Once again Dolby Laboratories supported the 62nd Berlin International Film Festival as the official supplier of digital cinema equipment and services including Dolby 3D. Berlinale 2012 got under way on February 9 and is recognized as the worlds largest publicly attended film festival attracting more than 19 000 accredited film professionals and hosting screenings for an anticipated 300 000 members of the public. The 11-day event will see the world premiere of 18 films in competition at the festival so pristine presentation is vital as Dr. Reiner Chemnitius supervising engineer of the Berlinale says. Every director in competition wants to ensure that their work is seen exactly as they intended and so we are pleased to be once again working with the Dolby Content Services Group to ensure this. They offer a broad range of expertise and technical solutions and are dedicated to achieving the highest quality of presentation so they are an essential part of the team supporting the festival. About 1 600 of the 2 000 screenings scheduled for this year's Berlinale will be digital cinema presentations to be shown on up to 50 different screens. The festival has worked closely with Dolby to establish a network of 37 digital cinema servers at the festival venues as well as five Dolby high-speed storage systems to enable a 24-hour transfer connection into the screening booths. The Dolby team will also be on hand to provide technical support for the largest digital cinema presentations during the festival including those in competition for the prestigious Golden Bear and Silver Bear awards. It is also anticipated that at least two 3D movies will be screened during the 2012 festival following the successful 2011 screening of the festival's first presentation in Dolby 3D before an audience that included German Chancellor Angela Merkel. The Berlinale is our busiest film festival of the year says Julian Pinn director of distribution services at Dolby not least because so many of the screenings are open to members of the public. With such a busy schedule it is vital for the festival organizers to know that they can rely on first-class technical support and we at Dolby are glad to help. Productions in the competition program this year include entries from Brazil Canada the Czech Republic Denmark France Germany Great Britain Greece Hong Kong/China Hungary Indonesia Ireland Italy Norway the People's Republic of China the Philippines Portugal the Russian Federation Senegal Spain Sweden Switzerland and the United States. With major international movies independent and art-house productions experimental and foreign-language movies and short films to be presented in many different locations the technical needs of the festival are extensive. The growth of digital cinema has seen the technical needs of the Berlinale change dramatically over the past few years says festival director Dieter Kosslick. Therefore we are delighted to continue our relationship with Dolby. It is a relationship built on mutual trust and we really appreciate the quality and flexibility of the service they provide to the festival year after year. Dolby Laboratories www.dolby.com
