composing a shot for anamorphic

[Stephen Williams]

Some examples of scope framing with negative space (although the first one has a farmhouse on the other side of the frame):

 

 

 

[

 

Hi David,

 

Do you know why they vignette so much?

 

Merry Christmas,

 

Stephen

[David Mullen ASC]

The wider-angle C-Series anamorphic lenses like the 40mm has a portholing effect, about a 1/2-stop loss around the sides. Don't know why the longer lenses used in "Superman" have that effect too, but this movie probably pre-dates even the C-Series, or was right around that time. Maybe they used an anamorphic zoom lens on the close-ups there -- they can porthole too.

[Adam Paul]

Some examples of scope framing with negative space (although the first one has a farmhouse on the other side of the frame):

 

 

 

 

 

These are just frames I already had access to...

 

 

Thanks David. So use of dead space just means no action taking place on the background or sides?

[David Mullen ASC]

So use of dead space just means no action taking place on the background or sides?

 

That's why it's dead... basically means balancing the subject with more or less blank or empty space, and how much weight you give that "negative" space. Usually the Rule of Thirds is applied, but for a more imbalanced frame, you might give even more weight to the emptiness and push the subject farther to the edges. In the case of the "Superman" frames, the negative space emphasizes both the vast, flat landscape and the growing distance between the two characters, the isolation of the hero in the landscape, a common visual motif of epics and romantic paintings.

 

That's what is great about the scope frame, the ability to emphasize "emptiness" surrounding a character, which is why I feel it is modernist in feeling.

[Guest Tim Partridge]

Re: SUPERMAN

 

That vignetting is all over the process shots too, and it's particularly jarring in shots that cut front projection with (clean) travelling matte (colour temp and contrast jump around all over). I think as David mentions it may be the result of the anamorphic zoom but also that COMBINED with the harsh lens diffusion. I've had the exact same side-effect with DVCAM stuff shot through heavy diffusion on zooms. That said Unsworth was using glass filters while Dennis Coop (process DP) was only using Lightflex to get the same effect.

 

SPY WHO LOVED ME (shot clean) has the same vignetting problems as SUPERMAN, but it's way more subtle and slightly sharper than the obvious, distracting blurs in SUPERMAN. Process plates look like the SUPERMAN problems (rephotographed 35mm clean plate, not enough light). Take a look- there's also a really sharp, horrible neon blue flare coming off one of the ski unit cameras (ski-cam DP Willy Bogner, action unit DP Alan Hume):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmpLTxdQHqA

 

I think with the diffusion on those anamorphic zooms it's just draining the exposure, and in the case of SUPERMAN it's all too emphasised. It's obviously more evident in any scene that uses available light/practicals (even partially) without the fill bumped up (check out the Daily Planet lobby). Looking back, Unsworth was to some extent technically careless (and somewhat irresponsible) with his creative decisions, and I think that generation and era always were. It's like how most movies made before 1985 always had uncorrected, green flo practicals, or hard light vainly mixed with available softlight doubling as real ambient light or the clearly unintentional, unmotivated, random vignetting. Priorities seemed to lie with studio light contrast ratios and footcandles. Still, considering all of the other elements, were these technical flaws just understandable compromise, and would we even be talking about these movies thirty years on had they not been so visually bold?

[David Mullen ASC]

I don't think it was carelessness, just a combination of a personal style (or taste) using available technology.

 

Unsworth did what so many DP's are taught not to do -- underexpose, diffuse, smoke, shoot wide-open, etc. -- in order to breakdown the sharpness, color, and contrast typical of the "Technicolor" high-key style that dominated most color photography until the 1970's. He didn't do it out of a misundertanding the limits of his tools, nor laziness. His technical priorities were not the same as yours or many people of his day, or today.

 

At heart, he was like an Impressionist painter -- he was happiest when the image was on the verge of falling apart in some way.

 

I think what saves his images from falling completely apart into mush is that his lighting style wasn't completely shifted over to the modern all-soft-lighting approach, so the occasional hard edge, key, or fill adds some snap back into the image that cuts through the diffusion.

 

Anyway, as I said, the older Panavision anamorphic lenses are prone to portholing anyway; that part is hardly his fault. I didn't realize how bad it was until I was shooting an overcast day exterior sky with a C-Series 40mm and had to call up Panavision while shooting to ask what was up with the dark edges all around the frame.

 

Also, lens diffusion would not contribute to portholing -- maybe vignetting if too small a filter is used. Using an older anamorphic zoom wide-open (not uncommon since they were T/5.6 lenses in an era of 100 ASA film) would contribute to this problem and sticking diffusion on it would soften the image further, but the filtration shouldn't cause portholing.

[Guest Tim Partridge]

He didn't do it out of a misundertanding the limits of his tools, nor laziness. His technical priorities were not the same as yours or many people of his day, or today.

 

I was never implyness laziness and certainly not misunderstanding, but it is no secret that especially on SUPERMAN, there was a lot of stuff out of Unsworth's hands that his personal style did not help when trying to integrate a consistent look across the movie. Moreso when it's dealing with visual effects, and I know having spoken with most of the team who did the front projection that Unsworth was never present for the process effects work, and was also VERY honest that he had never done front projection before. This was common for alot of DPs of his generation, when that stuff was often handled without the extended technical awareness that is expected today. It's not just on effects shots though, it's also on a lot of already mentioned medium/master stuff shot lowlight with harsh filtration (and no practical means for exposure compensation/lighting up) like the Smallville field, the Daily Planet lobby- David Watkin was always honest in his criticism and praise of Unsworth- Also, for a film shot through such a famous haze there are even operating bloopers with Peter McDonald visible in reflections at least twice in the movie!! Given vid assist clarity in 1977 and looking through that much glass onto glass would have made it impossible to get image perfection. Conflicting ambition with the photography and operating (although it makes you wonder how much of this was Richard Donner's doing). It's documented that they shot a LOT of unusable footage.

 

 

Anyway, as I said, the older Panavision anamorphic lenses are prone to portholing anyway; that part is hardly his fault. I didn't realize how bad it was until I was shooting an overcast day exterior sky with a C-Series 40mm and had to call up Panavision while shooting to ask what was up with the dark edges all around the frame...

Also, lens diffusion would not contribute to portholing -- maybe vignetting if too small a filter is used. Using an older anamorphic zoom wide-open (not uncommon since they were T/5.6 lenses in an era of 100 ASA film) would contribute to this problem and sticking diffusion on it would soften the image further, but the filtration shouldn't cause portholing.

 

There's definitely a harsh difference between the wide open zoom shots on SUPERMAN and SPY WHO LOVED ME. As we've both said before, with no practical means of compensating for exposure or lighting up (for the already portholing anamorphic), those Harrison filters (especially the #2) were a seriously problematic luxury that cost SUPERMAN a consistent look and polish. Still, like you, I think SUPERMAN would not have looked nearly as good without the filters or Unsworth's approach had he had too much of a bland, practical eye on visual effects/image consistency (see SUPERMAN IV). I'd rather have a dozen mushy/inconsistent shots than a movie full of uniform flatness.

 

It's a really fine line, and like you David I keep revisiting Unsworth's work because there's so much to learn from his visionary approach, and his failures.

[David Mullen ASC]

Certainly I agree that a heavily diffused style of photography was a nightmare for a composite-heavy efx movie -- it still is a problem today if you want to use a lot of lens diffusion rather than digital diffusion.

 

On the other hand, I think the heavy diffusion actually helped make some of the front projection in "Superman" look more believable -- you get background points of light in the night work halating around the actors, which normally wouldn't happen in an optical printer composite. At least, it helped with the urban night flying scenes done using the Zoptic process.

 

But the diffusion must have been a nightmare for the matte painters doing composites.

[Leo Anthony Vale]

Re: SUPERMAN

 

That vignetting is all over the process shots too, and it's particularly jarring in shots that cut front projection with (clean) travelling matte (colour temp and contrast jump around all over). I think as David mentions it may be the result of the anamorphic zoom but also that COMBINED with the harsh lens diffusion. I've had the exact same side-effect with DVCAM stuff shot through heavy diffusion on zooms. That said Unsworth was using glass filters while Dennis Coop (process DP) was only using Lightflex to get the same effect.

 

With the front projection you start out with a plate that has some vignetting on it. The zooms on both the camera and projector on the front projector rig each have vignetting, plus some projector light fall off all mutiply together to create Supervignetting.

 

 

But the diffusion must have been a nightmare for the matte painters doing composites.

 

Or it could have allowed them to use a less detailed style broader brush stocks like a Disney movie.

[Chris Keth]

On this topic, one of my favorite namorphic frames is from "Manhattan." The young lady that Woody is with is on a sofa far to the left and down buried in frame, lit. There is a ton of black space in the center of frame. Then, there is a spiral staircase on the right of frame with a white wall behind it lit to form a very neat silhouette. The entire scene plays in this frame without moving or going in for closeups. It still astounds me, in a way, that someone would be brave enough to do it. It also wows me. If someone could find the frame to help illustrate, I would greatly appreciate it. I don't have a copy of the film with me now.

 

This is a different still than the one I described, but you still get the feeling of how 2.35 aspect can be used for a very intimate, character movie:

[Steve Zimmerman]

 

Lynch's Lost Highway, shot by Peter Deming has some excellent use of negative space in the anamorphic frame. All I have is the letterbox VHS tape. This is the only widescreen frame I could find online.

[David Mullen ASC]

Here's that frame you're thinking of:

 

 

Some other examples of the framing in "Manhattan":

 

 

 

 

[Adam Paul]

Very nice frames. With so much extra space to play with I wonder if the old 2.66:1 films (which I don't think were many, at least I couldn't find any lists) wouldn't look too empty. Although 2.66:1 doesn't seem that much wider than today's standard 2.40:1 (which for some reason still been referenced as 2.35:1).

I think 2.66:1 was referenced as full Cinemascope right?

[David Mullen ASC]

2.66 never really was used for CinemaScope. It was the aspect ratio of 3-camera/3-projector Cinerama though.

 

When CinemaScope was first trotted out by 20th Century Fox to compete with Cinerama, they thought about shooting Full Aperture and using an interlocked mag track for sound like Cinerama did. That would have been 2.66 : 1 (2X squeeze on a 1.33 : 1 4-perf 35mm Full Aperture negative). But even before the first Cinerama movies were released (The Robe, How to Marry a Millionaire) a decision was made to put mag stripes on the print and make special print stock with smaller sprocket holes (CS perfs). This reduced the width of the projected image to 2.55 : 1 and the image was still centered on the neg/print. You see this problem with new prints of there early CinemaScope films (like Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea) -- the image is slightly off-centered now on the screen because scope prints put the soundtrack on one side.

 

So after a few years of mag-striped CS-perfed prints, Fox decided to go with the standard optical track on the left side just like Academy, which shifted the image over to one side and made the aspect ratio 2.35 : 1.

 

This was the standard for anamorphic until SMPTE/ANSI changed the anamorphic projector aperture again in the early 1970's, making it less tall in order to hide neg/print splices better at the frameline. The shorter height made the aspect ratio wider, around 2.39 : 1 (nearly 2.40 : 1.) It was changed again in the early 1980's but the aspect ratio is still about 2.39 : 1.

 

If you want to see awkward framing, look at some 2.7 : 1 UltraPanavision movies, or the 3-camera Cinerama movies where the actors had to stand in one of the three panels (enforcing the Rule of Thirds with a vengeance...)

 

Here's an example (I faked the curved screen projection on Photoshop):

 

 

[Adam Paul]

2.66 never really was used for CinemaScope. It was the aspect ratio of 3-camera/3-projector Cinerama though.

 

 

I thought it was used early on in Cinemascope movies.

 

 

When CinemaScope was first trotted out by 20th Century Fox to compete with Cinerama, they thought about shooting Full Aperture and using an interlocked mag track for sound like Cinerama did. That would have been 2.66 : 1 (2X squeeze on a 1.33 : 1 4-perf 35mm Full Aperture negative). But even before the first Cinerama movies were released (The Robe, How to Marry a Millionaire)

 

 

I thought The Robe and How to Marry a Millionaire were Cinemascope films and The Robe was in 2.66:1

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingcs2.htm

 

Although IMDB lists it as Cinemascope 2.55:1

 

 

 

If you want to see awkward framing, look at some 2.7 : 1 UltraPanavision movies, or the 3-camera Cinerama movies where the actors had to stand in one of the three panels (enforcing the Rule of Thirds with a vengeance...)

 

Here's an example (I faked the curved screen projection on Photoshop):

 

 

 

I kind like the wider aspect ratios better. I think 2.55:1 and even 2.66:1 are not too wide. But that may be just me.

[David Mullen ASC]

Ever try composing a scope movie?

 

Personally, it's awkward but in a creative way. However, I think the most elegant widescreen aspect ratio was for 65mm/70mm Super Panavision / ToddAO, which was 2.20 : 1. Look at the 2.20 compositions of "2001" or "Lawrence of Arabia" and compare them to a 2.7 movie like "Ben-Hur" or "The Battle of the Bulge".

 

I guess Marty Hart is saying that "The Robe" and "How to Marry a Millionaire" were only released in full aperture prints with interlocked mag track sound, but if so, it was therefore a very limited release. Any later wider releases would have used mag striped prints and CS perfs and thus been 2.55 : 1.

[Adam Paul]

Yeah, I have done some fake anamorphic photography, meaning shooting 16:9 to crop to 2.40. It's no easy task to fill the wide frame. Although I haven't heard of the use of negative space then.

A wider frame than 2.40 would be even harder to fill I guess. It's a pity we don't have many examples in the wider aspect ratios. Do you know of any examples of using the negative space with 2.55, 2.66 or even 2.7?

[Leo Anthony Vale]

Ever try composing a scope movie?

 

I guess Marty Hart is saying that "The Robe" and "How to Marry a Millionaire" were only released in full aperture prints with interlocked mag track sound, but if so, it was therefore a very limited release. Any later wider releases would have used mag striped prints and CS perfs and thus been 2.55 : 1.

 

The caption for the photo of the 2.66/1 screen states it was taken at a Fox studio screening, not a release print.

 

Elsewhere on Marty Hart's site he states that Fox used 2.66/1 with an interlocked track during the development stage. By the time 'The Robe' was released Fox had developed the mag striped prints.

So Fox CinemaScope movies never had a 2.66/1 release.

 

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen...mascope_oar.htm

 

The Vistarama travelogues used the academy aperture.

[David Mullen ASC]

Yeah, I have done some fake anamorphic photography, meaning shooting 16:9 to crop to 2.40. It's no easy task to fill the wide frame. Although I haven't heard of the use of negative space then.

A wider frame than 2.40 would be even harder to fill I guess. It's a pity we don't have many examples in the wider aspect ratios. Do you know of any examples of using the negative space with 2.55, 2.66 or even 2.7?

 

I'm sure one can dig through the few dozen movies shot in those formats and find something, but most of those movies weren't particularly "arty", they were screen-filling epics.

 

Probably one of the best-framed was "Fall of the Roman Empire", directed by Anthony Mann and shot by Robert Krasker in 65mm Ultra Panavision, who made "El Cid" together, one of the best-looking, best-composed 2.35 epics ever (shot in 8-perf 35mm anamorphic, i.e. Technirama.)

[Jamey Johnson]

I'm slightly confused about a couple things. When composing for anamorphic aspect ration, and using negative space to emphasize emptiness or isolation as Mr. Mullin has said, do you just basically ignore the rule of thirds? Is it really just an artistic decision? Also, in the Woody Allen frames, he is emphasizing negative space- but in the first Superman frame, is the emphasis on the negative space and was the choice to have the space shared by Clark and his mother fall in the rule of thirds just coincidence?

[David Mullen ASC]

I don't think you should over-think this. In the case of the wheatfields in "Superman", the close-ups border on being slightly more off to the sides than the Rule of Thirds, partially because when shooting in anamorphic, you have to factor in that many theaters will end up trimming the edges slightly, so in many theaters, those close-ups in "Superman" look more to the sides of the screen.

 

But even if they were exactly in the one-third position, the emptiness of the space (emphasized by avoiding over-the-shoulders) and the 2.40 frame still provide a lot of negative space in the frame offsetting the faces. If you were composing in 4x3, then putting a face on the one-third position would hardly leave you any negative space.

[Jamey Johnson]

Yes, I am guilty of overthinking it indeed :D - Late night internet ramblings. I guess the thing that I was trying to figure out is the difference between amatures and proffessionals using or not using the rule of thirds. I could easily see myself trying to use negative space for effect, but then people critique it saying I ignored the rule of thirds, whereas the Donner or Allen frames used it properly.

[Jason Debus]

Not all compositions use the 'rule of thirds'. Some of those Manhattan shots for example look more like 5ths. It's simply a method of overlaying a grid to maintain some order in the composition.

[Jamey Johnson]

I'm sorry- I was referring to Superman and Manhattan using negative space properly, not thirds. My sentence had an odd wording to it.

[David Mullen ASC]

No one rigidly applies these rules -- composing a shot is much more about applying aesthetic taste when arranging elements in the frame. No artist is going to do it exactly the same way.

 

The "rules" are pretty broad with lots of exceptions. For example, one useful guide when composing tight close-ups is that it is better to crop the forehead than the chin if you have a choice. But that's just a general guideline.