[rollei_list] Re: OT - "Motion picture film has not gotten that much better but HDTV has"
- From: "Richard Knoppow" <dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <rollei_list@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 29 Jan 2005 17:43:27 -0800
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ardeshir Mehta" <ardeshir@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <rollei_list@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, January 29, 2005 4:04 PM
Subject: [rollei_list] Re: OT - "Motion picture film has not
gotten that much better but HDTV has"
>
> On Friday, January 28, 2005, at 11:32 PM, Richard Knoppow
> wrote:
>
>> Motion picture film has not gotten that much better but
>> HDTV has.
>
> Actually, Richard, the problem in mainstream movies
> today - I'm not
> talking about IMAX, mind you, which is many times
> superior - is not the
> film but the projector. The ancient technology used for 35
> mm film
> projection causes a lot of visible jitter of the image
> on-screen.
> Besides it wastes film area. Standard projectors simply
> run the film
> through sprockets to move it thought the projector's gate.
> The problem
> with this is the fact that the sprockets and the 4
> sprocket holes can
> only fit together so tightly without breaking the film.
> The loose fit
> allows the film to jitter up/down and side to side while
> in the
> projector's gate (the place where light is passes though
> it to project
> the image). This jittering is slight enough that people
> may not
> consciously notice it, but the mind can perceive this, and
> it only
> helps to convince the viewer subconsciously that the image
> is not real.
>
I disagree with this. While many projectors are probably
not in the best condition the image steadiness can be pretty
good. One problem is the magnification of side weave caused
by the use of anamorphic processes.
The wasted space on film comes from a decision made by
Fox Film Corp, around 1929. Fox decided to use standard
width 35mm film with a cropped picture area to make room for
the track. This was due to a failure of the company to get
world rights to a group of German patents that used about
45mm film with the sound track in an added area outside one
row of perforations.
The Cinamascope system was an attempt to remedy this and
world have been a good system except that Fox executives
wanted a poor man's version of Cinerama. The original
Cinemascope formate was 1.65:1 If something more reasonable
had been chosen, say 1.66:1 it would have been a world
beater.
Much weave comes from printing machines and poor
cameras. Its interesting to note that often the backgound
plates for titles are weaving while the titles are steady.
Again, I ask you to look at work prints made directly
from camera originals to get some idea of what film should
look like. I think you will find these generally free of
much of the artifacts of release prints. Weave in
projectors is seldom due to the intermittant but to poor
edge guidance. A worn intermittant will show up as vertical
jitter.
The steadiest motion (and also for cameras) is a
non-intrmittant type using a compensating prism or mirror
system. Very high speed cameras use this system. It is not
really suitable for theater projectors. IMAX has a patent on
what they call a rolling loop but that is to enable moving
the large film without straining it.
I think the main problem with current release is the
sheer numbers of prints that are usually made, on the order
of 2000 for many movies.
Certainly improved projection mechanisms would be very
helpful but they won't make any difference if the print
itself is bad.
---
Richard Knoppow
Los Angeles, CA, USA
dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
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