Take a Quidditch Ride By the Seat of Your Movie Seat!

Here is a bit of a fun story. A few weeks ago we reported that several theaters in the US and Canada would be hosting special showings of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince in theaters that have the high tech D-Box motion enhanced theater seating. The Star.com has an article tonight about one of these theaters that has installed the special seats that move with the sound and action onscreen. The article speaks to one of the marketers of the special seats.

Guy Marcoux, marketing director for Montreal’s D-Box Technologies
Inc. says it’s not a theme park ride, nor are the seats like the 1970s
experiements with moving seats, dubbed Sensurround.”What makes
it very different is how perfectly timed the action is to the action
you see onscreen,” explains Marcoux, adding the motion is encoded frame
by frame.So what will patrons feel? Marcoux says it will range
from subtle to serious. But the mid-air, lightning-fast Quidditch
match, a part of every Harry Potter flick, is expected to be “the highlight of the film” for those in the D-Box chairs.

…for those who worry about air sickness when they fly off on their
Potter broomsticks, Marcoux says each chair has its own controls.”You
can, at any time during the movie, set three different levels. You can
jack it up or turn it down to low, or shut it off. It’s not meant to be
a ride.”