Lightyear Digital Theatre

Compact Interactive Theatre (CIT)

Lightyear’s business model, Compact Interactive Theatre (CIT), is a blend of live events, theatre, screened media and digital technology. CITs are highly efficient and luxuriously appointed digital theatres with modular designs of 50 to 1,500 seats that have the absolute versatility of open-sourced programming. Open-sourced programming means that no one body or regulatory commission controls the content that can be exhibited. CITs can either be retrofitted existing facilities or custom-built theatres.

With exceptional high-definition audio visual presentation, including optional 3D, these streamlined, economical and versatile digital theatres are serviced by a digital broadcast platform making each venue immediately responsive to changes in programming. The total audio visual effect is stunning to experience and audience perception is changed forever as a Window to Reality environment is created. Welcome to the theatre, classroom and interactive forum of the future!

The principal CIT target marketplace is that of small communities and suburban areas.  Special emphasis is applied to community theatres and universities. With high-definition audio visual content and 3D in a quality and environment that can seldom be found, even in large urban centres, the CIT will become an integral part of any community, bringing to the thousands of small towns and remote communities across North America a state-of-the-industry entertainment, cultural and educational venue.

Lightyears CIT program will open up communities with theatres that cater to entertainment, education, the dissemination of information, interactive meetings and the enhancement of arts and culture.  Digitization brings back the various choices of entertainment that once made the small town theatre flourish and placed the theatre as a principal centre of culture.  A CIT enhances live theatre, revitalizes old venues, offers versatility in exhibition and enables vastly enhanced revenue streams for exhibitors.

To complement its CIT program, Lightyear has a broadcast platform with the ability to deliver digital programming anywhere at any time. Lightyears broadcast network will offer custom programming for CIT venues of any size ensuring that each theatre is a continual source of information, education and entertainment.  Distribution is not limited to Lightyear theatres and broadcasts can be delivered to entities such as universities, convention centres, shopping malls, nightclubs, casinos and virtually any educational or entertainment venue. This distribution capability has placed Lightyear at the forefront of change.

Brilliant high-definition images and pristine sound will equal and often even exceed the vibrancy of live performance and will expand audiences exponentially.  A high-definition performance makes every seat the best seat in the house. This in turn will enable more companies to produce and present artistic content. Some producers have recovered the cost of their entire run on opening night through high-definition broadcast ticket sales.

Everything from premiere motion pictures to big screen computer games and live concerts to distance education are possible in CITs. People in outlying areas now have access to the worlds finest performances, distance learning in a real classroom environment and audio visual exhibition that probably exceeds anything available in a major urban centre. A CIT frees the theatre from its analogue constraints.  Lightyear has been involved in the research and development of digital theatre for over 15 years and has focused much of its efforts on single and duplex theatres for small to medium population bases, a market completely neglected by the mega-plex film entertainment industry.

Educational Application

Lightyear understands that education should be a primary focus of its CIT program. From the outset of digitalization in the industry Lightyear understood that digital technology would be the greatest new frontier in education since the printing press.

Larger classes, smaller attention spans and technology savvy students demand large screen high- definition impact and wide open distribution of educational materials. High-definition multi-media lectures with live or recorded teaching will open young and old minds to new worlds of sight and sound.  Whether touring the greatest museums on earth, discovering the topography of the ocean depths, traveling the cosmos or observing heart surgery in 3D, the fully realistic scenes will captivate and demand the attention of students.  A new era of explosive creativity is building an extensive library of first class art, nature, culture, science and educational films that blow the top off of convention.  Thousands of the worlds finest lectures can now be shared in the theatres classroom environment.

The students of today have seen it all when it comes to new technology and it requires state-of-the- art equipment to astound and captivate them. The latest digital equipment is highly affordable and is made to be adapted, upgraded and modified to stay ahead of the curve without major infrastructure changes.  Lightyear is fully committed to helping digital technology make an impact on education and deliver arts, culture and information to communities that need worldwide connectivity.

Broadcasting

Lightyears broadcast platform will open its theatres to complete interactivity with any number of other theatres, classrooms, community centers or arenas worldwide.  Lightyears distribution capability makes high video resolution, real-time, point-to-point live interaction with similarly equipped theatres possible.  It also facilitates lower resolution, point-to-multi-point distribution to accommodate delivery to a vast range of recipients in a wide range of formats (schools, universities, enterprises, consumer desktops, existing networks, etc.).

Each Lightyear CIT will have network connections for reception of an extensive range of pay-per- view broadcasts as well as subscription series events (sports, concerts, education, etc.), paid promotional simulcasts (live seminars, corporate meetings, etc.) and a vast array of other features. All of these capabilities significantly enhance profitability for the exhibitor.  The digital world opens up a wealth of digitally created content, televised content and live broadcast digital content.

In addition to independent sources of content, Lightyear will utilize the current film distributors and the distributors of televised programming, electronic programming and live broadcast programming. Film festivals for independent filmmakers will serve to create an entire spectrum of innovative and exciting new material.

Lightyear has spent years distilling the theatre to its essence in order to create an efficient, well- appointed and top quality setting in which to enjoy screen entertainment. The result is a state-of-the- industry audio/visual experience, in a low cost package that will keep profit margins high for exhibitors.

Weaving the multitude of technologies and content sources together has been a fifteen year task that is now one-touch integration.  Lightyear is at the forefront of innovation as digital media replaces celluloid for screen exhibition. Lightyear CITs will be the largest growth sector in the theatre and visual entertainment arenas, possibly even in the overall entertainment business, for the next decade.

Lightyear offers prospective exhibitors unsurpassed excellence in its build-out or retrofit of digital theatres.  The combination of expertise and knowledge contained under the Lightyear banner is second-to-none, coalescing individuals from many different corporations who have worked in the digital theatre realm since its inception.  Through its extensive network of affiliate corporations and strategic partners Lightyear is able to keep costs to a minimum without compromising quality.

The combination of Lightyears audio visual experience and ongoing exhibition assets, coupled to a highly efficient broadcast platform, is an extremely powerful package. When you add to this the worlds finest digital theatre installation and post-installation service, business deployment and operations are seamless.

The CIT program is launching now. Welcome to the theatre of the future.