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Comment by dale_glass | Hacker News Reader

Nice.

Digital IMAX is disappointing. Hardly "MAX" anything. It's just 2.9K, which doesn't even measure up to my at this point mundane 4K monitors.

I hope they come up with a better digital one. 4K is great for home use but in a cinema it's not quite there.

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You sent me down the rabbit hole. It turns out there are only 19 theatres that are serving up the film version: https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/movies/2023/07/.... This image near the bottom of the article shows the comparisons of the formats: https://gfx-data.news-engineering.aws.wapo.pub/ai2html/Cropp....

Now I have huge FOMO and don't have a city close to me to see it. I haven't seen a movie in theatres in years and it would have been nice to treat myself to this one.

Same here, the FOMO led me to finding a film theater, luckily I found a 70mm non-IMAX showing in driving distance.

Honestly looking forward to not seeing pixelated digital screendoor for this one.

Most IMAX locations are just gonna be 2048x1080. Even sitting way in the back it looks low-res.

If anyone currently in Hamburg, Germany plans to watch this movie, the movie theater "Savoy" (seems to be independent - no chain) offers the Oppenheimer movie in original English language (no dubs/subs) in the original 70mm version.

I think I'm gonna attend next week.

Edit: I'm seeing the list above which claims there are no German cinemas who have the original 70mm film. However this[0] German cinema in Hamburg clearly claims to have original 70mm version ("OV"). Not sure if I either misunderstand something, the list is incorrect, or if the cinema is lying?

[0] https://savoy.premiumkino.de/vorstellung/oppenheimer/2023072...

Regular 70mm is not the same as 15/70mm IMAX.

This video does a great job on visualizing the difference https://youtu.be/x-7hHNoU8do

There's only one location on continental Europe for 70mm IMAX in Prague. We will go from Munich if you to join in.

Good to know but it's a bit too far for me

IMO the ranking goes like this:

1. IMAX 70mm

2. 70mm (non-IMAX, 2.2/1 aspect ratio)

3. Dual Laser IMAX (4K, can show the full 1.43/1 picture instead of just 1.9/1)

4. Single laser IMAX (4K, shows 1.9/1)

5. Dolby Cinema (4K, aspect ratio probably 2.39/1, not sure)

6. 35mm film

7. Non-laser IMAX

8. Regular theater

(1) is the most special, (2) is still quite special as only every few years do these theaters typically bring out 70mm projectors, (3) is also pretty special because rarely do movies return to IMAX where you can see the full uncropped image. (4) and (5) will still have great picture and sound quality compared to almost any home setup (OLED has contrast advantage always). (6) is pretty special, as [0] says: The 35mm prints have been made photochemically, preserving all the rich analog color of the original 65mm photography. (7) will have a big screen and good sound. (8) regular theaters are still good too. The value of the movie-going experience is not insignificant, which you get at any theater.

[0]: https://www.oppenheimermovie.com/tickets/formats/

> The value of the movie-going experience is not insignificant, which you get at any theater.

Not arguing, just curious: what do you perceive the value to be in going to a (8) plain 'ol regular theater? As opposed to something like a 65" OLED in your living room.

I think it's partly the shared event and ritual. You're taking part in something with hundreds of other people, and a lot of effort goes in to making it just right (with a good projectionist and a cinema that gives a shit)

65" OLED is fantastic (better color, contrast, resolution). One thing is that you get to see the movie sooner. May or may not be a big deal. Another is that you get a big screen with few distractions around (hopefully). Something about being in the dark room with the big screen makes the experience more memorable and immersive. You've got your popcorn. You can recreate all that at home to a large extent though. There's also something to the communal aspect -- it's at least a little intriguing to look around and see who else is at the movie. Sometimes it's a great crowd during the showing and there's laughter and applause and gasps, and that adds something to the experience. Sometimes you strike up a conversation with somebody afterward. You also get the experience of intentionally going out. Maybe you meet or bring some friends or family, maybe you get some ice cream afterward (I've also gone to a few movies alone, and that's its own interesting experience). I guess that's mostly all to say it's a little more fun. I also have some notion which is probably a little silly of supporting the thing I'm seeing. This especially applies to movies like Shin Kamen Rider, which I made sure to catch in the one or two days it was playing in the US.

Thanks for this! Booked my ticket for Oppenheimer at one of the places in the UK.

But this is about the film version, though.

Digital IMAX is pointless, but it is still technically "MAX" as the max is for physical size, not resolution.

The original reason IMAX uses 70mm film (8.3x the area of 35mm) is because projecting onto a larger screen required a more powerful lamp, which would produce more heat and burn 35mm film, so they had to place it farther away from the lamp, meaning the film had to be larger.

> But this is about the film version, though.

Yes, I meant "Nice" as in "it's nice that they went through the extra effort to release it in the rare, high quality medium available, and not a format that's worse than what I can watch at home".

> The original reason IMAX uses 70mm film (8.3x the area of 35mm) is because projecting onto a larger screen required a more powerful lamp

70mm is also much higher resolution. Modern digital can compete with 35mm, but to my knowledge there's nothing out there that competes with 70mm yet.

I think that IMAX has really struggled with branding confusion as the majority of "IMAX" branded screens are slightly larger regular screens and not the true experience that IMAX can be. There's only a few dozen IMAX 15-perf 70mm film theatres in 1.43 aspect ratio worldwide, some more digital 4K IMAX multi-laser in 1.43 which are also quite good, and then the vast majority of other "IMAX" screens are digital IMAX Xenon which is usually just a slightly bigger screen than a traditional theatre (but still not the 1.43 ratio the filmmaker intended).

I think IMAX Xenon as well as general confusion about which systems are in use at which theatres and which movies are filmed in which format has led to a ton of frustration with the brand, even though when everything is just right they can produce some really incredible experiences.

Then even for Oppenheimer there is a lot of technical troubles going on for the film theatres... The top of /r/imax has stories of people who flew cross country to see it in the best format they could and then had the projector bonk out 20 minutes in.

I think that, post-COVID, a lot of people have realized that a good home video theatre is very affordable, lots of movies are going to streaming either direct or very quickly, and that modern 4K HDR OLED TVs can be absolutely gorgeous. I don't have a lot of motivation to go to a standard theatre screening these days, but IMAX is an experience you can't get at home though so I hope it stays around.

To add more to the confusion, there's also single-laser IMAX, which gives you a 4K picture in a 1.9 to 1 aspect ratio. Taller than standard 2.39 to 1, but not the full IMAX.

That 16K Sphere in vegas could be worth checking out

Well, I think "IMAX with Laser" is 4K.

https://www.imax.com/news/imax-laser-here

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