• Today, the best digital projection format that any theatre can offer is DCP, regardless of the original media.

  • Image
    • You can deliver your master on any storage medium and leave any necessary conversions to Charbon.
    • If your post-production studio has the ability to produce a specific output format for your DCP mastering, the ideal is a 16-bit TIFF image sequence in RGB colour, or for smaller formats, ProRes 444, ProRes HQ, or Avid DNX-HD.
    • Above all, do not convert your existing Quicktime master into an image sequence, as the quality will not be improved and the colours or the gamma will probably be distorted.
    • Editing software (Final Cut Pro, Avid, Premiere, After Effects) do poor-quality re-scaling. It is better to deliver the master as is, even if the resolution is not good. Charbon will take care of adapting it to the DCP format.
    Charbon accepts almost all storage media for its DCP services.
  • Sound
    • DCP supports the audio from mixing as is and maintains full quality.
    • DCI standards require at least a 5.1 soundtrack. In pratice, most theaters broadcast stereo (2.0) correctly, although audiences at the edges of the room are not used to hearing dialogue coming from the sides. If possible, you should mix in at least 3.0, so that the dialogue comes from the center.
    • The audio must be in 24 bits and last at least as long as the image. If need be, it will be converted or lengthened.
    • Surround sound must be delivered separately from the image, with a clear track assignment (for example: L.wav, R.wav, C.wav, LFE.wav, Ls.wav, Rs.wav).
    Charbon offers upscaling of stereo sound to 3.0 or 5.1 sound, done in the mixing studio.
  • Subtitling
    • A DCP can be made in many different subtitled versions.
    • Les sous-titres pourront être soit sous forme de flux (c'est moins cher et plus souple), soit gravés dans l'image (ça résout les rares problèmes d'incompatibilité et permet un contrôle total de leur mise en forme).
    • Les fichiers de sous-titres créés à l'extérieur peuvent être transmis sous forme .srt, .stl, .xml, .stp, ou sous forme de simples générateurs de texte (≠ plugins) dans une séquence Final Cut Pro.
    Charbon can manage all translation and subtitling work.
  • Synchronisation

    An niveau synchronisation, il faut veiller à ce que son, sous-titres et images puissent être calés sans erreurs possibles. Les medias images, sons, et le timecode 00:00:00:00 des sous-titres commencent alors

    • either all with the same lead-in time before the first image of the film (e.g.: 15 seconds pre-roll)
    • or all without a leader, start of the delivered image = first image of the film
    • or with a beep in the image and the sound, and subtitled "beep"
    If you are unable to prepare everything, Charbon has the know-how!
    The necessary work can be done prior to the DCP mastering.
DCP resources
Tools