case for the continued use of 35mm film. Nolan pleaded to his fellow directors about what 35mm film can do. Nolan says, “The danger comes from filmmakers not asserting their right to choose that format. If they stop exercising that choice, it will go away”. Director James Cameron started the movement to digital filmmaking in 2009 with his film Avatar distributed by 20^th Century Fox.  The blockbuster could be only be screened using digital projectors resulting in the first wave of many theaters quickly upgrading their projection technology to that of digital. Recently, Paramount Pictures has followed in footsteps of 20^th Century Fox by releasing The Wolf of Wall Street the company’s first all digital motion picture. According to Ars Technica, a technology news and information website, Anchorman2: The Legend Continues was the company’s last film released on celluloid.

Avatar Trailer (2009)

The Wolf of Wall Street Trailer (2013)

Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues Trailer (2013)

The switch over to digital not only affects the studios and the filmmakers but also the movie theaters that screen the films. Now, theaters across the country are going to have to upgrade to digital projection, if they have not done so already, if they wish to continue films that come out of Hollywood.

Director Martin Scorsese on the set of Hugo with a digital camera
Photo via creativecow.net

The Clayton Theatre in Dagsboro, Delaware
Photo via GoogleMaps

I recently made a trip to The Clayton Theatre, a small local movie theater located in Dagsboro, Delaware to visit owner Joanna Howe who just upgraded her theater to digital projection this past week.  Howe explains that the switch to digital has been a long time coming, she says “the studios came to us about a year ago and announced that after this, the end of 2013 they were going to start to phase out 35-millimeter film completely”. How had started raising money in February of last year in order to switch The Clayton Theatre over digital, knowing that if she upgrade her business would suffer. She states that “it was on us and other small theatres across the country, that if we didn’t go digital we would go dark”.  It took Howe one year to raise the $65,000 she needed to upgrade to digital projection and took three days to install the new projection system.

The movement to end the production of 35mm film will completely change the industry especially when it comes to distribution costs.  UCIRA states that digital technology is a cheaper and faster than 35mm prints making the switch to digital beneficial to both the film creator and distributor. David Johnson, a film professor at Salisbury University located in Salisbury, Maryland says, “it simply costs more money to manufacture film, to process film, and to screen films…all those things cost money than digital technology”. Joanne confirms this explaining that “it cost the studios quite a bit more, about a thousand dollars a film to send a 35-millimeter print, where as now that’s dropped to about one thousand dollars a film to send it out”.  Studios no longer want to pay to physically print and ship films. In 2010 the former chairman of Universal Pictures told Variety that studios “stand to eliminate billions of dollars in costs in coming years without spending very much”.

In the very near future, 35mm film will be a thing of the past and the new digital technology will change the production the films in the industry.