Podcast 114: Ron Williams

Ron Williams, CEO of The Landmark Group and consultant to the film and broadcast industries, discusses the growing importance of 4K and Quad HD, 4K in film and TV production, 4K displays and cameras, the emergence of 8K in Japan, consumer preferences for 4K versus 3D, true stereoscopic versus converted 3D, high frame rates, answers to chat-room questions, and more.

Run Time: 1:05:38

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Professional in the broadcast and film industries for 37 years, Ron Williams has successfully operated The Landmark Group as a design and consulting company in the broadcast and video, CGI, and film industry. The Landmark Group has designed and built facilities for all major networks, post-production houses, and government facilities as well as performing quality-control and proof of performance for CGI, film, and HDTV facilities.

Mr. Williams served as Engineering and Technical Director for the ABC television network in New York and Hollywood. As one of the team leaders who designed six Olympic games, five political conventions, and many Wide World of Sports events—winning nine Emmy nominations in the process—he went on to organize the special-events unit for the network.

In his time working for Sony as a product and sales marketing manager and Panasonic as the Western Regional Sales Manager, he brought many new products to market. He still contributes to manufacturers development of new products.

Most recently, he has contributed computer graphics for several major motion pictures, writing color references for the conforming data. Managing the color conversions and monitoring for film, TV, and CGI is part of the work of the Landmark Group. Consulting for several corporations, he is designing digital-intermediate timing rooms for digital cinema. Landmark also does measurements and testing for theaters and screening rooms as well as display design and standards for many CE manufacturers.

Landmark was ahead of the times with its 4K LCD professional monitor developed in-house in 1996. This allowed filmmakers to work with 4K images for feature films.

The list of major motion-picture contributions is long and varied. Aiding in the color timing, alignment, gamma mapping, or quality assurance, he has touched most of the “A” titles released in the past five years.

Mr. Williams continues his work with SMPTE standards-writing committees. Writing standards for high-definition television and other standards, he has worked on the digital cinema standard for SMPTE committees and the DCI (Digital Cinema Initiative). He has chaired several SMPTE standards committees, including the Monitor Calibration committee and the DC28 Colorimetry committee for Digital Cinema, and now Display standards.

Previously, Mr. Williams served as the VP at Doremi Labs. Doremi is the leader in digital-cinema exhibition servers as well as 3D servers and converters.

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