At the Bank of America Media, Communications, and Entertainment Conference, IMAX CEO Richard Gelfond elaborated on utilizing AI (Artificial Intelligence) in IMAX theaters and presentations. It appears that AI is an integral part of the IMAX operation, especially when the project was shot on non-IMAX film cameras. 

IMAX and AI

“We are very actively trying to integrate AI on the imagery side and operational side as well”, IMAX CEO Richard Gelfond explained at the Bank of America Media, Communications and Entertainment Conference. It appears that AI (Artificial Intelligence) has an important role in IMAX presentation and operation, and also, as we reported before, on the imagery side as well. As elaborated by Gelfond: “For instance, we monitor every one of our theaters in the world in real-time. So if the sound is too low in Beijing, We call them and tell them to turn it on. We are wired to do that right now. We get tons of data that we can’t analyze because there is too much of it, but one of the things we can do is maintenance prediction, so we can figure out if something is going to break in Malaysia when it will, and AI helps us reduce the costs of maintenance”. Furthermore, now notes not a secret that IMAX utilizes AI to make the images sharper and more compatible the the huge canvas. “On the content side, AI is going to play a role, like blowing up images. We make the images look better in terms of quality, making the image sharper even better” Gelfond admits.

On the content side, AI is going to play a role, like blowing up images. We make the images look better in terms of quality, making the image sharper even better.

IMAX CEO Richard Gelfond

AI for non-IMAX cameras

We assume that the AI takes an essential role when the footage is shot on non-IMAX cameras, digital and film. For instance, there are films screened in IMAX theater that were shot on a GoPro. In that case, IMAX implements AI methodologies to, how they say it, ‘explode’ the image so it can fit into the IMAX screen. On the contrary, this process is not needed when the film is shot on real IMAX film cameras or high-end IMAX-certified digital cameras. That would explain the recent phenomenon, of why so many projects are screened in IMAX theaters and were shot on cheap consumer digital cameras. According to IMAX, AI tech is applied to qualify those highly compressed and dull footage for IMAX screening.