Remember how a system for selective digital grading was developed by Peter Doyle for the LOTR trilogy? (I talk about it in Chapter 9 of The Frodo Franchise and blogged about it here.) And remember how Peter Jackson was having live video conferencing between him in London and his special-effects team back in Wellington, all over the innovative secure internet connection they dubbed the Fatpipe? If you’ve forgotten, you’ll find short segments on those techniques in the extended-edition DVD supplements.

Those were incredibly cutting-edge technologies at that time. Now Variety reports that Technicolor has put the two together to allow filmmakers to sit in on and participate in color-grading sessions going on at a distant facility. It’s called “Technicolor Remote Grading.” The same footage is shown on 2K digital projectors in Technicolor offices that might be in Hollywood and London. According to Marco Barrio, VP of theatrical post-production for Technicolor Creative Services, “We have clients working with that colorist as if they’re sitting in the same room. The color matches, it’s in real time, and the quality is the same as if they were sitting in the same room with the colorist.”

Back in 2003 when I first interviewed Barrie Osborne, he said that the trilogy’s greatest impact on the film industry would be its use of digital intermediates (the version of the film used for color grading). I think it’s safe to say that this new technology’s origins could be trace back, directly or indirectly, to the innovations of the LOTR film. Quite possibly something of the sort will be used on The Hobbit.