"Digital is going to be big in India," says Shah Rukh Khan

Remember the time when prints were carted around in the boot of a car from one theatre to another in the first week of a film's release? Things may still remain largely the same in the bigger metros but satellites are increasingly being used for transmitting films to smaller centres, cutting not only costs but also curbing the rampant piracy existing there.

Digital prints require projectors that cost Rs 40 lakh plus transmission equipment to beam the film. But the economics works in its favour. Each physical print costs Rs 70,000 whereas the new technology allows a few master prints to be used to transmit the film across the country (see box). So, had Sajid Nadiadwala released 350 prints of Heyy Babby in celluloid, it would have cost him Rs 2.5 crore. But, by using digital technology, he managed to cut down costs by 80%.

Distributors and exhibitors gain by being able to screen the film in smaller centres in the initial weeks of its release. “There is potential for increasing box-office revenue by 100%. Piracy, which takes away 40% of the revenue, can be curbed better now,'' a cinema manager from Amravati said. New films hitting small towns like Amravati now coincides with their worldwide launch; places like Amravati are used to seeing new movies a week or two after they hit the metros and this allows pirated prints to reach these towns earlier.

Om Shanti Om and Saawariya are among the immediate releases whose makers are riding piggyback on digitalisation to broadbase their release.

“Digital is going to be big in India,'' actor Shah Rukh Khan said. Three hundred and fifty of Om Shanti Om's 850 prints are being released digitally; the plan is to bombard the smaller centres and capitalise on the hype in the first few days of its release.

Bharati Dubey, TimesOfIndia