Studios Agree On Digital Standard For Theaters

Motion picture studios have reportedly agreed on standards for providing digital movies in theaters. Screening digital movies in theaters promises to save significant amounts of money over traditional films, each print of which costs about $1,000 to $1,200 to produce.

Theater owners have been reluctant to install digital equipment, however, due to fears that disagreement among the studios over the technology standards would leave theaters with expensive yet obsolete digital projectors. Details about the new standards have not been announced, though some involved in developing the standards said the technology should work with digital movies today as well as with higher-resolution movies in the future. Questions remain over how to pay for the digital projectors, which cost roughly $100,000. Some proposals would have movie studios helping to cover some of the cost of the projectors for theaters.

New York Times, 27 July 2005 (registration req’d)