Christie Provides Products, Services and Financing, While “Future Proofing” CinemaCon Attendees’ Investments

Las Vegas, NV -- (SBWire) -- 04/26/2012 --Christie®, a global visual technology company, will showcase a wide range of innovative cinema projection solutions, backed by its monitoring and support services, at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, April 23 – 26. Christie is the world’s largest manufacturer, installer and servicer of DLP Cinema® projectors and has contracted for its largest-ever CinemaCon exhibit area to confirm its position as the “Exhibitor’s Choice” for attendees of this pre-eminent gathering of movie theater owners from around the world.

“Christie is the key supplier of all the pieces that exhibitors may require to stay ahead of the digital cinema conversion curve,” said Craig Sholder, vice president, Christie Entertainment Solutions. “Our latest Christie® Duo™, Christie® IMB and Christie® SKA-3D™ offerings – the latter two being officially announced at CinemaCon – are part of our ongoing commitment to arm our customers with the pieces they need to deliver a wide range of cinema-market applications.”

Sholder noted that “independent exhibitors, which encompass drive-ins, film festivals and post-production in-house studios, get the same commitment and dedication that national circuit exhibitors have come to expect from Christie, so that we can deliver to all of them the technology and services they need to leverage cinema and alternative content, in 2K, 4K and in 3D on standard and large-format, ‘premium’ screens.”

In addition to comprehensive solutions on display in Christie booth #2111 and in the Milano Room, Christie is a sponsor of the International Day activities, including its Awards Luncheon on April 23, which Jack Kline, president and chief operating officer, Christie Digital Systems USA, Inc. will address. As well, Michael Esch, senior director, Entertainment Solutions product development at Christie, will take part in a panel discussion on “Laser Light Technology: The New Frontier in Screen Brightness” at 9am on April 25 in the Colosseum.

(Esch recently chaired a vibrant information sharing session and discussion on high frame rates, laser projection, and the future of 3D and 4K projection at Christie’s worldwide center for engineering, research and development in Kitchener, Ontario, which included the first-ever laser light engine projection of high frame rate cinema and alternative content on to a 30-foot white screen. Attendees at this HFR Summit included recent Gordon E. Sawyer Academy Award winner Douglas Trumbull; Ian Bidgood, Technical Director, Park Road Post Production; Matt Cowan, Chief Scientific Officer, RealD; John Helliker and Bert Dunk, Directors at the Screen Industries Research and Training Centre and Demetri Portelli, Stereographer.)

Christie’s HFR 3D Leadership for Cinema/Alternative Content Solutions
Christie will continue to demonstrate its high-frame rate leadership, epitomized by the HFR Summit, Christie’s technical alliances with Lightstorm, Park Road, Weta, the Screen Industries Research and Training Centre and other industry leaders, with a number of product introductions and demonstrations at CinemaCon.

The Christie® IMB, an integrated media block solution that seamlessly converts and delivers feature-film and alternative content within a secure, DCI-compliant environment to all of Christie’s 2K and 4K, DCI-compliant Solaria® Series 2 projectors will be formally launched at the conference, following several months of commercial field trials. DCI Compliance certification is expected shortly.

As well, Don Shaw, senior director, Entertainment Solutions, Christie will host a High frame Rates 3D Comparison for the media featuring footage from James Cameron in the HFR Theater in Christie’s booth on Monday, April 23, and for attendees throughout the duration of the show.

(A four-minute video primer on high frame rates and their future impact on movie-making, delivered by Dr. Paul Salvini, chief technology officer, Christie, is also available at http://vimeo.com/40316231).

The Five Zones in Christie’s Booth Showcase Choices for Exhibitors
“Visitors to the Christie booth will have the opportunity to experience our entire digital cinema offering, whose scope encompasses financing the move to digital cinema, establishing an affordable and flexible upgrade path towards new formats and technologies, and turnkey service and support for their operations,” said Kathryn Cress, vice president, global and corporate marketing, Christie. “Five zones will amply demonstrate Christie’s commitment to be a trusted, one-stop shop for all exhibitor needs.”

Zone 1 – High Frame Rates in 3D: A comparison of original film footage provided by James Cameron – projected at 24 frames per second (fps), 48fps and 60fps – will be the talk of the conference in the HFR Theater throughout the duration of the show. Attendees will see how HFR technology reduces artifacts such as motion blur, judder and strobing seen in the current generation of films. The Christie IMB will facilitate the hourly presentations of the HFR footage on a single Solaria CP2220 projector, complete with automatic and seamless switching between different frame rates.

Zone 2 –Lamps and Virtual Print Fees (VPF) Lounge: One size doesn’t fit all, and in this zone Christie experts will guide exhibitors through the range of Christie Solaria® digital cinema projectors, Christie Xenolite® lamp options and the details of Christie’s Virtual Print Fee (VPF) Program, which offers unprecedented financing options.

Zone 3 – Network Operations Center: Christie remote monitoring will be showcased on an award-winning Christie® MicroTiles® display. Visitors can experience a video demonstration of Christie’s state-of-the-art Network Operations Center (NOC) for remote monitoring, maintenance and troubleshooting of digital cinema projection and digital displays. Christie safeguards its customers’ visual technology displays, keeping them running 24/7/365. The Christie NOC is remotely monitoring more than 50,000 devices in more than 1,800 locations while also providing the latest in predictive analytics to anticipate and resolve potential technical issues – minimizing theater and lobby downtime.

Zone 4 – Digital Theater Lobby Displays: Find out how the Managed Services group at Christie can design, build and deploy a digital signage network that's right for exhibitors. Christie supports every stage of a digital signage rollout, from strategy and equipment selection to pre-staging and POS software integration, as well as a synchronized deployment and post deployment strategy. Ongoing hardware and software support, maintenance, monitoring and business impact analytics completes this ‘one-stop shopping’ experience. Additionally, the Managed Services team will showcase their customized booth-less projection system as part of a complete customized solution. This turnkey booth-less solution provides a special lift system that enables projectors to be positioned out of the way during normal operation and lowered for maintenance, freeing up space for seating that would normally have been taken up by the projection booths.

Zone 5 – Christie SKA-3D Audio-Visual Processor: See and hear the newly announced Christie® SKA-3D™ digital cinema processor, a powerful product innovation that delivers flawless audio performance and 2D/3D image playback from virtually any content source on any brand of projector with separate L/R eye dual DVI inputs. It is a true, high-caliber “all in one” cinema processor that ends equipment rack clutter by combining the multiple units typically found in a projection booth – an audio processor, digital crossovers, video scaler, 3D decoders, video cross conversion and more – into a single, lightweight and compact box. On the video front, featuring full support for SENSIO® Hi-Fi 3D and RealD Format, the new Christie SKA-3D seamlessly switches between multiple 2D/3D alternative content sources – including pre-show advertising servers, Blu-ray players, Sony PlayStation®, set-top boxes, personal computers and satellite feeds – which in turn facilitate new revenue streams for digital cinema owners through the playback of any content available to them.

Christie’s Commitment to HFR
The two main goals of Christie’s HFR activities are to help the industry develop the best HFR content and the best delivery system for HFR content. The first goal involves assisting leading-edge filmmakers and post-production companies in perfecting HFR movie creation, so the industry has the most engaging, entertaining content possible. The second goal is to assist exhibitors in showing these 3D HFR movies in all their glory. To these ends, Christie is helping create the standards for 3D HFR movies through formal and informal technology-development alliances with major producers and directors, post production facilities, studios and technology partners. On the exhibitor’s front, Christie provides one stop shopping for all the hardware, software and services that enable exhibitors to deliver a filmmaker's vision in stunning 3D HFR quality. For more information visit http://www.higherframerates.com.

About Christie
Christie Digital Systems USA, Inc. is a global visual technologies company and is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ushio, Inc., Japan, (JP:6925). Consistently setting the standards by being the first to market some of the world’s most advanced projectors and complete system displays, Christie is recognized as one of the most innovative visual technology companies in the world. From retail displays to Hollywood, mission critical command centers to classrooms and training simulators, Christie display solutions and projectors capture the attention of audiences around the world with dynamic and stunning images. Visit www.christiedigital.com for more information.