The Effects of Digital Video Technology On Modern Film

A Thesis

Submitted to the Faculty’s

of

Drexel University

by

Kaichen Hu

in partial fulfillment of the

requirements for the degree

of

Master of Science in Television Management

May，2016
 © Copyright 2016

Kaichen Hu. All Rights Reserved.

 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to acknowledge and express my deepest appreciation to my program

director, Albert Tedesco, who offered his continuous advice and encouragement

during the past two years.

I would like to express my very sincere gratitude to my thesis advisor, Dave

Culver who gave me valuable advice regarding this thesis. Without his guidance and

help, this thesis would not have been possible.

I would like to dedicate this to Mr. Gerald Hooper, for offering his insightful

opinions and useful industry information that related to my topic during the interview.

Also, I would like to appreciate Li Dan, the scholar of Beijing University of

Aeronautics and Astronautics, Lily Mao, the former channel director of CCTV, Jiaran

Wang, the assistant professor of Beijing Film Academy, and Jianfeng Du, the

professor of Beijing Union University, for the generous help during the interviews.
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

TABLE OF FIGURES ........................................................................................ iv

ABSTRACT......................................................................................................... 1

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION........................................................................ 2

1.1 Research Background............................................................................. 3

1.2 Definition of Digital Technology and Other Relevant Concepts........... 4

1.3 Purpose of the Study............................................................................... 5

1.4 Statement of Problems............................................................................ 6

1.5 Research Questions................................................................................. 7

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW PART I................................................ 8

2.1 Before the Sound............................... ..................................................... 10

2.2 Introduction of Sound Technology......................................................... 11

2.3 Vivid Color............................................................................................. 12

2.4 The Chaotic Time After Color................................................................ 13

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW PART II............................................... 15

2.5 Influences on Shooting ........................................................................... 16

2.6 Influences on Post Production ................................................................ 17

2.7 Digital Special Effects............................................................................. 18

2.8 The Impact of Digital Technologies on Film Distribution ..................... 19

2.9 Production Cost and Efficiency .............................................................. 21

2.10 The Future of Digital Technology ........................................................ 24

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY........................................................................ 34

3.1 Introduction............................................................................................. 34

3.2 Setting .................................................................................................... 35

3.3 Sample .................................................................................................... 36

 3.4 Data Analysis.......................................................................................... 37

CHAPTER 4: RESULTS...................................................................................... 38

4.1 What Are the Specific Impacts from Digital Technology to Films? ...... 40

4.2 What Qualitative Changes have happened in various Links of Film

Production? .......................................................................................................... 41

4.3 Specific Influences of Digital Technology on Filming .......................... 42

CHAPTER 5: DISCUSSION................................................................................ 42

5.1 Introduction............................................................................................. 42

5.2 Limitations............................................................................................... 43

5.3 Conclusion .............................................................................................. 44

REFERENCES...................................................................................................... 45

APPENDIX A....................................................................................................... 46
 LIST OF FIGURES

1. Muybridge's The Horse in Motion...........................................................................13

2. The Kinetograph machine........................................................................................14

3. Vitaphone projection................................................................................................16

4. Historical Statistics from IMDB database...............................................................18

5. The Aeroscope camera.............................................................................................19

6. A super 8 film camera..............................................................................................20

7. Sony HD-900F camera.............................................................................................22

8,9. Pictures from two different versions of King Kong film......................................25

10. An optical motion capture system.........................................................................26

11. The special effects of Life of Pi.............................................................................27

12. Film "Who Framed Roger Rabbit"........................................................................28

 Abstract

Film is an art, and it is also a product of the development of science and

technology. Without science and technology, humans cannot have this magical art

that can make our fantasies become reality. Throughout the history of film, every

revolutionary technological advancement has dominated the development direction of

film. However, since 1960s, with the emergence of digital technology, the whole film

industry entered a new era. People all over the world can experience an unprecedented

pleasant amazement and audio-visual experience when they are watching films.

Meanwhile, digital technology has become a powerful tool, allowing many

filmmakers who have the great passion to make their own movies easier than before.

Now, everyone can make “films”.

This paper studied the evolution of the film industry under the emergence of

digital technology from the perspective of interviews of some professional

practitioners, history of film development and film industry economics. First of all,

the research addresses the current situation of film industry, which involves every link

of the film industry such as production, distribution etc. We move then to find the

fundamental changes hiding inside the industry to learn that what digital technology

really means to film industry.

Finally, the paper will address the impact of new digital technology on film

industry.

Key words: digital technology, film industry, film history, production and distribution
 CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

The emergence of the film producing industry must pay tribute to technology,

which offers opportunity for people to dream and presents moving pictures in front of

our eyes. According to Jieyi Wang (2011), “It should be noted that the Lumière

Family is considered as the inventor of film exactly because they offered technology

that supports group watching, unlike the Kinetoscope by Edison that only allows one

people to watch film alone” (p.1). After that, technological progress has had a

progressively important impact on film: from silent film to sound film, black and

white to color, followed by wide-screen, digital, huge-screen, and 3D films, even the

revolutionary VR film. All these are products of technology in the field of film.

Compared to film revolutions ignited by technological development, how digital

technology shapes the movie from the 1960s is the most impressive. Current research

efforts on the relationship between digital technology and film are concentrated on

changes to film form, film production, digitalized distribution. This has not included

an overall, in-depth analysis of how digital technology affects film from a perspective

of industry. After digital technology reaches its maturity, what profound changes does

the film industry experience? Is this a disruptive revolution? All these questions have

not been answered in the literature so far.

Advanced technology brings various possibilities to the future of the film, and

studying the history of film industry, firstly, helps us to gain a full picture of digital

technology, and secondly, promotes analysis of the new form of American film

industry and even the world's film industry after total digitalization.
1. 1 Research Background

Research Status of Digital Technology and Film Industry Development

For the present, research on the relationship between film and technology,

including digital technology, has paid most attention to technology-enabled changes

to and improvement of films, i.e. how digitalization transforms the way film is

produced and distributed, but about film production. In this field, American film

scholar James E Spellerberg and his book Technology and the Film Industry: The

Adoption of Cinemascope (1980) mainly explores how wide screen technology

expand the in film creation and how audiences feel about wide-screen film. However,

Spielberg has not dug in the whole industry.

Beside, Marc Brownett, in his article How technology has affected and

influenced the film industry and cinema (1980) published on Digital Media: Research

and Analysis, quoted many famous films and gave a reasonable, comprehensive

analysis on how technological progress affects film production, seeing and

distribution.

Another American scholar Barry Salt discussed in his Film Style and

Technology: History and Analysis (1992) about the relationship between film

technology and film style, and teased out the interwoven relations between technology

and film. Pitifully, it only focuses on film itself.

Research Status of Film History and Film Technology History

Work on film history is voluminous, including the classic Histoire du cinéma

mondial (1972) by Georges Sadoul of France, and Crafton’s History of the American

Cinema (1999)
1.2 Definition of Digital Technology and Other Relevant Concepts

Digital Technology

Digital technology embraces digital electronics, and utilizes certain equipment to

transform picture, text, sound, image and other information into binary digits that can

be recognized by electronic computer, which then computes, processes, stores,

transmits, spreads and resume these information. It is named as digital technology

because the computer is used to encode, compress and decode the information in

computing and storage.

Digital technology in this paper refers to all computer technologies applied in

film. It can be divided into two: technologies that used to produce the film itself, i.e.

digital graphic processing technology based on computer graphics, including digital

imaging, HD technology, non-linear editing, and scene design; and digital film

transmission technologies represented by digital video, network, digital distribution

and digital projection (Jieyi, 2011).

4K/UHD Technology

The UHD technology, according to Cotton (2013), Ultra HD (also known as

“Ultra High Definition” / “Super Hi-Vision” / “Ultra HDTV” / “UHD” / “UHDTV” /

“4K” / “8K”), “is a video format conceptualized by the Japanese public broadcasting

network, NHK. The Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) announced that the

official term “Ultra HD” would be used for any display with a 16 x 9 ratio with at

least 1 digital input cable carrying a minimum resolution of 3,840 x 2,160 square

pixels” (p. 20).

Virtual Reality Movies

Virtual reality or virtual realities (VR), also known as immersive multimedia or

computer-simulated reality, is a computer technology that replicates an environment,

real or imagined, and simulates a user's physical presence and environment in a way

that allows the user to interact with it. Virtual realities artificially create sensory

experience, which can include sight, touch, hearing, and smell (Yanming, 2016).

Film Industry

The film industry or motion picture industry comprises the technological and

commercial institutions of filmmaking, i.e., film production companies, film studios,

cinematography, film production, screenwriting, pre-production, post production, film

festivals, distribution; and actors, film directors and other film crew personnel

(Robertson, 1988).

1.3 Purpose of Study

This paper sorts out the milestones in film development before the emergence of

digital technologies, and also discusses changes to the film industry for 40 years after

application of digital technologies, including not only changes to film itself, but also

changed to the film industry. In addition, this paper predicts what new technologies

will dominate the film industry in the future.

Challenges and innovation: there are few existing works that specialize on the

relationship between digital technology and the film industry. Most of them target

certain sectors and how progress in digital technology affects the film and audiences.

They, however, fail to cover history, technological growth and industry change. For

this reason, data collection is difficult. This requires reading and summarizing of

massive amount of history books, scientific literature and data to support the thesis.

1.4 Statement of Problem

Digital Video technology has been widely used in several areas, especially in the

movie industry decades. The utilization of Digital Video technology has lead in pre

production to high quality Movies and offers a better audience experiences for
consumers. Technology providers kept updating their equipment to make a easier

entry for more people to utilize. Therefore, in order to deeply understand how Digital

Video technology has affected the development of movie industry，and the

relationship between them, we need to examine the literature.

However, through my research and review of numerous other academic literature

that is related the topic of digital video, most articles are limited to only talking about

the film itself. It is very difficult for researchers to find journals or articles that mainly

focus on the enormous and profound impact of digital technology on every aspects of

movie industry.

1.5 Research Questions

1. What are the major reasons that the motion picture industry is more likely to use

digital camera to shoot film instead of the traditional film camera?

2. What are the cost advantages of digital video technology and how this technology

helps film industry to lower the cost?

3. What were the major barriers that prohibited the independent moviemakers from

producing their films in the pre-digital era?

4. How does digital video/digital camera technology change the situation for

independent moviemakers?

5. How do digital cameras/digital videos lower the industry barrier to entry for

independent moviemakers?

6. What was the pre-production and post-production process of the filmmaking in the

past?

7. How has digital technology changed the pre-production and post-production

process in the modern film industry?

8. What has changed in the film distribution system (cinema, digital platform) with
the rise of digital video technology?

9. What is the developmental history of 4K technologies?

10. Can 4K technology really dominate the TV & Film market in the future?

11. What is VR film?

 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW Part I

2.1 Before the sound

In the very early stage of the film industry, Eadweard Muybridge can be seemed

as the ancestor of the motion picture technology. He was an English photographer

important for his pioneering work in photographic studies of motion, and early work

in motion-picture projection. As described by Muybridge himself (1887), in order to

research some photographic studies for Stanford, Muybridge planned to take a series

of photos on 15 June 1878 at Stanford's Palo Alto Stock Farm. He placed numerous

large glass-plate cameras in a line along the edge of the track; the shutter of each was

triggered by a thread as the horse passed. The path was lined with cloth sheets to

reflect as much light as possible. He copied the images in the form of silhouettes onto

a disc to be viewed in a machine he had invented, which he called a zoopraxiscope.

Afterwards, Muybridge happened to find "persistence of vision" and used it to

achieve serial photography, and the display he produced offers vivid picture. This

inspired Edison to invent Kinetoscope Kinetoscope, a rectangle cabinet with a 2.5mm

convex mirror on its top (Jieyi, 2011).

Figure 1 Muybridge's The Horse in Motion, 1878

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division; source: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/cph.3a45870

 In it, a strip of 35 mm wide film was passed rapidly between a lens and an

electric light bulb while the viewer peered through a peephole. Behind the peephole

was a spinning wheel with a narrow slit that acted as a shutter, permitting a

momentary view of each of the 46 frames passing in front of the shutter every second.

The result was a lifelike representation of persons and objects in motion. However,

Edison's Kinetoscope has a critical defect: only one can see the motion pictures at one

time, and Edison could not solve the problem of the proper method to transport the

film, film transmission; (Hendricks, 1966) the Lumière Brothers brothers, Auguste

Marie Louis Nicolas and Louis Jean, were the first filmmakers in history, found

inspiration in the sewing machine, and presented a perfect solution to transport the

film by using Kinetograph (Cook, 2004). However, the Kinetograph was invented by

Dickson and his team at the Edison lab in 1890s, and it is an innovative motion

picture camera with rapid intermittent to photograph movies for in-house experiments

(Bellis, 2014). Also, it combines shooting, projecting and printing in one and offers

infinite possibilities for group film watching, and 16 frames/second projection saves a

lot of film stock.

Figure 2 Charles Kayser of the Edison lab seated behind the Kinetograph,

Source: National Park service (1891)

 If the instinctive desire and dream for "replay of reality" in the subconscious

mind is the primary cause for the birth of film, then the development of technology is

the immediate cause for the emergence of film for making this dream come true. Both

the film developing from chemistry and perspective principle from physics shows that

film is a product of technology, and the introduction of new technologies like sound

and color further accelerates the development of film (Jieyi, 2011).

2.2 Introduction of Sound Technology

Although film was invented more than 100 years ago, but during the first three

decades since it was born, there is nothing people can hear from the cinema.

However, these films with no voice are called silent films. A silent film is a film with

no synchronized recorded sound, especially with no spoken dialogue (Everson, 1978).

The silent film could only record or replay the visual content of "reality", and the

absence of sound denies its perfect recreation of "reality". Despite its emergence, film

disappoints the audiences in "replay of reality". In fact, long before the sound

technology was used in movies, people had been trying to make films associate with

the sound; for instance, in the 1920s, the musicians and some small orchestra would

often play music to accompany the films in the cinema; before the advent of the real

cinema sound system, many scientists and inventors had been working hard to make

the movie "Speak". In those days, there were hundreds of patent records about the

movie sound technology in the world, the most representative and influential one of

which is the "Vitaphone".

Thanks to Vitaphone, The Jazz Singer, a mediocre silent, left its name in the

history of films. The Jazz Singer recorded the sound into a disc of 100/3 rounds/sec,

which was then played with vitaphone (Barrios, 1995). On October 6, 1927, when

audiences watched the movie once again, they surprisingly heard what characters
said. This marked the advent of a new era. Only one year later, there were 500

cinemas in America for sound movies, and the figure rose to 5,200 in 1929. Soon

after, the revolutionary photographic sound track which can carry sounds on films

emerged. Thereupon, many film makers and exhibitors jointly developed the standard

for the width of sound track, and made projection speed of 24 frames one second,

which is still in use today.

Figure 3 A Vitaphone projection setup at a 1926 demonstration

Source: history department at the University of San Diego, PD-PRE1978.

With technologies, sound, an indispensable element in daily life was incorporated

into films, accelerating the development of the film industry. The appearance of sound

films in 1930s also made the amount of movie viewers double.

In fact, sound technologies brought overall impact to the film industry at that

time. Almost all relevant industries chains developed: filming equipment and

consumables were updated because of sound technologies, and live recording evolved

to post recording. The performance of actors were also influenced. For example,

actors who were non-native English speakers were gradually forgotten by the public

for non-fluent English or unpleasant pronunciation. When film sound technologies

first appeared, silent movies could duel with sound films in terms of distribution and

projection, but then gradually quit the arena of history amid growing interest in sound

movies. With the end of silent movies, a wave of sound film cinemas swept across

America.

2.3 Vivid Color

The real world has not only sound and frames but also beautiful colors. When we

"heard" movies, we started thinking about the application of colors in films. Since the

birth of films, many creative color treatment methods have been applied to present

different colors in a film. In 1920s, nearly 80% of Hollywood silent movies were

manually colored in post-production (Maltby, 2003). However, the artificial coloring

was very time-consuming as every frame had to be colored, and the color would fade

as time went by. Despite this, some epic movies emerged in this age. For example,

Battleship Potemkin, a black-and-white film by Sergei Eisenstein who is a master of

the Soviet Union Montage School, was manually colored one frame by one, so that

audiences could see a red flag rising on the grand Battleship Potemkin. This intense

visual shock to audiences at that time could hardly imagine by people today (Jieyi,

2011).

Battleship Potemkin is not a true color film. Real color films (Chao, 2008) are

defined as those with three-color technicolor (red/green/blue). ‘Vanity Fair’ in 1935

demonstrated the real sense of color film. The process developed by Technicolor

required sync photography of special cameras onto three different films to separately

record three colors (red, green, blue). The three films were then incorporated into a

different film for softer, more natural color. In the 1950s, (Shaojing, 1982) Eastman

Kodak Company developed Eastmancolor, a widely successful "single-strip color"

processes, which eventually displaced the more cumbersome Technicolor three strip
film process. In the following years, Eastmancolor was widely recognized by the

world, and it also inspired the birth of Warnercolor and Metrocolor. According to

statistics (Figure 4) from Jieyi Wang (2011), the production of color movies first

exceeded black-and-white movies in the late 1960s.

Figure 4 The number of movie productions from IMDB database. In this figure, ① represents

the total number of film, ② represents the black and white movies ③ represents the color films, also,

the X-axis means time, and the Y-axis means the number.

Source: Jieyi Wang. (2011). An Analysis of the Impact of Digital Technology on Film Industry.

Nanjing University of the Arts, Nanjing.

Indeed, color technologies did not bring as profound drastic changes to film

production as sound technologies, but color pictures silently evolved and influenced

the film industry during the 1940s to 1970s. The evolution of color technologies in

this period is no doubt the third technological revolution in the film industry, and the

sound technology makes scenes on the screen more "realistic". It also further impacts

film shooting, for example, light application and tunes. Just like sound movies, color
movies also promoted technological improvements in film shooting and projection.

2.4 The chaotic time after color

When sound, color and image jointed together, people began to pursue a higher

leveled film watching experience. Therefore, some new technologies have been

invented such as “Stereoscopic film”,“wide-screen film”, and “70mm format film”.

But because the technologies were only improved in terms of the size and width of

screen as well as the viewing environment, the influence on the whole film industry

was not revolutionary. The technologies were not fundamental and didn’t achieve the

effect as the sound film and color film triggered before through their influence on the

entire film industry (Robertson, 1988).

Afterwards, digital technology showed up.

 LITERATURE REVIEW Part II

2.5 Influences on Shooting

Actually, the influence on digital technology during the shooting process is

intuitive. In the past, traditional motion picture camera used 8mm and 16mm film

format.

Figure 5 The Aeroscope (1910) was the first hand-held movie camera.

Source: http://wichm.home.xs4all.nl/aeroscop.jpg

Figure 6 A classical super8 system handheld camera (1965).

Source: http://www.totalmotorcycle.com/reviews/GoProHDMotorsportsHeroReview1.htm

During shooting, the shooting time was often limited within 10 minutes. Besides,

the traditional motion picture cameras were extremely heavy and could not even
control by hand in some special shooting scene, which was quite inconvenient for the

photographer. Therefore, the emergence of digital camera has changed the situation.

Digitalization of Shooting Equipment

First, based on its digital technology and physical principles, a digital camera is

highly precise computerized equipment providing digital display modes for the

convenience of the shooting process. Second, it provides important data reference for

the post-production of film and enables the post editing very quickly. Third, the

storage medium of digital camera will no longer be limited to a single format like

film, because digital cameras use digital memory cards or a plug-in hard disk to

replace the film (Thursby, 2009).

Figure 7 the classic Sony HD-900F

Source: http://www.panavision.com/products/uk/hd900f

Fourth, professional digital camera manufacturers such as Arriflex, Sony and

RED have all developed small and handheld new models that are nearly as good as

large traditional cameras. Also, these cameras allow filmmakers to make steady

moves even when the film crew is shooting under some extreme conditions (Dongli,

2013).
 Digital Format Shooting

Another huge impact brought by the digital video camera to the film industry is

that people are able to obtain the feedback of video and audio immediately. Directors

and cameramen can get the actual details and effects shot just now (including image

and sound) right away via the external monitors and other equipment of the digital

video camera, which contributes to the decision and controlling of whether it is

needed to add shooting, reshoot or confirm the direction of the shoots in future, and

greatly improves the mastering of the entire shooting site by directors and other

creators. While in the past, with the traditional film shooting, directors and other

creators usually can only see how the post-productions were on the second day

samples meeting (James, 2005).

After adopting shooting in the digital format, editing and shooting can

theoretically proceed almost simultaneously. This shortens the interval between

shooting and editing in traditional film generating, and makes post-production faster

and more economical.

Digital shooting, up to now, has always been considered the weakest link in film

industry digitization. Even in Hollywood, the amount of feature films shot utilizing

digital technologies only accounted for one fifth of the total amount. Many famous

directors, such as Christopher Nolan and Martin Scorsese, have said they will not

abandon film, the most classic film shooting media (James, 2005).

However, in low-end independent films, digital shooting has become the

mainstream, greatly lowered the barriers of shooting films.

2.6 Influences on Post-production

Digital Editing

The conventional film editing before was all finished on the cutting benches. In

the face of over hundreds of thousand inches of films, the editor would rearrange the

scenes according to director’s requirement and the editor’s own understanding of the

creative needs of the production (Evans, 2005). This work needs editing instruments

to cut, separate and connect the cine-films, which can be called the real art of editing.

Upon the entry into digital times, owing to the appearance of digital intermediate (see

below), more productions have come to be edited using computer digital technology

formats. Compared to conventional editing, digital editing and image processing

appear to be more simple and convenient, and have saved a good deal of money.

Digital editing adopts the concept of non-linear editing, leaving post producers

flexible creation space. Non-linear editing uses computers to rearrange scenes. One

advantage of non-linear editing is it can instantly access element of image and sound

in real time, and no longer needs to linear thousands of feet of film repeatedly as in

the past (Buck, 2007).

Secondly, the program materials need only to be acquired once, and then can be

used for multiple versions, saving human and material resources, and increasing work

efficiency. In 1984, George Lucas used Edit Droid and Sound Droid system

developed by himself to assemble one of the first films finished in non-linear fashion

(Buck, 2007). With the development of digital editing technologies, editors and

producers gradually abandoned the conventional physical editing process.

Digital Intermediate

Intermediate is an indispensable link in traditional film making. The first edition

cine-film shot by cameraman is called “camera original” after been developed and
printed, which is all the crystallization of the handwork of film crew (James, 2005).

The data will be sealed immediately, because if the “camera original” is damaged, the

first-hand material is lost. Before the “camera orignial” is sealed, it will be copied,

which is the first version of “intermediate”.

In over one hundred years after the film was born, this work has always been

undertaken by departments of the film laboratory, which is finished by means of

traditional chemical processing and scissors and tape. During this more than one

hundred years, although the film processing technologies have been continuously

developed, it has not become significantly faster or more cost effective (James, 2005).

2.7 Digital Special Effects

Before the development of digital technology, special effects were normally

physical special effects, such as the primitive miniature, fireworks technology, and the

later animal-robot technology. The appearance of Terminator 2 in 1980s made

audiences have great interest in visual effects for the first time, and just because this

special effect brought people visual wonders, it urged more film workers to devote

himself to this new style means of production (Guanglv, 1998).

In the film special effect industry in digital times, the production and application

of special effects rely on computer technology platforms, which enable the special

effects to be more lifelike. In addition, digital special effect is also a high-end

technology in film digital technology application. The current digital technology

application in film special effect presents in following aspects:

Creation of Virtual Characters

Before computer graphics (CG) technology, special roles like monsters, devils

and gods and legendary figures were all realized by actors wearing special costumes

or film artists using real objects or models to form things up.

 Figure 8 an articulated skeleton of theBrontosaurus used in 1933 King Kong film

Photo was taken in The Dinosaur Museum in the city of Blanding, Utah, USA.

Figure 9 Andy Serkis in his Kong bodysuit in 2005 King Kong film.

Source: http://www.bright.nl/node/462

But at the moment, producing special roles figures can be realized by 3D

scanner scanning the real person or role model, and post rending with strong computer

special effect software to form the CG role modelings. In addition to that, virtual

characters’ actions are usually formed with motion capture technology, namely the

Motion Capture collecting real person’s or animal’s action (figure 10), or referring to

images in video recordings, which are all established based on computer technology.
 Figure 10 a dancer wearing a suit used in an optical motion capture system

Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MotionCapture.jpg

Creation of Virtual Scene

The endless ocean, fierce Bengal tiger and fantastic cannibal island appeared in

‘Life of Pi’ which won Oscar’s Best Film of 2012 did not shoot scenes in real places

as what traditional films had done in the past, but rebuilt the scenes with digital

technologies.

Figure 11 the BTS scene of special effects of Life of Pi

Source: https://www.pinterest.com/BirdsEyeDP/film/

Director Ang Lee hoped this kind of film visual effect could make audience feel

like they were at the real scenes and feel Pi’s all emotions when seeing Pi contending
against nature on the ocean alone. In fact, to achieve the largest degree of reality,

creators need to acquire professional training to know how to acutely observe the tiny

differences between live-action and CG scenery and make adjustments, thus making

the two objects integrate perfectly (“Rhythm & Hues Makes Skies Soar”, 2012).

Digital Synthesis

In late 1980s, the arrival of ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit’ (1988) astonished

movie fans around the world, which was the first attempt at using digital synthesis

technology. It managed to make the real character and painted animation figure

appear on the same frame, allowing the audience to feel a fantastic world. The later

movie Space Jam also entirely used digital synthesis technology to make Michael

Jordan and Bugs Bunny compete on the same stage.

Figure 12 Judge Doom (Christopher Lloyd) threatens Roger in the movie. Source: Behind the

Ears: The True Story of Roger Rabbit, 2003, Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment

This digital synthesis technology mixes video and audio materials of multiple

digital formats into a single video-audio file via professional post producing software

on computer, which may generally include four major steps of color correction,

geometric fluctuation, filter and picture synthesis (Zhengning, 1998). This synthesis
technology changes traditional film making vast amounts on screen effects easier and

less expensive to create. This technology, which enables the authentic roles and

characters to “appear in the same scene” has also been utilized by parts of film-

television industry. The result of the application can be seen very often in children’s

TV shows and other narrative TV production.

2.8 The Impact of Digital Technologies to Film Distribution

The first digitally distributed film was ‘Star War Prequel I’ (1999) by American

director George Lucas in 1999. As one of the earliest Sony films shot with digital

cameras, it was digitally presented in four American cinemas, winning a lot of

applause (Fan, 2010).

The success of the film depended on the continuous technological development.

Early in 1987, Texas Instruments developed Digital Light Processing (DLP). At

present, this technology has been a leading technology for digital projection in

commercial films across the globe, and even the industrial standard. Many film

production companies have projection equipment with DLP (Maltby, 2003).

As time goes on, the introduction of digital technologies has contributed to

geometric growth in film distribution, which is much more advanced than before. This

thesis will then discuss specific impact of digital technologies on film distribution.

Digital Projection

With digital technology, films on the screen are presented in nearly perfect

condition without declining brightness and color, dirty spots and scratches caused by

damaged film. At the same time, digital technologies preserve and present original

high-fidelity sound, creating a true, exciting stereo ambience for audiences (Jieyi,

2011).

Digital Film Distribution

 Traditionally, films were delivered by distributors to cinema projectors through

simple means of transportation. Movies always had many reels which must be

contained in a special large box. This brought great challenges to movie distribution

for not only inconvenient transportation but great space for storage and manpower for

maintenance (Fan, 2010). The digital distribution of a film is possible only with an

encrypted high-capacity hard disk that can store vast amount of data.

Thanks to digital technologies, audiences can more easily enjoy films through

different platforms, and cinema is no longer their sole choice. The emergence of

online video sites like Netflix and Hulu is a prime example.

Digital transmission of the film content

The transmission and receiving of film became easier through digital method of

network and satellites. For example, in 2002, before the distribution of ‘Star Wars

Episode III - Revenge of the Sith’ (2002) by 20th Century Fox, the Culver City digital

film laboratory in California transmited the global teaser to the digital center in

Singapore, and it took for only 10 minutes to finish the transmission of the teaser with

a total capacity of several hundreds GB. In the past, the transportation of film was not

only costly in time, but also wasted a great amount of labor and money (Jieyi, 2011).

2.9 Production Cost and Efficiency

With the full introduction of digital technologies into the film industry, a larger

amount of special effects are seen in the production and operation of films, especially

those blockbusters. Of course, high technological content means high cost, namely

lots of capital is required to maintain the application of leading technologies in the

film industry. Digital equipment, including high-definition digital cameras, a set of

non-linear editing workstations and super computers for special effects always cost

much more than traditional equipment, up to several million dollars (Liu Fan, 2010).
 However, it is worth noting that, digital technologies brought to film production

and operation not only higher cost, but higher production efficiency and more

scientific operation cycle, in particular more enjoyment and attraction to films

realized by visual effects. Computerized information processing, digital storage of

frames and audio and transmission media improves the operational efficiency of every

link in the film industry, and makes many tasks which are traditionally complex and

time-consuming easier and more convenient (Allen, 2005).

2.10 The Future of Digital Technology

4K movies

4K Ultra High Definition Digital Cinema was also called “p”, namely,

latitudinally 4000 pixels and longitudinally 2160 pixels, with the total pixel exceeding

800 million. This equals to 2k of another projector and four times that of HDTV

resolution. Resolutions of 2k digital cinema and HDTV are roughly the same, but

resolution of HDTV is 1920x1080. If theater is displaying 4k movies, no matter what

position in the theater, the audience can clearly watch every detail of the scene.

However, as recently as 2013, only 10% of theaters were able to project 4k and UHD

contents (Jugang, 2015).

Globally, Europe and other developed countries are accelerating the upgrade

implementation in 4k digital cinemas. Among them, the three major US cinemas -

Regal, AMC and Cinemark are installing 4k cinema projection system in their

cinemas. Regal and AMC use Sony SXRD technology. Earlier in 2009, the 2

companies respectively signed agreements with Sony on 6500 sets and 4500 sets 4k

projection system installation. On the other hand, Cinemark, which adopted DLP

technology, has been planning to install more than 4,000 sets of 4k projection systems

in the United States and Latin America. In addition, many European cinemas, middle
and small American cinemas, and even Asian countries such as Korea, Japan and

China started to upgrade 4k digital cinemas in succession. Theaters in Europe, the

UK, Switzerland and the Netherlands and other European countries have also signed

an agreement with Sony to install 4k (Jugang, 2015).

A brief analysis and summary of the advantage and the main problems existing in

the development of 4K digital cinema are followed as below. Advantages of

developing 4K digital cinema are:

•Wide screen, high-quality definition, and excellent audio and visual effects are

eternal targets of movie audiences. 4K digital cinema is equipped with a super high-

quality definition and visual effects, which can greatly improve audience's viewing

experiences as well as competitiveness and influence for movies in traditional and

new media (Archer, 2014).

•The popularization and application of 4K digital cinema will effectively break

the monopoly of IMAX in the giant screen film industry and significantly reduce the

costs of super-large screen projection system. IMAX essentially belongs to 70mm

film projection technology, which has been very backward among technologies in the

digital era. At the same time, the launch of digital IMAX projection system is an

improved 2K projection system, not a 4K projection system in its true sense. Many

key innovations are reflected and injected into 4K digital cinemas (Archer, 2014).

Practical problems existing in the development of 4K digital cinema:

• Obviously, 4K sources are insufficient at present. Annual output of 4K films in

the world is about a dozen in recent years, among which most are produced by

Columbia Pictures.

• Compared with 2K sources, 4K sources are obviously at a disadvantage.

 • That the limited spaces of most theaters is a reason for screen width shortage,

which making it is difficult to give full play and reflect technological advantages and

visual effects of 4K film (Archer, 2014).

Virtual Reality Technology

Film technology developed regarding black and white to colorful screen, silent

to sound, 2D to 3D, panoramic screen to IMAX and so on, which reveals human

being’s continuous efforts for the purpose of ultimate pursuit towards vivid

experiences of the reality, especially the emerging virtual reality technology (referred

to VR). By using computer technology and digital space, which are highly similar to

reality, VR allows users to timely feel things in the virtual space without any

limitations. VR was applied to movie creation so as to let the audience completely

immerse in it without relying on lights and space of the cinema. Film-makers all

around the world draw attention to VR since it was born (Yanming, 2016). After a

few years of development, it gradually advanced out from obscure conception to real

products and experiences which are tangible and feasible.

This is a kind of completely immersive, interactive viewing experience.

In 2012, VR movie made its debut at the Sundance Film Festival in the United

States. Since then, VR movies came to light and gradually become more familiar to

the public. At Sundance Film Festival, for example, the number of new VR

productions has multiplied in recent years: four in 2014, nine in 2015, while 33 this

year. According to rough statistics, there are more than a dozen Hollywood directors

who started to throw themselves into VR filmmaking.

So, what’s the audio-visual experience of watching VR movie? Let us take the

VR version of ‘Star Wars’ that distributed by Lucasfilm as an example. The audience

wears a head-mounted display and every scene they watch exists in the outer space of
the movie. They can turn around their heads by virtue of a gyroscope to choose

perspectives freely. Viewers are able to observe this novelty from different angles

when a "vehicle" passes by (Yanming, 2016).

Published on the Sundance Film Festival in 2015, the VR movie Fury is similar

to ‘Godzilla’ (2014) and both of them belong to the disaster movie genre. Director

constantly changing shooting method during production, so it changes the perspective

to see people's reactions to chaos as if they are living in the city that is being invaded

by the monster. Therefore, a “virtual reality" viewing experience is enjoyed by the

audience.

Possibly, the curiosity and expectations we poured into VR movies are just like

the feelings people had when watching The Lumiere Brothers 100 years ago.

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY
3.1 Introduction

In the study of this subject, the following research methods are mainly adopted:

on the one hand, the existing historical records and books of authority are collected

and consulted to understand the historical evolution and cultural characteristics of

research objects. In other words, the relations between digital technology and films

are sorted out from a historical perspective, and digital technology is analyzed from

the standpoint of filmology.

On the other hand, the comparative method, inductive method, and data

collection and analysis method are utilized to combine first-hand and secondary

academic materials. Industrial economics and film history are integrated to perfect the

analysis of the influence of digital technology on the film industry. On this basis, the

relevant materials and data are combined in the context of present digital condition to

further analyze the current situation of film industry and look into the future

development trend of films.

This research also conducted in-depth interviews for those professional

filmmakers and professors. The researcher believes that the experts in the film

industry all have strong opinions on the way things should be but depending on who

you are speaking to, the opinions tend to change. Based on the information previously

researched and mentioned throughout this work, three university professors, and two

former filmmakers were interviewed. Their job functions are as follows: Li Dan, the

scholar of Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Lily Mao, the former

channel director of CCTV, Jiaran Wang, the assistant professor of Beijing Film

Academy, and Jianfeng Du, the professor of Beijing Union University. Each of them

answered a set of interview questions and gave their point of view based upon

personal experience and industry knowledge.

3.2 Setting
In this study, each interview took place separately using a set of questions to be

answered by each filmmaker and professor. One interview was done via cellphone,

two were done via face to face during a convention. Two participants were

interviewed in their office that located in Beijing, China. Each interview was using a

voice recorder to transcribing. Since each person answered the questions, the

researcher took hand notes. This research applied the qualitative method to collect in

depth information and perceptions from key parties involved. However, the only

requirement for the participants is they need to be a professional in the film industry

and willing to offer their personal insights.

3.3 Sample

Interview Questions for Filmmakers:

Topic1: In the money-driven movie industry, the emergence of digital video

technology allows filmmakers to save money in the shooting and editing processes.

1) What do you think is the major reason that the industry is more likely to use

the digital camera to shoot film instead of the traditional film camera?

2) Why the digital camera was not popular in the film industry at its invention?

3) Besides price, what are the other advantages of digital cameras over old film

cameras?

Topic2: The rise of digital video technology changed the way that film make-up

and post-production are made.

1) As a director, can you simply describe the film appearance design in the pre-

digital camera era?

2) Which aspect of the appearance design was most affected by the digital video

technology?
 Topic3: Digital video technology offers a great chance for those low-budget

independent moviemakers and amateurs who could not afford the high production

costs before to produce their own movies.

1) In a director’s point of view, what are the major barriers that might prohibit

the independent moviemakers from producing their films?

2) With digital technology, how do you think that might change the industry

environment for independent moviemakers?

3) Since digital platforms like YouTube have risen up, the amateurs can upload

their own videos on it. Therefore, how do you think this phenomenon can be

attributed to digital cameras & digital video technology?

Topic4: In the future, the newest digital video technology like UHD/4k still will

affect film production.

1) UHD technology has extremely high quality for the image and video, and as a

director, can you briefly explain why there are not too many famous film

studios and companies willing use UHD cameras to produce movies right

now?

2) What are the major difficulties for film and TV industry to distribute and

broadcast 4k content for audiences?

3.4 Data Analysis

When the data collected from the interviews with the filmmakers and professors,

the researcher transcribed what they said during the interview into written language

that can support the arguments and hypothesis of this study. Also, this method makes

it easier for the researcher to track the useful information. Then each response from

those interviewees was categorized to match the order of the interview questions.

CHAPTER 4: RESULTS
4.1 What are the specific impacts from digital technology on film itself?

Digital Technology Brings the Opportunity for Creating Spectacles on Film

In the past, production of traditional films was limited by numerous technical

conditions and mostly completed by things that actually existed in real life. Audiences

then evaluate films in terms of the closeness of the film scenes and compare them to

existing materials in real life. The long shots of André Bazin, the montage theory of

Eisenstein, and the realistic filming of Akira Kurosawa were all established on the

basis of shooting existing objects in real life, and the film subjects were are all related

to human life.

However, with the introduction of digital technologies, including electronic

imaging technology, CG special effects and green-screen technology, such limitations

were done away with; filming can be completed without physical entities, but

produced by powerful computers freely according to the demand. Therefore, all kinds

of natural disasters, wonders of the universe and other scenarios that could hardly be

presented in early films can now be easily performed in the big screen; further, myths

and legends, alien worlds and other topics that were hardly involved in films of the

past can now be presented by using synthetic technology without the preparing the

real objects. Just as the scholar Shi Keyang proposed in his “impact of digital

technology on cinema aesthetic ” (2012), a new kind of film aesthetics—“virtual”,

aesthetics—has come into being.

The Impact of Digital Technology on Film Language and Narrative

Approach

The traditional film language system is built on the basis of long shots and

montage and is edited in a linear manner, while digital technology adopts a non-linear

editing mode that maximizes the freedom of the filming process to jump entirely
throughout according to the story and replicate without restriction, thus providing

audiences with unprecedented visual spectacles. Accordingly, the traditional bias

toward the opposition of “long shot” and “montage” is no longer as important as in

the past (Jianfeng Du, personal interview, October 14, 2015).

4.2 What qualitative changes have happened in various links of film production?

Pre-Production

In over one hundred years history of film development, the post-prodcution

shooting of film could not proceed without camera. The collections of images and

sounds of traditional films were mostly through video camera and voice recording

equipment collecting in actual environments, yet the emergence of digital technology

hugely overturned this conventional shooting way. The traditional video camera used

film recording means, and the 35mm film was superior to magnetic tape signal

whatever in color rendition or image clearness degree. But with the development of

science and technology, traditional 35mm film’s status has been challenged, from the

emergence of high definition camera to CCD full-width digital movie camera like

35mm cine-film launched by Sony. These changes produced huge shocks to

traditional film photography. At the same time, in shooting pattern, the emergence of

digital technology also overthrew past shooting methods.

Post-Release

The impacts from digital technology on film are not merely during the shooting

and producing stage. The huge impact is on the post-production of showing and

releasing, and about forming a new set of layout of film releasing and showing under

this impact. The release pattern of traditional movies could only depend on selling the

copies to cinemas to proceed releasing, the transportation and storing of copied films

were frustrating and costly. However, after digital technology arose, digital films
brought a brand new releasing way, there would be no more need of being worried

about the transportation and storing of films, and the transmission of film entered into

diversification.

But for another, we could conclude from the analyzing of the above that the

digital technology doesn’t reduce the production cost of film industry in every aspect.

Most of the top-level commercial films in Hollywood maintain very high budgets,

because the cost for film’s post special effect increases a lot than for that of traditional

movies, and the prices of relative corollary equipment are very expensive, which

objectively causes the costs of digital technology in some links of film producing

being higher than of traditional film making.

4.3 Specific Influences of Digital Technology on Filming Cost

Since traditional film-making requires shooting in real conditions, extensive

manpower and resources are involved, and thus the budget rises. Some shootings

should be completed under certain natural conditions and thus the crew often has to

wait for a long time, which can also increase the filming costs and delay the

production process. With the advent of digital technology, most shootings can be

completed in the studio, and pre-production can be obtained by processing characters

with green-screen technology. This greatly helps the industry to reduce the cost of

production, as certain scenes can even be produced entirely by the computer.

Also, digital technology has substantially reduced the access threshold of the

industry (Luzi, 2011). As consumer-level high-definition digital cameras have

become popular, many amateur enthusiasts of the filming industry and those

independent film-makers, who could hardly afford the expensive filming equipment

in the past, can now take the opportunity to enter the film industry. In general, the rise
of digital technology has trained a new generation of directors, photographers and

post-production staff for the entire film industry.

Meanwhile, it can be seen from the above analysis that digital technology does

not necessarily help decrease the overall production costs of the film industry.

Nowadays, most of the top Hollywood commercial films still maintain a very high

budget level. The major reason for this phenomenon is that the costs of post-

production effects of filmmaking are actually much higher than in traditional films.

As mentioned above, much of the relevant high-end film-making equipment is so

expensive that the startup companies cannot afford the price, and it also causes

another situation where only big companies, such as Warner Brothers, and 20th

Century Fox, can make a huge profit from their top commercial films.
 CHAPTER 5: Discussion

5.1 Introduction

Although digital technology has become popular in today’s global film industry,

the author does not believe that we should accept new technologies without

reservation. In fact, the traditional film technologies are still of great value. Although

computer technology comprehensively dominates the film industry, this does not

mean that traditional film technologies are receding. On the contrary, it is the

knowledge and principles of traditional film technologies that support the

development of films. Without these technologies, the film industry would no longer

exist.

5.2 Limitations

As a matter of fact, for the film industry, digital technology itself has many

limitations. First, the revolution in technology has not become a revolution in film

aesthetics after all, and it will not necessarily lead to an overall revolution in film art.

Besides, if the problems in film aesthetics are not solved, new technologies and the

manifold film forms and techniques they have generated will conceal the problems of

the film art itself. These real problems will not attract attention and will fail to be

resolved, which will lead to the decline of film aesthetics and the degeneration of film

art. In brief, the revolution in technology has never challenged the artistic nature of

films and therefore has never shaken the foundations of film aesthetics.

5.2 Conclusions

Digital technology, which started to develop since the late middle period of the

last century, has penetrated deep into every aspect of people’s life. As one of the

industries that are the closest to people, modern film industry is also experiencing

changes under the influence of digital technology.

 The arrival of the digital age has been considered in the filmdom as the third

great revolution following the transition from silent films to sound films and the

replacement of black-and-white films by color films. Although this revolution has just

begun and appears to be immature and inadequate in technology, and is also troubled

by the problem of high cost, the immaturity implies unlimited development space.

The development potential created by digital technology for films is much greater

than the former two revolutions, but it will take a lot of time to explore such potential

and there will still be a long way to go. Even though more manpower and material

resources are required for perfecting the storage of digital images and for establishing

a complete system of digital film production, distribution and projection, the return on

such inputs will be enormous.

The most essential influence of digital technology on film industry is that it

makes the relations among various film industry chains even closer and optimizes the

overall structure of the film industry. Today, digital technology has entitled us to the

audio-visual enjoyment of higher quality than ever and is gradually changing our

audio-visual habits. Perhaps in the near future, the film industry chain of pre-

production, shooting, post-production and distribution will be replaced by new and

more complex forms.

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 APPENDIX A

Interview Questions for Filmmakers:

HP1: In the money-driven movie industry, the emergence of digital video technology

allows filmmakers to save money in the shooting and editing processes.

1) What do you think is the major reason that the industry is more likely to use

the digital camera to shoot film instead of the traditional film camera?

2) Why the digital camera was not popular in the film industry at its invention?

3) Besides price, what are the other advantages of digital cameras over old film

cameras?

4) As a cameraman/editor, what features attract you to use digital video tech to

produce films?

5) In a producer’s point of view, do you think the digital camera and video shift

the industry into another era?

HP2: The rise of digital video technology changed the way that film make-up and

post-production are made.

1) As a director, can you simply describe the film appearance design in the pre-

digital camera era?

2) Which aspect of the appearance design was most affected by the digital video

technology?

3) What is the prophase filming and postproduction of the filmmaking in the

past?

4) What is the difference between the post-production of filmmaking in the past

and present?
HP3: Digital video technology offers a great chance for those low-budget independent

moviemakers and amateurs who could not afford the high production costs before to

produce their own movies.

1) In a director’s point of view, what are the major barriers that might prohibit

the independent moviemakers from producing their films?

2) With digital technology, how do you think that might change the industry

environment for independent moviemakers?

3) Since digital platforms like YouTube have risen up, the amateurs can upload

their own videos on it. Therefore, how do you think this phenomenon (can be)

was attributed to digital cameras & digital video technology?

4) In general, what was the entry threshold of the movie industry for an

independent moviemaker before the rise of digital video technology?

5) From a producer’s point of view, how do digital cameras lower the industry

entry for these moviemakers in past decades?

HP4: In the future, the newest digital video technology like UHD/4k still will affect

film production.

1) UHD technology has extremely high quality for the image and video, and as a

director, can you briefly explain why there are not too many famous film studios

and companies willing use UHD cameras to produce movies right now?

2) What are the major difficulties for film and TV industry to distribute and

broadcast 4k content for audiences?

3) Do you think 4k technology will dominate the TV & Film market in the

future?