How has digital technology had an impact in the film industry?

Digital cinematography is the process of capturing motion pictures as digital images, rather than on film.

Production - On-set monitoring allows the cinematographer to see the actual images that are captured, immediately on the set, which is impossible with film. A digital cinematographer can choose a film 'light' stock he or she is familiar with, and expose film on set with a high degree of confidence about how it will turn out. Advances in digital technology mean that films can be shot straight onto a Hard Drive rather than using a reel of film. Digital tehnology has opened more opertunities in post production aswell, for example, frames from 35mm film can be scanned into a computor for digital editing - this enables effects such as colour grading, shifting focus with lighting or adding completely new elements.

Distribution - Films are still available from general stores but in all different formats, we now have DVD, HD, Blue-Ray and other formats available to us from download or purchase. Films have not switched to digital yet and cinema's still have the films layed out on a real, very old school! Cinematogrophy may change in that it will turn to digital which will enable it to be better quality etc, this will get rid of those annoying black spots on the screen that come up from time to time. The digital age has opened a new world of piracy - Hollywood claims piracy has cost it $6bn (£3.2bn), digitising films means that copies are easily made and distributed illegally which is a big threat to the industry. Example of piracy: By the time the Phantom Menace reached Asia for example, box office receipts were far lower than expected. Piracy was blamed because so many people had already seen it. The second film was given a simultaneous world wide cinema release as a result, probably a good idea as 10 million people went online to download it.

Exhibition - Films are now experienced through many different ways because of the digital age, we now experience them in the comforts of our own home and through the cinema's. Quality of our film experience has also risen greatly with the indroduction of digitally stored films. Not particularly, i went to Odeon the other night and it was the same as when i went to see Tarzan when i was 5! But on serious notes, cinema's are changing but not dramatically but slowly. Yes and No, the whole cinema experience is based on the fact that it is not available at home legally at the time, so cinema attracts the people that want to see it comforting conditions and earlier than others. But the transformation to a digital cinemtagrophy has made it easier for the cinema experience to be in the comfort of your own home.