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103-541: Todd-AO is also the name of the widescreen, 70 mm film format that was developed by Mike Todd and the Naify brothers, owners of United Artists Theaters in partnership with the American Optical Company in the mid-1950s. Todd-AO had been founded to promote and distribute this system. Todd-AO began as a high resolution widescreen film format. It was co-developed in the early 1950s by Mike Todd ,

206-550: A Broadway producer, and United Artists Theaters in partnership with the American Optical Company in Buffalo, New York . It was developed to provide a high definition single camera widescreen process to compete with Cinerama , or as characterized by its creator, "Cinerama outta one hole". Where Cinerama used a complicated setup of three separate strips of film photographed simultaneously, Todd-AO required only

309-511: A movie palace downtown theatre exclusively, sometimes for a year or more. Often a "hard ticket" policy was in effect, with tickets sold for specific numbered seats, and limited showings per day. Most Todd-AO films through the late 1960s, including Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines and The Sound of Music , were initially shown on a roadshow basis. In some US cities, individual theaters were converted for use in

412-441: A widescreen picture on standard 35 mm film or other visual recording media with a non-widescreen native aspect ratio . It also refers to the projection format in which a distorted image is "stretched" by an anamorphic projection lens to recreate the original aspect ratio on the viewing screen (not to be confused with anamorphic widescreen , a different video encoding concept that uses similar principles but different means). In

515-589: A "spread") or simply left blank. If a 70 mm film was shown in a Cinerama theatre, the Cinerama sound system was used. From 1976 onwards, many 70 mm prints used Dolby noise reduction on the magnetic tracks but Dolby disapproved of the "spread" and instead re-allocated the 6 available tracks to provide for left, center and right screen channels, left and right surround channels plus a "low-frequency enhancement" channel to give more body to low-frequency bass. This layout came to be known as " 5.1 " (the "point one"

618-548: A 128, 64, 48 or 37 degree field of view. The aspect ratio of this format was 2.20:1. Both film sizes had been used in the past, in the 70 mm Fox Grandeur process in 1929–1930, however Todd-AO's physical format was not compatible with this format. The use of 65 mm photography and 70 mm printing became the standard adopted by others: Super Panavision 70 (essentially the Panavision company's version of Todd-AO) and Ultra Panavision 70 (the same mechanically, but with

721-495: A 2.55∶1 ratio ( ANSI PH22.104-1957 ). The initial SMPTE definition for anamorphic projection with an optical sound track down the side ANSI PH22.106-1957 was issued in December 1957. It standardized the projector aperture at 0.839 × 0.715 inches (21.31 × 18.16 mm), which gives an aspect ratio of c. 1.17∶1. The aspect ratio for this aperture, after a 2× unsqueeze, is 2.3468…∶1 (1678:715), which rounded to

824-423: A 65 mm negative is used during production and then used to produce the 70 mm positives for distribution. The sprocket hole perforations on the two are the same, and the positives are printed using contact printing with the negatives centered on the larger 70 mm film. Contact printing was used on prints that were to be "double system," using a separate, synchronized 35 mm full-coat magnetic film for

927-444: A 70 mm print, a 1.25× anamorphic projection lens was used to decompress the image to an aspect ratio of 2.76:1, one of the widest ever used in commercial cinema. Due to the high cost of 70 mm film and the expensive projection system and screen required to use the stock, distribution for films using the stock was limited, although this did not always hurt profits. Most 70 mm films were also released on 35 mm film for

1030-439: A 70 mm projector added polarization and merged the two images on the screen. The 1971 re-release of Warner Bros. ' House of Wax used the side-by-side StereoVision format and was distributed in both anamorphically squeezed 35 mm and deluxe non-anamorphic 70 mm form. The system was developed by Allan Silliphant and Chris Condon of StereoVision International Inc., which handled all technical and marketing aspects on

1133-566: A Todd-AO credit (not necessarily the more specific Todd-AO 35 credit) appears in some widescreen films made in the 1970s and 1980s. It becomes even more confusing as 70 mm prints were made for films which, unlike earlier pictures made in the process, were shown in multiplexes, like Dune and Logan's Run . During the late 1970s through the early 1990s 65 mm photography such as that used in processes like Todd-AO or Super Panavision became rare. However, some major films had 70 mm prints made by blowup from 35 mm negatives mostly for

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1236-689: A conventional flat widescreen, and resembled ordinary films, except for their greater clarity and six-track stereo sound. A variation on Todd-AO called Dimension 150 did, however, make use of Cinerama-like deeply curved screens. Only two films were made in Dimension 150 – The Bible: In the Beginning... , directed by John Huston , and Patton , starring George C. Scott . In some venues, however, Todd-AO and Dimension 150 films received their first run in Cinerama theatres in order that they be shown on

1339-523: A copycat process known as Dimension 150) were shown in some Cinerama cinemas, which allowed for deeply curved screens. Todd-AO adopted a similar multi-channel magnetic sound system to the one developed for Cinemascope two years earlier, recorded on "stripes" of magnetic oxide deposited on the film. However Todd-AO has six channels instead of the four of Cinemascope and due to the wider stripes and faster film speed provides superior audio quality. Five of these six channels are fed to five speakers spaced behind

1442-440: A deeply curved screen – such as the first Atlanta showings of The Sound of Music . Todd-AO films were closely associated with what was called roadshow exhibition. At the time, before multiplex theatres became common, most films opened at a large single screen theatre in the downtown area of each large city before eventually moving on to neighborhood theatres. With the roadshow concept, a film would play, often in 70 mm at

1545-490: A digital step with no degradation of image quality. Also, 3-perf and 2-perf pose minor problems for visual effects work. The area of the film in 4-perf work that is cropped out in the anamorphosing process nonetheless contains picture information that is useful for such visual effects tasks as 2D and 3D tracking. This mildly complicates certain visual effects efforts for productions using 3-perf and 2-perf, making anamorphic prints struck digitally from center cropped 4-perf Super 35

1648-458: A far lower cost. Coupled with the rise of the multiplex cinema, which meant that audiences were increasingly seeing films on relatively small screens rather than the giant screens of the old "Picture Palaces", this meant that the expensive 70 mm format went out of favour again. The DTS digital sound-on-disc system was adapted for use with 70 mm film, thus saving the significant costs of magnetic striping, but this has not been enough to stop

1751-434: A faux-film grain applied to the footage. One common misconception about the anamorphic format concerns the actual width number of the aspect ratio, as 2.35 , 2.39 or 2.40 . Since the anamorphic lenses in virtually all 35 mm anamorphic systems provide a 2:1 squeeze, one would logically conclude that a 1.375∶1 full academy gate would lead to a 2.75∶1 aspect ratio when used with anamorphic lenses. Due to differences in

1854-433: A five-year special-royalty basis with Warner Bros. The big screen 3D image was both bright and clear, with all the former sync and brightness problems of traditional dual 35 mm 3D eliminated. Still, it took many years more before IMAX began to test the water for big-screen 3D, and sold the concept to Hollywood executives. Hollywood has released films shot on 35 mm as IMAX blow-up versions. Many 3D films were shown in

1957-407: A fix for anamorphic mumps, they were actually only a compromise. Cinematographers still had to frame scenes carefully to avoid the recognizable side-effects of the change in aspect ratio. Beginning in the 1990s, anamorphic began to lose popularity in favor of flat formats , mainly Super 35 . (In Super 35, the film is shot flat, then matted, and optically printed as an anamorphic release print.) This

2060-405: A handful of films (such as Spider-Man 2 ) have used 65mm for this purpose, but the usage of digital intermediate for compositing has largely negated these issues. Digital intermediate offers other benefits such as lower cost and a greater range of available lenses and accessories to ensure a consistent look to the footage. A horizontal variant of 70 mm, with an even bigger picture area,

2163-421: A higher definition widescreen image for mastering). With the rise of digital cinematography, anamorphic photography has experienced something of a renaissance, as the higher light sensitivity (ISO) of digital sensors has lowered the lighting requirements that anamorphic lenses once demanded. Many vintage lens series, some of which saw little to no use for decades, have been sought by cinematographers wishing to add

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2266-453: A more classic, film-like quality to digital cinematography; and manufacturers such as Panavision and Vantage have produced modern lenses using vintage glass for this purpose. Emulation of anamorphic film has also been achieved in computer animation . One example of this is the animated series Star Wars: The Bad Batch by Lucasfilm Animation , which mimics the natural behavior of an anamorphic lens through simulated depth of field effects and

2369-484: A regular spherical lens, plus an anamorphic attachment (or an integrated lens element) that does the anamorphosing. The anamorphic element operates at infinite focal length, so that it has little or no effect on the focus of the primary lens it's mounted on but still anamorphoses (distorts) the optical field. A cameraman using an anamorphic attachment uses a spherical lens of a different focal length than they would use for Academy format (i.e. one sufficient to produce an image

2472-671: A single camera and lens . The company's focus began to shift after Mike Todd's sudden death in an airplane accident in 1958. The 70 mm Todd-AO process was adopted by Panavision, Cinerama and others. As the production and exhibition markets became saturated with Todd-AO System hardware, the focus of the company gradually began to narrow down to the audio post-production side of the business, and Todd-AO became an independent sound mixing facility for commercial motion picture films and television after acquiring Glen Glenn Sound in 1986. In May 2014, Todd-AO's parent company, Todd Soundelux , filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. As part of

2575-432: A slight 1.25:1 anamorphic squeeze to accommodate extremely wide aspect ratio images) are both 65/70 processes. The Soviet film industry also copied Todd-AO with their own Sovscope 70 process, identical, except that both the camera and print stock were 70 mm wide. The IMAX format also uses 65 mm camera and lab film to create 70 mm prints for projection (also known as the 65/70 mm process); conforming to

2678-513: A system of his own which, he hoped, would be as impressive as Cinerama, yet be simpler and cheaper and avoid the problems associated with three-strip projection; in his own words, he wanted "Cinerama out of one hole". In collaboration with the American Optical Company , Todd developed a system which was to be called " Todd-AO ". This uses a single 70 mm wide film and was introduced with the film Oklahoma! in October 1955. The 70 mm film

2781-431: A wider distribution after the initial debut of the film. South Pacific (1958), Lawrence of Arabia (1962), My Fair Lady (1964), and The Sound of Music (1965) are well-known films widely shown in 70 mm format with a general release in 35 mm format. 70 mm film received a brief resurgence in the 1980s when it became popular to make "blow-up" prints of 35 mm titles. It had another resurgence in

2884-409: Is 2.39 times its height, (this is sometimes approximated to 2.4:1). The older Academy format of Anamorphic widescreen was a response to a shortcoming in the non-anamorphic spherical (a.k.a. "flat") widescreen format. With a non-anamorphic lens, the picture is recorded onto the film negative such that its full width fits within the film's frame, but not its full height. A substantial part of the frame area

2987-459: Is a kind of lens flare that has a long horizontal line, usually with a blue tint, and is most often visible when there is a bright light in the frame, such as from car headlights, in an otherwise dark scene. This artifact is not always considered a problem, and even has become associated with a certain cinematic look, and often emulated using a special effect filter in scenes shot with a non-anamorphic lens. Another common aspect of anamorphic lenses

3090-509: Is a wide high-resolution film gauge for motion picture photography, with a negative area nearly 3.5 times as large as the standard 35 mm motion picture film format . As used in cameras, the film is 65 mm (2.6 in) wide. For projection, the original 65 mm film is printed on 70 mm (2.8 in) film. The additional 5 mm contains the four magnetic stripes , holding six tracks of stereophonic sound. Although later 70 mm prints use digital sound encoding (specifically

3193-476: Is commonly called 'Scope' (a contraction of the early term CinemaScope ), or 2.35:1 (the latter being a misnomer born of old habit; see " Aspect ratio " section below). Filmed in Panavision is a phrase contractually required for films shot using Panavision's anamorphic lenses. All of these phrases mean the same thing: the final print uses a 2:1 anamorphic projector lens that expands the image by exactly twice

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3296-463: Is perforated at the same pitch (0.187 inch, 4.75 mm) as standard 35 mm film. With a five-perforation pull-down, the Todd-AO system provides a frame dimension of 1.912 inch (48.56 mm) by 0.87 inch (22.09 mm) giving an aspect ratio of 2.2:1. The original version of Todd-AO used a frame rate of 30 per second, 25% faster than the 24 frames per second that was (and is) the standard; this

3399-448: Is that light reflections within the lens are elliptical, rather than round as in ordinary cinematography. Additionally, wide-angle anamorphic lenses of less than 40 mm focal length produce a cylindrical perspective , which some directors and cinematographers, particularly Wes Anderson , use as a stylistic trademark. Another characteristic of anamorphic lenses is that the cylindrical glass effectively creates two focal lengths within

3502-542: Is the low-frequency enhancement channel) and was subsequently adopted for digital sound systems used with 35 mm. In the 1980s the use of these "blow-ups" increased with large numbers of 70 mm prints being made of some blockbusters of the period such as the 125 70 mm prints made of The Empire Strikes Back (1980). However the early 1990s saw the advent of digital sound systems ( Dolby Digital , DTS and SDDS ) for 35 mm prints which meant that 35 mm could finally match 70 mm for sound quality but at

3605-430: Is thereby wasted, being occupied (on the negative) by a portion of the image which is subsequently matted-out (i.e. masked, either on the print or in the projector) and so not projected, in order to create the widescreen image. To increase overall image detail, by using all the available area of the negative for only that portion of the image which will be projected, an anamorphic lens is used during photography to compress

3708-435: Is unclear. Anamorphic widescreen was not used again for cinematography until 1952 when Twentieth Century-Fox bought the rights to the technique to create its CinemaScope widescreen technique. CinemaScope was one of many widescreen formats developed in the 1950s to compete with the popularity of television and bring audiences back to the cinema. The Robe , which premiered in 1953, was the first feature film released that

3811-459: Is used for the high-performance IMAX format which uses a frame that is 15 perforations wide on 70 mm film. The Dynavision and Astrovision systems each use slightly less film per frame and vertical pulldown to save print costs while being able to project onto an IMAX screen. Both were rare, with Astrovision largely used in Japanese planetariums . IMAX introduced a digital projection system in

3914-462: The DTS format), the vast majority of existing and surviving 70 mm prints pre-date this technology. Each frame is five perforations tall (i.e., 23.8125 mm or 15/16 inches tall), with an image aspect ratio of 2.2:1. The use of anamorphic Ultra Panavision 70 lenses squeezes an ultra-wide 2.76:1 aspect ratio horizontally into that 2.2:1 imaging area. To this day, Ultra Panavision 70 produces

4017-464: The MGM Camera 65 system they helped develop for MGM that was used to film Raintree County and Ben-Hur . Both Ultra Panavision 70 and MGM Camera 65 employed an anamorphic lens with a 1.25x squeeze on a 65 mm negative (as opposed to 35 mm CinemaScope which used a 2× compression, or 8-perf, horizontally filmed 35 mm Technirama which used a 1.5× compression). When projected on

4120-900: The Museum of the Moving Image in New York City, the TIFF Bell Lightbox in Toronto, the Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Massachusetts, and others. For home theater, VHS and DVD did not offer enough resolution to carry the full image quality captured by 70 mm film, and VHS and DVD video transfers were usually prepared from 35 mm reduction elements. The high-definition Blu-ray format, in contrast, can potentially reveal

4223-697: The 1950s as dedicated Todd-AO "Cinestage" showplaces. These theaters showed exclusive roadshow engagements of Todd-AO and other 70 mm films on large, deeply curved screens. They included the Rivoli Theatre in New York City, the Cinestage Theatre in Chicago and Hunt's Cinestage Theatre in Columbus, Ohio . The roadshow era ended in the early 1970s, although a very few films (among them Gandhi ) were shown in roadshow format after that. In

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4326-524: The 1959 film Ben-Hur and the 2015 film The Hateful Eight , both of which were filmed with the Ultra Panavision 70/MGM Camera 65 process at an aspect ratio of 2.76:1. It required the use of a 1.25x anamorphic lens to horizontally compress the image, and a corresponding lens on the projector to uncompress it. Limited use of 65 mm film was revived in the late 1970s for some of the visual effects sequences in films like Close Encounters of

4429-456: The 1970s, under the leadership of Dr. Richard Vetter, Todd-AO made an attempt to compete with Panavision in the 35 mm motion picture camera rental market. The company built a series of anamorphic lenses in the 2.35:1 scope format, and owned several camera bodies (Mitchell and Arriflex) that they would provide with the lens package. Films produced in Todd-AO 35 include Conquest of the Planet of

4532-405: The 6 sound tracks, in addition to the 70 mm film for the picture. The much more common 70 mm release prints used a slightly optically reduced picture, and placed four of the soundtracks on either edge outside of the perforations, and two more soundtracks inside the perforations, providing a total of six soundtracks, on a 7.5 mm magnetic surface. It is a common error to suppose that only 5 mm of space

4635-915: The 70 mm IMAX format. The Polar Express in IMAX 3D 70 mm earned 14 times as much, per screen, as the simultaneous 2D 35 mm release of that film in the fall of 2004. Same as Standard 65 mm except Same as Standard 65 mm except Same as IMAX except same as standard 65/70 except: Omnivision started in Sarasota, Florida . Theatres were designed to compete with Omnimax but with much lower startup and operating costs. Most theatres were built in fabric domed structures designed by Seaman Corporation. The last known OmniVision theatres to exist in USA are The Alaska Experience Theatre in Anchorage, Alaska , built in 1981 (closed in 2007, reopened in 2008), and

4738-642: The Apes , Conan the Barbarian , Mad Max , Dune and Logan's Run . By the mid 1980s the venture was moribund, and was abandoned. Eventually all of the Todd-AO cameras and lenses, both 35 mm and 65 mm (70 mm), were sold to Cinema Products in Los Angeles. The 35mm anamorphic lenses are now in the rental inventory of Keslow Camera. (films photographed in Todd-AO 35 not included) 70 mm film 70 mm film (or 65 mm film )

4841-585: The Christopher Nolan films The Dark Knight (featured 28 minutes of IMAX footage), Inception , The Dark Knight Rises (over an hour in IMAX) and Interstellar . Since the 2010s, most movie theaters have converted to digital projection systems, resulting in the removal of both 35 mm (the previous industry standard) projectors and 70 mm projectors. However some venues and organizations remain committed to screening 70 mm film, seeing

4944-477: The Greek anamorphoo ("to transform", or more precisely "to re-form"), compound of morphé ("form, shape") with the prefix aná ("back, again"). The process of anamorphosing optics was developed by Henri Chrétien during World War I to provide a wide angle viewer for military tanks. The optical process was called Hypergonar by Chrétien and was capable of showing a field of view of 180 degrees. After

5047-655: The Hawaii Experience Theatre in Lahaina, Hawaii (closed in 2004). Rainbow's End (Theme Park) in NZ had the only remaining permanent Cinema 180 attraction until May 2015 when it was demolished. One of the few producers of 70 mm films for Cinema 180 was the German company Cinevision (today AKPservices GmbH, Paderborn). Anamorphic Anamorphic format is the cinematography technique of shooting

5150-465: The Third Kind , mainly because the larger negative did a better job than 35 mm negative of minimizing visible film grain during optical compositing . 65 mm was the primary film format used at VFX pioneer Douglas Trumbull 's facility EEG (Entertainment Effects Group), which later became Boss Film Studios , run by former Industrial Light & Magic alum Richard Edlund . Since the 1990s,

5253-403: The Todd-AO sound system. Ampex would later go on to manufacture the sound system, including selectable four-track composite (CinemaScope), six-track composite (Todd-AO), four-track interlocked, six-track interlocked or optical sound sources. The Todd-AO Company also offered a 35 mm anamorphic process technically similar to 35 mm Panavision or CinemaScope. This may cause some confusion if

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5356-507: The amount horizontally as vertically. This format is essentially the same as that of CinemaScope, except for some technical developments, such as the ability to shoot closeups without any facial distortion. (CinemaScope films seldom used full facial closeups, because of a condition known as CinemaScope mumps , which distorted faces as they got closer to the camera.) There are artifacts that can occur when using an anamorphic camera lens that do not occur when using an ordinary spherical lens. One

5459-409: The available film area. In either case, since a larger film area recorded the same picture the image quality was improved. The distortion (horizontal compression) introduced in the camera must be corrected when the film is projected, so another lens is used in the projection booth that restores the picture back to its correct proportions (or, in the case of the now obsolete Technirama system, squeezes

5562-483: The bankruptcy proceedings, the company closed its Hollywood and Santa Monica facilities, leaving only their Burbank location operational. On November 17, 2014, Sounddogs acquired the Todd-Soundelux Trademarks (Todd AO and Soundelux) and Copyrights (Sound Effects Library) through Federal Bankruptcy Court (Central District Case No. 2:14-bk-19980) The Todd-AO process uses two separate film stocks;

5665-426: The benefit of six-track sound. These prints would typically play only in a few theatres in a few large cities while everyone else viewed the film in 35 mm. The advent of multichannel digital sound in the 1990s obviated these very expensive prints. "Blow-up" 70 mm prints also followed the Todd-AO layout, although in the case of films made with a 1.85:1 aspect ratio, it was retained in the 70 mm version, with

5768-420: The camera and projector, rather than invest in an entirely new film format, which would require new cameras, projectors, editing equipment and so forth. Cinerama was an earlier attempt to solve the problem of high-quality widescreen imaging, but anamorphic widescreen eventually proved more practical. Cinerama (which had an aspect ratio of 2.59:1) consisted of three simultaneously projected images side by side on

5871-468: The camera gate aperture and projection aperture mask sizes for anamorphic films, however, the image dimensions used for anamorphic film vary from flat (spherical) counterparts. To complicate matters, the SMPTE standards for the format have varied over time; to further complicate things, pre-1957 prints took up the optical soundtrack space of the print (instead having magnetic sound on the sides), which made for

5974-485: The case of an actor's face, when positioned in the center of the screen faces look somewhat like they have the mumps , hence the name for the phenomenon. Conversely, at the edges of the screen actors in full-length view can become skinny-looking. In medium shots, if the actor walks across the screen from one side to the other, he will increase in apparent girth. Early CinemaScope presentations in particular (using Chrétien's off-the-shelf lenses) suffered from this. Panavision

6077-450: The cinematographer must use a longer lens to obtain the same horizontal coverage. A third characteristic, particularly of simple anamorphic add-on attachments, is "anamorphic mumps". For reasons of practical optics, the anamorphic squeeze is not uniform across the image field in any anamorphic system (whether cylindrical, prismatic or mirror-based). This variation results in some areas of the film image appearing more stretched than others. In

6180-501: The commonly used value 2.35∶1 . A new definition issued in June 1971 as ANSI PH22.106-1971 . It specified a slightly smaller vertical dimension of 0.700 inches (17.78 mm) for the projector aperture (and a nearly identical horizontal dimension of 0.838 inches (21.29 mm)), to help make splices less noticeable to film viewers. After unsqueezing, this would yield an aspect ratio of c. 2.397∶1. Four-perf anamorphic prints use more of

6283-423: The cropping and anamorphosing of a spherical print requires an intermediate lab step, it is often attractive for these films to use a different negative pulldown method (most commonly 3-perf, but occasionally Techniscope 2-perf) usually in conjunction with the added negative space Super 35 affords. However, with advancements in digital intermediate technology, the anamorphosing process can now be completed as

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6386-459: The decline, and 70 mm prints were rarely made. Among some of the more recent 70 mm blow-up titles are Paul Thomas Anderson 's Inherent Vice (2014) and Phantom Thread (2017), Patty Jenkins 's Wonder Woman (2017), and Steven Spielberg 's Ready Player One (2018). In the late 20th century, the usage of 65 mm negative film drastically reduced, in part due to the high cost of 65 mm raw stock and processing. Some of

6489-709: The entirely distinct " Cinerama " format), started in 1900 by Raoul Grimoin-Sanson . In 1914 the Italian Filoteo Alberini invented a panoramic film system utilising a 70 mm wide film called Panoramica. In 1928, William Fox of the Fox Film Corporation , in personal partnership with Theodore Case as the Fox-Case Corporation, began working on a wide film format using 70 mm film which they named Grandeur . Cameras were ordered by Fox-Case from Mitchell Camera Corp, with

6592-459: The few films since 1990 shot entirely on 65 mm stock are Kenneth Branagh 's Hamlet (1996), Ron Fricke 's Baraka (1992) and its sequel, Samsara (2011), Paul Thomas Anderson 's The Master (2012), Quentin Tarantino 's The Hateful Eight (2015), Christopher Nolan 's Dunkirk (2017) (almost 80 minutes, about 75% of the film was shot on 65 mm IMAX film, while the rest

6695-721: The first 70 mm production cameras, designated as the Mitchell Model FC camera, delivered to Fox-Case in May 1929. This was one of a number of wide-film processes developed by some of the major film studios at about that time. However, due to the financial strains of the Great Depression, along with strong resistance from movie theater owners, who were in the process of equipping their theaters for sound, none of these systems became commercially successful. Fox dropped Grandeur in 1930. Producer Mike Todd had been one of

6798-522: The first two Todd-AO films, Oklahoma! and Around the World in Eighty Days , employed 30 frames per second photography. Because of the need for conventional versions at 24 frames per second, every scene of the former film was shot twice in succession: once in Todd-AO and once in 35 mm CinemaScope. The latter film was shot with two 65 mm Todd-AO cameras simultaneously, the speed of

6901-464: The format was popular enough with audiences to trigger off the widescreen developments of the early 1950s. A few films were distributed in Cinerama format and shown in special theaters, but anamorphic widescreen was more attractive to the Studios since it could realize a similar aspect ratio and without the disadvantages of Cinerama's complexities and costs. The anamorphic widescreen format in use today

7004-420: The founders of Cinerama , a wide-screen movie process that was launched in 1952. Cinerama employed three 35 mm film projectors running in synchronism to project a wide (2.6:1) image onto a deeply curved screen. Although the results were impressive, the system was expensive, cumbersome and had some serious shortcomings due to the need to match up three separate projected images. Todd left the company to develop

7107-438: The full height of the frame and twice its width), and the anamorphic attachment squeezes the image (in the horizontal plane only) to half-width. Other anamorphic attachments existed (that were relatively rarely used) which would expand the image in the vertical dimension (e.g. in the early Technirama system mentioned above), so that (in the case of the common 2-times anamorphic lens) a frame twice as high as it might have been filled

7210-407: The height of its popularity most major markets and cities had a theater that could screen it. Some venues continue to screen 70 mm to this day or have even had 70 mm projectors permanently or temporarily installed for more recent 70 mm releases. Films formatted with a width of 70 mm have existed since the early days of the motion picture industry. The first 70 mm format film

7313-439: The image being photographed, in only one direction, as with a cylinder, e.g. the original CinemaScope system based on Henri Chrétien's design). Regardless of the method, the anamorphic lens projects a horizontally squeezed image on the film negative. This deliberate geometric distortion is then reversed on projection, resulting in a wider aspect ratio on-screen than that of the negative's frame. An anamorphic lens consists of

7416-460: The image horizontally, thereby filling the full (4 perf) frame's area with the portion of the image that corresponds to the area projected in the non-anamorphic format. Up to the early 1960s, three major methods of anamorphosing the image were used: counter-rotated prisms (e.g. Ultra Panavision ), curved mirrors in combination with the principle of total internal reflection (e.g. Technirama ), and cylindrical lenses (lenses curved, hence squeezing

7519-407: The image vertically) to restore normal geometry. The picture is not manipulated in any way in the dimension that is perpendicular to the one anamorphosed. It may seem that it would be easier to simply use a wider film for recording movies. However, since 35 mm film was already in widespread use, it was more economically feasible for film producers and exhibitors to simply attach a special lens to

7622-501: The late 1990s and 2000s, anamorphic lost popularity in comparison to "flat" (or "spherical") formats such as Super 35 with the advent of digital intermediates; however, in the years since digital cinema cameras and projectors have become commonplace, anamorphic has experienced a considerable resurgence of popularity, due in large part to the higher base ISO sensitivity of digital sensors, which facilitates shooting at smaller apertures. The word anamorphic and its derivatives stem from

7725-473: The late 2000s and most IMAX venues have migrated to a digital setup. The first commercial introduction of 70 mm single projector 3D was the 1967 release of Con la muerte a la espalda , a Spanish/French/Italian co-production which used a process called Hi-Fi Stereo 70, itself based on a simplified, earlier developed soviet process called Stereo-70. This process captured two anamorphic images, one for each eye, side by side on 65 mm film. A special lens on

7828-459: The lens. This results in out-of-focus points of light (called bokeh ) appearing as vertical ovals rather than circles, as well as an increase in horizontal angle of view, both in proportion to the squeeze factor. A 50mm anamorphic lens with a 2x squeeze will have the horizontal view of a 25mm spherical lens, while maintaining the vertical view and depth of field of a 50mm. This has led to the common claim that anamorphic lenses have shallower focus, as

7931-623: The mid-2010s with the release of The Master (2012), The Hateful Eight (2015) and Dunkirk (2017), with a small number of venues getting temporary or permanent 70 mm film projectors in order to be able to screen these titles. Quentin Tarantino , in particular, led a successful campaign to have the equipment required to show The Hateful Eight in Ultra Panavision installed in 100 cinemas worldwide. The 35 mm to 70 mm "blow-up" process produces 70 mm release prints from 35 mm negatives, so that films shot on

8034-480: The mid-70s (before the advent of Dolby A ) were screening 35 mm prints with single channel monaural sound. However these "blow-ups" rarely used the full six channels of the Todd-AO system and instead used the four-track mixes made for 35 mm prints, the additional half-left and half-right speakers of the Todd-AO layout being fed with a simple mix of the signals intended for the adjacent speakers (known as

8137-495: The most well known in the film industry: Although many films projected anamorphically have been shot using anamorphic lenses, there are often aesthetic and technical reasons that make shooting with spherical lenses preferable. If the director and cinematographer still wish to retain the 2.40:1 aspect ratio, anamorphic prints can be made from spherical negatives. Because the 2.40:1 image cropped from an Academy ratio 4-perf negative causes considerable waste of frame space, and since

8240-516: The negative's available frame area than any other modern format, which leaves little room for splices. As a consequence, a bright line flashed onscreen when a splice was projected, and theater projectionists had been narrowing the vertical aperture to hide these flashes even before 1971. This new projector aperture size, 0.838 × 0.700 inches (21.29 × 17.78 mm), aspect ratio 1.1971…∶1, made for an un-squeezed ratio of about 2.39∶1 (43:18). The most recent revision, SMPTE 195-1993 ,

8343-512: The picture and the holes, as well as the wider tracks (to hold two tracks each) outside the holes. They can be seen in Figure 1 of this article, above the caption "positive 70 mm". Todd-AO soundtracks were very high fidelity, and could still compete with modern digital tracks above 40 kHz. Even though there were no subwoofers in theaters in those days, Todd-AO delivered high-impact bass using crisp-sounding horn-loaded speakers. Four lens options covered

8446-437: The pitch and perforation standard for 70 mm Todd-AO film. However, the IMAX frame is 15-perfs long and runs horizontally through the projector, whereas the Todd-AO frame is only 5-perfs high and runs vertically through the projector. The original version of the Todd-AO process used a frame rate of 30 frames per second, faster than the 24 frames per second that was (and is) the standard. The difference does not seem great, but

8549-414: The process between 1958 and 1970), which is itself usually rounded up to 2.40 (implying a false precision as compared to 2.4). With the exception of certain specialist and archivist areas, generally 2.35, 2.39 and 2.40 mean the same to professionals, whether they themselves are even aware of the changes or not. There are numerous companies that are known for manufacturing anamorphic lenses. The following are

8652-440: The quality advantage of 70 mm productions. Although telecine machines for 70 mm scanning are uncommon, high-resolution transfers from high-quality full-gauge elements can reveal impressive technical quality. An anamorphic squeeze combined with 65 mm film allowed for extremely wide aspect ratios to be used while still preserving quality. This was used in the 1957 film Raintree County and to incredible success in

8755-445: The same screen. However, in practice the images never blended together perfectly at the edges. The system also suffered from various technical drawbacks, in that it required a film frame that was 6 perf in height, three cameras (eventually simplified to just one camera with three lenses and three streaming reels of film and the attendant machinery), and three projectors, which resulted in a host of synchronization problems. Nonetheless,

8858-418: The screen, and the sixth is fed to surround speakers around the walls of the auditorium. Panavision developed their own 65/70 mm system that was technically compatible and virtually identical to Todd-AO. Monikered as Super Panavision 70 , it used spherical lenses and the same 2.2:1 aspect ratio at 24 frames per second. Panavision also had another 65 mm system, Ultra Panavision 70 , which sprang from

8961-755: The second camera was 24 frames per second for wide release as optical reduction prints. All subsequent Todd-AO films were shot at 24 frames per second on a 65 mm negative and optically printed to 35 mm film as needed for standard distribution. In all, around 16 feature films were shot in Todd-AO. Todd-AO was developed and tested in Buffalo, New York at the Regent Theatre. Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II went there to see Todd-AO test footage, which led them to approve its use for Oklahoma! . Ampex Corporation engineers were in charge of developing

9064-405: The sensitivity of the human eye to flickering declines steeply with frame rate and the small adjustment gave the film noticeably less flicker, and made it steadier and smoother than standard processes. The original system generated an image that was "almost twice as intense as any ever seen onscreen before, and so hot that the film has to be cooled as it passes through the Todd-AO projector ". Only

9167-432: The sides of the 70 mm frame left black. While Todd-AO was intended to be "Cinerama out of one hole", the extreme wide-angle photography and projection onto a very deeply curved screen (which is what that would imply) saw little use. Most Todd-AO theatre installations had only moderately curved screens and the extreme wide-angle camera lenses were used only on a few shots here and there. Todd-AO films made after 1958 used

9270-459: The smaller format could benefit from 70 mm image and sound quality. This process began in the 1960s with titles like The Cardinal (1963) and continues up until the present day, with the height of its popularity being in the 1980s. These enlargements often provided richer colors, and a brighter, steadier and sharper (though often grainier) image, but the main benefit was the ability to provide 6-channel stereophonic sound as most theaters before

9373-682: The special format as something that can set them apart and be an audience draw in an industry where most movies are screened digitally. 70 mm film festivals continue to take place regularly at venues such as The Somerville Theatre in Somerville, Massachusetts, The Music Box Theatre in Chicago, the Hollywood Theatre in Portland, Oregon, the American Cinematheque 's Aero and Egyptian Theaters in Los Angeles,

9476-466: The un-squeezed ratio of about 2.39∶1. The camera's aperture remained the same (2.35∶1 or 2.55∶1 if before 1958), only the height of the "negative assembly" splices changed and, consequently, the height of the frame changed. Anamorphic prints are still often called 'Scope' or 2.35 by projectionists, cinematographers, and others working in the field, if only by force of habit. 2.39 is in fact what they generally are referring to (unless discussing films using

9579-428: The war, the technology was first used in a cinematic context in the short film To Build a Fire (based on the 1908 Jack London story of the same name) in 1927 by Claude Autant-Lara . In the 1920s, phonograph and motion picture pioneer Leon F. Douglass also created special effects and anamorphic widescreen motion picture cameras. However, how this relates to the earlier French invention, and later development,

9682-433: The widest picture size in the history of filmmaking; surpassed only by Polyvision , which was only used for 1927's Napoléon . With regard to exhibition, 70 mm film was always considered a specialty format reserved for epics and spectacle films shot on 65 mm and blockbuster films that were released both in 35 mm and as 70 mm blow-ups. While few venues were equipped to screen this special format, at

9785-423: Was a more robust "squeeze" system, which was coupled with a slight expansion sub-system. The expansion sub-system was counter-rotated in relation to the main squeeze system, all in mechanical interlinkage with the focus mechanism of the primary lens: this combination changed the anamorphic ratio and minimized the effect of anamorphic mumps in the area of interest in the frame. Although these techniques were regarded as

9888-523: Was changed after the second film – Around the World in 80 Days - because of the need to produce (24 frame/sec) 35 mm reduction prints from the Todd-AO 65 mm negative. The Todd-AO format was originally intended to use a deeply curved Cinerama-type screen but this failed to survive beyond the first few films. However, in the 1960s and 70s, such films as The Sound of Music (which had been filmed in Todd-AO) and Patton (which had been filmed in

9991-409: Was devoted to the soundtracks, perhaps because writers do the math and find that 70 - 65 = 5, not allowing for a slightly reduced picture area to accommodate two tracks inside the sprocket holes, as well as four outside, and perhaps because the souvenir program for Around the World in Eighty Days made the same error. Anyone with a release print in front of them would immediately see the tracks between

10094-409: Was filmed with an anamorphic lens. The introduction of anamorphic widescreen arose from a desire for wider aspect ratios that maximized overall image detail (compared to other widescreen formats, not compared to fullscreen) while retaining the use of standard ( 4 perf per frame ) cameras and projectors. The modern anamorphic format has an aspect ratio of 2.39:1, meaning the (projected) picture's width

10197-501: Was largely attributed to the artifacts, distortions, light requirements, and expenses (in comparison to its spherical counterpart), in the face of the rising use of digital visual effects. Moreover, with the advent of the digital intermediate in the 2000s, film grain became less of a concern with Super 35, as the optical intermediate/enlargement process could now be bypassed, eliminating two generations of potential quality loss (though an anamorphic negative, due to its size, still retained

10300-611: Was most likely footage of the Henley Regatta , which was projected in 1896 and 1897, but may have been filmed as early as 1894. It required a specially built projector built by Herman Casler in Canastota, New York and had a ratio similar to full frame, with an aperture of 2.75 inches (70 mm) by 2 inches (51 mm). There were also several film formats of various sizes from 50 to 68 mm which were developed from 1884 onwards, including Cinéorama (not to be confused with

10403-485: Was released in August 1993. It slightly altered the dimensions so as to standardize a common projection aperture width (0.825 inches or 20.96 mm) for all formats, anamorphic (2.39∶1) and flat (1.85∶1). The projection aperture height was also reduced by 0.01 inches (0.25 mm) to give an aperture size of 0.825 × 0.690 inches (20.96 × 17.53 mm), and an aspect ratio of 1.1956…∶1, and thus retaining

10506-577: Was shot on regular 65mm film), Kenneth Branagh 's Murder on the Orient Express (2017), Tenet (2020), Oppenheimer (2023), and The Brutalist (2024). Other films used 65 mm cameras sparingly, for selected scenes or special effects. Films with limited 65 mm footage include Terrence Malick 's The New World (2005), the Patty Jenkins film Wonder Woman 1984 (2020), Cary Joji Fukunaga 's No Time to Die (2021) and

10609-417: Was the first company to produce an anti-mumps system in the late 1950s. Panavision used a second lens (i.e. an add-on adapter) which was mechanically linked to the focus position of the primary lens. This changed the anamorphic ratio as the focus changed, resulting in the area of interest on-screen having a normal-looking geometry. Later cylindrical lens systems used, instead, two sets of anamorphic optics: one

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