Christian Appelt

BTW, the Bausch & Lomb anamorphic adapter was not made especially for newsreel and documentary work. In fact, some of the early CinemaScope productions (after ROBE/MILLIONAIRE/TWELVE-MILE-REEF) must have used it. Marty Hart has a picture of the adapter on a camera shooting 20.000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA (1954). AWSM So the B & L adapter definitely was used for feature film work until the first series of B & L block lenses became available. Unfortunately, I have not found any information on which films used which type of lenses. Set photos from Jack Cardiff's unfinished production of WILLIAM TELL (1954) clearly show the silver adapter lens. When the B&L block lenses were available, the adapters must have been used for short subjects newsreel and low budget feature work. THE ROYAL TOUR (of Queen Elizabeth II, 1954) and some of the early CinemaScope short films we saw at Karlsruhe (about the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown) certainly used them.

Matt, there were three UltraScope telephoto lenses: f=300mm/5.6 f=400mm/5.6 f=600mm/5.6 Is it possible that your colleague's lenses are that type? The 300 and 600mm lenses have black and silver housings with a black "UltraScope" logo near the mount, the 400mm is all black and has the logo engraved in white. Paul, I should have been more precise - I was not referring to the anamorphic "Todd-AO 35" lenses used for JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR, MACBETH and FLASH GORDON but to the special look of spherical 65mm format Todd-AO lenses. Those medium shots in A STAR IS BORN reminded me of certain shots in AIRPORT (1970) shot in 65mm using Todd-AO lenses. There is a car interior/night scene with Jean Seberg and Burt Lancaster that looks almost 3D even in faded prints.

Last weekend, I had the chance to see a number of early CinemaScope productions during the annual Widescreen Festival at Schauburg cinema, Karlsruhe, Germany. These were the films shown over two days: THE ROBE (1953, d. Henry Koster) HOW TO MARRY A MILLIONAIRE (1953, d. Jean Negulesco) THE VIOLENT MEN (1954, d. Rudolph Maté) A STAR IS BORN (1954, d. George Cukor) THE LAST FRONTIER (1955, d. Anthony Mann) THE DARK AVENGER (1955, d. Henry Levin) THE VIRGIN QUEEN (1955, d. Rudolph Maté) All films were shown in vintage prints with 4-track mag sound and (except THE DARK AVENGER) in 2.55 ratio. Most prints were Technicolor dye transfer, THE ROBE had about three reels of vintage (faded) Eastman positive, the rest was Technicolor and Agfa positive. A STAR IS BORN was a "mixed" print too. It was a great experience for me to see all these titles on a big screen (curved with a width of about 17 metres) and in stereo mag sound. Some observations may be interesting in this dicussion of vintage CinemaScope lenses. 1. The Eastman color parts of THE ROBE had excellent sharpness and extremely fine grain. These reels seemed to be contact prints from OCN, both the Technicolor footage and the Agfa positive had much more grain and (Agfa) a lot of dust and abrasions from dry dupe and release printing. During the OCN parts, I scanned the image for any telltale signs of lens problems with the Chrétien adapter but could not find any. Especially the daylight exteriors where sunlight allowed stopping down a bit more looked spectacular. 2. HOW TO MARRY A MILLIONAIRE was Technicolor dye transfer all the way and seemed more grainy with less definition. Especially the New York scenic views were really bad, I always wonder whether these were shot especially for the movie or taken from the Scope demo reels. The lens breathing with focus changes (at the fashion show) was very obvious, they tried to hide it with dissolves between shots. All in all a much better picture than I remembered although less interesting in terms of cinematography. 3. With THE VIRGIN QUEEN and THE LAST FRONTIER, I cannot speak about the lens performance because obviously early CinemaScope Technicolor prints had a real problem with shadow detail. Dark zones simply disappear in black or grey which never was the case with 3-strip Technicolor movies. This becomes really painful to the eye because LAST FRONTIER has a lot of day for night scenes which look absoultely terrible. I strongly suspect that a contact print from the OCNs would show that both films had much better resolution than visible in the IB prints - not the CinemaScope lenses are to blame but the pre-1955 dye transfer process. 4. THE DARK AVENGER, shot by Guy Greene in England, had the best looking Technicolor print both in terms of color rendition and sharpness. Cpompared to the other viontage prints, Technicolor London did the best job in creating a dye transfer print from Eastman negatives. 5. The greatest surprise to me was A STAR IS BORN, although it was a 120 minute version which is a great loss compared to the full 176 minute restored version. Nonetheless, it was all Eastman positive contact printed, strongly faded of course, like with all Eastman prints of that period. It was obvious that they had to struggle for more depth all the time, especially in the theatre at the picture's opening. Resolution and precision of focus varied from shot to shot. In some musical numbers (Judy Garland performing the "production number clichés" in her living room) focus pulling did not always match Garland's movement, it must have been hell to do this with 25ASA stock and early anamorphic lenses! But what really surprised me was the sharpness of many medium shots - some of them reminded me of the almost three-dimensional look that you find with certain Todd-AO films. Despite the color fading, it felt as if you could reach out and feel the texture of actors' skin or costumes. I wish all modern release prints had this sharpness. For some reason, most of these shots had no visible grain which speaks for the quality of the early 5248 stock. To sum it up: If you want to see how good or bad vintage CinemaScope lenses were, you have to look at a vintage Eastman color positive print. This is how the process was meant to be seen. Of course it's nicer for most people to watch a film in dense and bright Technicolor than in more or less faded Eastman color, but the pre-1955 dye transfer process added some problems of its own. (Later IB prints from improved matrix stock, especially when done from large format VistaVision or Technirama, are another thing.) It was impressive how good THE ROBE looked, and it says a lot about the filmmakers and especially the cinematographer's team that they could manage to steer around the limitations of this new process and the old 1927 Chrétien lenses.

Glen Alexander wrote Yes, it came from England. Since I bought it last year, I saw two more listed on eBay, so keep watching the skies and you can buy your own - certainly cheaper than renting old anamorphic lenses. There are a few rental houses that may have 1960s UltraScope or remounted Lomo lenses, but I think it's easier to buy a CinemaScope lens if you need one. There are Bausch&Lomb lenses listed on http://martinhill.com/Cameras.htm at US$ 500 each. How they can be adapted to your camera is another question. I'll post my test shots, but it may take some time because I have to modify a lens support either for my Arri IIA or the Konvas 2M to use the B&L adapter. Max Jacoby wrote: The new DOLCE VITA print compares to older release prints like a 16mm print to 35mm. The image reminded me of large format black&white prints, films shot on the 1950s Dupont b&w stock often look fantastic. Thanks for the LOLA MONTEZ article link. I was sceptical when I read about the restored version being done in HD resolution, so I sat in the front row when the 35mm print was screened. Now I never saw LOLA MONTEZ in vintage contact prints (mag sound & 2.55 ratio), but the restored version certainly looked great compared to all prints struck from the terrible 1968 dupe negative (cut off asymmetrical on the left side because the sound track area was matted out, orange-tinged colors and lots of grain). There is a 40 page booklet titled LOLA MONTEZ - REKONSTRUKTION that explains the available elements and processes used during restoration (in German only). It was published by the Munich film museum and the Cinematheque Municipale du Luxembourg in 2002. An article written in English by Stefan Droessler was printed in THE JOURNAL OF FILM PRESERVATION: Droessler, Stefan: "Reconstructing the German Version of Lola Montes", in: Journal of Film Preservation (Brussel), Nr. 65, Dezember 2002 IIRC the name of the company was Shiga. IIRC they also made the anamorphic parts for the JDC series of anamorphic lenses and at least for some of the Todd-AO 35 lenses. Joe Dunton mentioned them in one of his lectures. I must admit I never saw decent prints of the 1970s Hongkong films, most of them looked very grainy in their German release prints and had so much dust printed in that it resembled a snowstorm. I was told by a former distributor that they didn't even lease or buy a dupe negative, they just got a release print from Hong Kong and duped it as cheaply as possible! If these films do look soft on DVD, I would rather blame it on the different 1960s/70s zoom lenses that were "anamorphized" by using the back adapters, but since I never saw any production photos, I have no idea whether they also used front adapters. Maybe somebody from Hong Kong can enlighten us!

Bausch & Lomb combined lenses (not the anamorphic adapter lens used for newsreel and low-budget work) were not that bad. If you see early CinemaScope films in vintage contact prints (mostly faded, of course), you will be surprised how good some images do look. Unfortunately, many films were ruined in rereleases (like LOLA MONTEZ), going through additional dupe stages which kill resolution and add grain. For years I used to think that Fellini's LA DOLCE VITA - shot in 1959 with TotalScope anamorphics, looked diffuse and milky because of the anamorphic lenses low quality. What a surprise when I watched the restored version created by Cinecittá labs in the 1990s: Excellent sharpness and resolution, crispy and contrasty black & white. I had mistaken the inferior dupe printing process for the anamorphic system's weakness. Same with BRIDGE OIN THE RIVER KWAI which ran in terrible grainy and fuzzy rerelease prints with yellowish or orange skin tones for many years. - So I would advise never to judge an anamorphic lens except by original prints. I believe it was Joe Dunton who mentioned in his Bradford Widescreen Weekend lecture on anamorphic lenses that B & L CinemaScope lenses continued to be used in visual effects/process work even in the 1980s because they were quite sharp (stopped down two or three stops from wide open, I assume). Marty Hart has a nice overview over the different types of B & L anamorphics here: AWSM: B&L CinemaScope lenses Bausch & Lomb claimed that THE ROBE used their lenses, although in fact it was shot with the original Chrétien adapter made in 1927 (visible on page 1) , which may have helped to create the myth of those oh-so-bad Scope lenses: AWSM - Bausch & Lomb ad I bought one of the later B & L adapters some time ago and hope to do some test shots with it during the summer. Although I have no Baltar lens as with the original CinemaScope system, a Zeiss Planar 50mm should work fine as a spherical base.

from www.stanleykubrick.de : If someone wants to know places and dates to see Kubrick's film equipment (and write down all serial numbers...), you can subscribe to the Stanley Kubrick Newsletter here: SK Newsletter

Thomas, please check your negative with the registration problem. How do the sprocket holes look, are they in any way deformed or damaged? If you project the neg, is the first run exposure steady in relation to the perfs? is it the second run exposure that jiggles, or do they both move? I suspect that there is either damage to the perfs during the first run or that the loop is lost because there is some slippage in the first mag sprocket, causing the top loop to get too small. Did you start the camera at 50fps or did you bring it up to speed from a lower fps? 50 fps with a Konvas is only possible if your camera and all your mags are in top condition (serviced/lubricated), with perfect brake tension, non-worn sprockets with correct spring load and correct gate tension.

This is mostly black & white... ;) NIGHT OF THE DEMON (GB/USA 1957, DP: Ted Scaife, Dir. Jacques Tourneur) LA MASCHERA DEL DEMONIO/BLACK SUNDAY (Italy 1960, DP & Dir.: Mario Bava) THE HAUNTING (USA 1963, DP Davis Boulton, Dir. Robert Wise) ...in color? Hmmmm... THE SHINING (UK/USA 1980, DP: John Alcott, Dir Stanley Kubrick) THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM (1961, DP: Floyd Crosby, Dir. Roger Corman) Good excuse for another Barbara Steele pic!

CORNWELL-CLYNE, ADRIAN, COLOUR CINEMATOGRAPHY. 1951. 2. CORNWELL-CLYNE, Adrian. COLOUR CINEMATOGRAPHY. London: Chapman and Hall, 1951. 3rd edition. 780 pp that book even has technical drawings of a dye transfer machine. of course it does not cover the later 1950s processes and modifications!

Kristian, detach your motor from the camera body. You should now be able to turn the mechanism with your fingertip (without pain, please). If not, your camera needs cleaning and lubrication, which every experienced camera shop should be able to do. And remember: Those mags become part of the camera - have them cleaned/lubed too, or they will act like brakes, slowing down the camera and putting unnecessary strain on whatever motor you use. Please check whether the pins on the motor clutch have their rubber hoods, these are necessary to avoid vibration and play between camera mechanism and motor drive - if they are missing, you may get fluctuations in speed and additional noise.

2-perf cinematography has been discussed so much these days, some forum members might light to look at this auction from Switzerland: Techniscope Arriflex (Not my auction BTW)

Jackie Gleason Paul Newman George C. Scott in THE HUSTLER (1961) Jack Lemmon in THE APARTMENT (1960) Anton Walbrook (Adolph Wohlbrück) in THE RED SHOES (1948) Hardy Krüger James Stewart in FLIGHT OF THE PHOENIX (1965) Humphrey Bogart in KEY LARGO (1942) I find it very hard to judge actors by new films since the 1980s because their performances get so chopped up by directors and editors who don't trust their script and players. To me it seems like many actors have adapted to that choppy-movie making and try to emote for their life in every frame. "Dynamic" editing, "stylish" camera movements and the usual sticky-sweet Prozac known as modern film scores all diminish good film acting. Yesterday I saw EXODUS on TV (1960, d. Otto Preminger, DP Sam Leavitt), and while Preminger's 70mm long take mise en scene is not always great art, I found myself pulled into the movie because of the actors' presence (Paul Newman, Eva Marie Saint, Ralph Richardson et al). The best examples of film acting can be seen from many supporting players especially during films made inside the studio system. The worst film acting, as David Mamet noted, can be seen with actors playing great actors. David Mamet: Seeing and Believing (The Guardian)

Make yourself a cardboard or plastic disk the same size as 50 meters (~ 150 ft) of film on a Kodak core. If you have a horizontal rewind, so can break down larger rolls of raw stock into small rolls for the smaller Konvas mags. (But remember to wind the roll to the end before rewinding/cutting it up, otherwise the KeyCode will be on the wrong side.) I like them for handholding, often have a second Konvas available with a compact lens and a small mag if the director decides to handhold a shot. Shooting in cars is also better with 200ft. mags. "Short ends" are a cheap way to load the 200ft. mags, just swap them for the always occuring last sunset shot or to have a short length of different speed film stock. All gear parts and film gate are identical to large mags, so you can use the 200ft. mags for spare parts if any of your large mags gives you mechanical trouble.

At some point when the 70mm release prints a part of the original negative must have been damaged. It happens in the last reel when Bowman sees himself as an older man through the doorway. In the new 70mm prints I saw, the image goes EXTREMELY grainy with greenish colours. Two years ago, I looked into a vintage 70mm print of 2001 and was surprised to find that even in that print there was a SLIGHT jump in quality, but nowhere as bad as in the new prints. Since vintage prinbts were struck from camera negative and new prints came from a dupe negative, this is what I believe happened: 1. During release printing, a scetion of 65mm camera negative is damaged. 2. The footage is replaced by dupe negative, either from 65mm interpos>interneg printing or from 65mm separations>dupe negative. This dupe is spliced into the OCN. 3. Many years later, a new interpositive is struck from OCN, new interneg(s) and prints produced. That would mean OCN>Interpos>Interneg>Print most of 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY BUT: OCN>Interpos>Interneg>Interpos>Interneg>Print for the damaged section ! which explains the degradation of color, grain and resolution in this short section. If you compared different vintage prints of 2001, you could find out when the damage occured. In a perfect world, the old dupe section would have been substituted by a new dupe part from B&W separations or a digital dupe if damaged OCN parts still exist, but I suppose that this was either prohibitive for such a small run of new prints. BTW, the AC article about 2001 says that a special Fairchild wide angle lens was used for HAL's POV shots.

Two labs that do excellent blowup work: Schwarzfilm Zurich Andec Film berlin (english)

Same to me! I went to a screening two years ago, but about 35 minutes into the movie I got the feeling that I had to throw up if I saw another zoom shot that looked like the control of a Panazoom lens motor went out of control... ;) When I saw it on a huge screen, I became really sick by the combined zooming-in-and-out while panning too fast. BTW, Nicholas Roeg's TRACK 29 is a favourite film of mine, DP'd by Alex Thompson IIRC.

Those baffles are there to prevent stray light reflected by the ground glass from hitting the film. With some older lens designs and in really bright conditions I have seen strange leak light effects on a "de-baffled" Arri that were not caused by leaks in the door or mag - we had done a check on that before. I wouldn't take them out unless there is a very good reason for it! :)

Isco Optics has a modular lens system for all anamorphic conversions: Film Printing System (Isco) Contact: Isco Technical Support ISCO Precision Optics GMBH P.O. BOX 200155 37086 Göttingen / Germany TECHNICAL SUPPORT: PHONE +49 (0) 551 - 50 58 - 3 FAX +49 (0) 551 - 50 58 - 410 www.iscoprecisionoptics.com

You should try to get a second motor for your camera. If anything breaks down, it's almost certain to be the motor. 15EPSS motors without control units can be used with small changes for studio work. They can be fed by a variable voltage power supply unit, my motor will run 24fps at about 21.6 volts. Nice to have a backup wherever you can find a wall plug... Motors are the weakest parts of any Konvas setup (excluding unserviced mags, of course...)

Freya, the only lens in your set that will show some barrel distortion that actually matters in real-life conditions is the f=35mm square front lens. So if you are shooting geometric patterns like the window front of a building or a wide fence with this wide angle lens, don't expect the lines to be straight. If you use an 18mm lens in spherical format, the problem will be the same. Just yesterday I telecined some Konvas footage shot with f=35, 50 and 80mm square front anamorphics only, and it looked slightly better than the Foton-A zoom footage I shot before under same lighting conditions. In wide position which is f=37mm the distortions are not very different from the f=35mm fixed lens. I recommend doing some test shots, then you get a feeling for the rendition of space these lenses will give you. Both the 35&50mm lenses have very good sharpness, but remember to keep stray light from the front lens. A matte box is the best investment you can make when shooting with these anamorphics, Rafcamera should have one for you. They also turn up on eBay frequently. Do some tests so you know what your lenses can do, checking and doing tests is essential with all Konvas equipment.

Look here for more on Clairmont lenses Anamorphic Lenses (by Max Jacoby) Here are some scans from an older Clairmont ad in AC with a list of anamorphics available back then.

I forgoit to mention Audi (they belong to Volkswagen) with a good quality record. Opel belongs to General Motors, and they had a good name until Ignacio Lopez, the cost-cutting mastermind, put more pressure on engineering and production. Opel cars are sold under the name of Vauxhall internationally, don't know about the U.S. If you want to see some beautiful 1950s Opels, look here and click left: Opel Classics / History Volkswagen used to have very good production quality, but during the last years serious quality issues have been troubling the customers.

Are we talking cars or cine cameras? :unsure: One should remember that most (continental) European movies before the 1950s were shot with French cameras, mostly Debrie. In fact, even manufacturers in Germany made licensed versions of French cameras, like Askania did with Debrie Parvo models. Printing machines and lab equipment from France was installed all over the world, certainly not because of unreliable or fragile construction. The most innovative camera of the post WWII era, the Caméflex (aka. Camerette) has been used under very demanding circumstances - another French design. Here in Germany, they used Super-Parvos and Super-Parvo Color cameras into the 1960s because the only alternative, an Arri 35 in a Blimp 300 (1000ft.) was almost as heavy and had no pin registration. The only French camera that gave me trouble again and again was a Pathé Webo 16mm model that was a real pain in the a**, always breaking down when one part had been fixed. BTW, even French cars are much better nowadays - and if you buy a German car which is not a BMW, Mercedes or Porsche, there's a good chance you will experience some quality problems formerly attributed to Italian cars like Fiat (they used to spell it in German F.I.A.T = Fehler in allen Teilen = Faulty in every part). ;)

I can't imagine what the 127 minute version of "Death Proof" is filled with. Boring talk. Women's feet. More boring talk. And so on...and on...and on... Maybe Tarantino and the Weinsteins believed what the temporarily blind film director in Woody Allen's HOLLYWOOD ENDING said: "The French will love it". ;)

BTW, if you need anamorphic lens element & parts to construct your own setup, have a look at this page on rafcamera.com: Rafcamera.com - Attachments