..Gary Dretzka
..Noah Forrest
..Leonard Klady
..R.J. Matson
..David Poland
..Douglas Pratt
..Ray Pride
..Michael Wilmington

March 23, 2004

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

 

Buena Vista Partners
With Kodak, Dolby and NATO
to Eliminate Silver Soundtracks

BURBANK, Calif., March 22 /PRNewswire/ -- Starting this fall, Buena Vista Pictures Distribution will begin issuing 35mm prints of Walt Disney Pictures and Touchstone Pictures releases with environmentally friendly pure-dye cyan soundtracks, it was announced today (3/22/04) by Chuck Viane, president of Buena Vista Pictures Distribution, and Jeff Miller, executive vice president, Worldwide Post Production and Operations for The Walt Disney Studios. This new soundtrack technology represents a significant environmental advance for the motion pictures industry, and eliminates the use of traditional silver-applicated tracks and the caustic chemicals involved in that process. Buena Vista plans to switch entirely to cyan soundtracks on all of its worldwide release prints by January, 2005. To accomplish this goal, the Disney
distribution arm is working closely with Dolby, Kodak, Technicolor and NATO to perfect the technology and encourage theater owners to install RED LED soundtrack readers on their projectors. RED LED readers, which are now standard in all US manufactured projectors, are currently installed in the vast majority of projectors in use in this country. MGM has also announced that they will be issuing pure-dye cyan soundtracks on all release prints beginning this May.

Commenting on the announcement, Viane said, "Our industry is striving to eliminate sources of environmental harm, improve lab productivity and theatrical efficiency, and Buena Vista is proud to be taking a cutting edge position in this worthy effort. Most theater projectors are now equipped with the RED LED readers and we expect the others to convert to this technology by 2005. I'm sure that other distributors will soon be supporting this movement
to cyan soundtracks and that together we can all do our part to make this a cleaner planet."

Jeff Miller added, "Dolby, Kodak, Technicolor, NATO, and our Studio have been working hard to perfect the new cyan soundtrack technology so that audiences will enjoy the sound reproduction for analog tracks on RED LED readers as the filmmakers intended. Buena Vista will release one of its major fall titles with this type of soundtrack as we move forward with our plans for complete conversion by January, 2005. This is a major advance for our industry and something we can all be very proud of."

John Fithian, president of the National Association of Theatre Owners, said, "NATO congratulates our friends at Disney for taking this important step. It's wonderful to see America's movie theatres and movie studios work together to improve our environment."
In addition to eliminating silver and all of the associated caustic chemicals used in the old process, the new cyan soundtrack technology provides enormous benefits in terms of water conservation. Given that a typical movie release may require between 5,000 to 10,000 prints, it is estimated that this new approach to film production can conserve enough water to supply a town of 75,000 people with drinking water each year.

- wbp -