There has been much talk recently about optimizing IMF version workflows, and the associated cost savings, in order to achieve the holy grail of  master once, use forever. 

In this episode Bruce Devlin looks at the mastering process. Some of the first adopters of IMF workflows have been the Hollywood studios. But what of other content owners? IMF present a big opportunity to get the master version right first time and lift the overall quality of a title forever.

Maintaining visual quality involves many things:

• maintaining spatial fidelity
• rescaling and aspect ration adjustment
• high quality de-interlacing
• noise, wanted like film grain, v. unwanted
• changing frame rate

As IMF rolls out it is up the masters of the mastering process to show than high quality done once can lead to a long tail of commercial success. SO don't stamp your master with the 2017 look of inferior technology.