Long live the M!
Christie’s M Series projectors are at the heart of many installations in theme parks and museums by Judith Rubin
A new M to replace the old M
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hristie’s original M Series was a leap in the evolution of projection. First introduced in 2007, it became a top-selling line of projectors and lenses for Christie and a hugely successful 3DLP product within the industry. “The M Series packed a lot of features in a small package,” says Larry Paul, Executive Director, Technology and Custom Solutions, Christie. “Features like the intelligent lens system and embedded Twist for blending and warping were unique at the time. That and its small size and weight made it popular and an AV game-changer. The M Series stands for reliability, ruggedness and innovation.” The original M Series projectors sit at the heart of many installations in theme parks, planetariums, museums, visitor centers and live events, and they’re still used in the fleets of rental and staging production companies. Christie has worked to design its successor - one that would continue to deliver everything customers loved, but perform to a higher standard, incorporating the best of current technology while retaining the existing product footprint and the same lensing. That successor, now officially launched, is the M 4K25 RGB billed by Christie as their smallest, lightest, quietest all-in-one RGB pure laser projector. Within its petite, 92-pound frame, the reinvented M offers 25,000 lumens and 4K UHD resolution – boasting four times the resolution, double the brightness, and twice the color of the original M (greater than 96% of the Rec. 2020 color gamut as opposed to the previous, and much smaller, Rec. 709). It further boasts up to 50,000 hours of stable runtime, new TruLife+ electronics with electronic color convergence
(ECC), an intelligent lens system (ILS1), and a field-replaceable light source. It is 3D capable and high-frame-rate capable all the way up to 480 frames per second (FPS) with a Christie Mirage upgrade (more on this below).
“We showed a sneak peek to an industry audience in Orlando and they were blown away by what they saw: this little, tiny projector making a giant, brilliantly colorful image on a wall - and by what they didn’t hear: projector noise. This allows you to go into environments where you couldn’t previously have had a projector.” - Larry Howard The M 4K25 RGB takes the same much-loved ILS1 lenses and utilizes the same lens mount as Christie Crimson Series projectors and the former M and J Series, and it is compatible with existing system components and Christie’s suite of software products. It has new qualities that make it likely to find its way into even more venues, indoor and outdoor settings, and guest experiences than before. It promises to make installation and maintenance a breeze, and get operators and creatives excited about new storytelling possibilities. In this article we have focused on some of the more dramatic improvements from the old M to the new.
Re-M-vestment Are you ready for 2022-2023? The conditions of the pandemic have added fuel to the fire of innovation and ramped up the digital sophistication of the public. And, according to the latest TEA/AECOM Theme Index, the cycle of recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic is already underway. The stages are identified as downturn (2020), bounce-back (2021) and the beginnings of real recovery (2022) followed by elevated guest expectations (2023).
The Christie M 4K25 RGB pure laser projector offers 25,000 lumens and 4K UHD resolution.
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Since reopening, parks, museums and attractions have had no shortage of returning guests eager to gather again for real-life, out-of-home experiences. Operators must do what they always do to remain competitive: reinvest. Given that today most operators are faced with having to do more with less, the new M
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