DCP too big for cinema screen

[heedwa]

Hi everybody

Thank you for allowing me to join the group.

I've been having an issue with creating a DCP over the last few weeks and I am fresh out of ideas.

I have a feature film I am looking to create a DCP from. The film is presented in 2k scope at 25fps. Any combination of aspect ratio and container size I have tried when creating the DCP is always too big for the screen on one side when played back at the cinema. Even when playing the film back in flat, and the screen is letter boxed and pillar boxed, again one side of the frame is cut off (the right side). I have titles which go from edge to edge (width) but they never fully appear on the screen. (see image below) The image is also cut off from the top and the bottom when played back in scope.

IMG-20190412-WA0007[1].jpg

Is there any idea why this would be happening? (The last letter is supposed to be a 'D', but is being cut off)

Could it be because the film is in 25fps and not 24? Could it be an issue with the projector? I've checked all the files used to create the DCP (ie TIFF files) but there is nothing out of place with them. Is it something to do with the container size or aspect ratio?

Any help would be much appreciated as I have a screening of the film next week (at the same cinema as where I am testing the DCP) and would love to present the film as a DCP.

If you need anymore information please let me know, as this is my first post here so I'm not too sure if there's more information I need to present.

Thank you again

[carl]

Hi,

If you can attach or email the metadata.xml file from inside your project's folder, and one of your TIFF files, that would be a good start.

carl@dcpomatic.com

[heedwa]

Thank you.

I have emailed that information over to yourself as a zip file.

Thank you again for taking a look

[Carsten]

We had similar issues before, and very often, they turned out as bad projector presets. The way to fix this is to play an 'official' setup DCP that is able to convince the operator/cinema owner to have their presets checked.

If you play back your DCP with DCP-o-matic player, and there is no cutoff, and everything is fully visible, then it is very likely that either a wrong projector preset is used, or that the scope preset is setup wrong.

- Carsten

[Aswippe Johnson]

Agreed. Projector isn't setup properly. Run the Communicator program for that projector and put up an alignment test pattern... it should reveal much. They may have the image scaled on the chips, because they don't have the proper lens in that projector. That can make the image wonky if not done correctly.

[gunnar]

The problem there is probably that the screen itself is not in correct scope format so the projector is set to fit vertically on top and bottom but the left and right sides are cropped off.
It is actually pretty common that some part of the images are cropped off a little bit to fill out the scope screen but it is never as notisable like this.

The projectionist there should adjust the preset to leave a blank space on the top to avoid the projector from cropping so much out of the images.

The green line around the images (where the arrows point at) should be visible when projector preset are adjusted.


The SMPTE framing charts can be downloaded here:
https://isdcf.com/t/SMPTE-DCP-Tests/framing-chart.html