Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Modern Kinemacolor 35 mm films

This is topic Modern Kinemacolor 35 mm films in forum Film Handlers' Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

To visit this topic, use this URL:
https://ft-forum.com/ft/cgi-bin/ubb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=1;t=002888

Posted by Matthew Bailey (Member # 601) on 12-17-2001, 07:27 AM:

I was looking one time at a site that featured an early theatrical
means of showing color films called a Kinemacolor system.
It consisted of a projector & camera both which were equipped
with a rotating red&green filter.
A more modern 35 millimeter Kinemacolor film would use optical
or contact printing using a black&white negative,the contact
printing method shown as follows.

B&W NEGATIVE COLOR STRIP RESULTING POSITIVE
- - -
R
- - -
G
- - -
R
- - -

The -'s shown are the frame lines. The letters R&G are for
red&green.

Posted by Matthew Bailey (Member # 601) on 12-17-2001, 07:40 AM:

Pardon me,even though the description may be inaccurate,
the resulting Kinemacolor positive will alternate between
red on one frame & green the next frame continuously throughout the
reel.

Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 12-17-2001, 08:10 AM:

Kinemacolor was developed by the UK-based movie pioneer Charles Urban. A detailed technical description of it and other early additive colour processes can be found in Brian Coe, 'The History of Movie Photography'.

See also the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television's information sheet on Urban and Kinemacolor (in PDF format), info on Kinemacolor from Widescreen Museum website, and a 1913 article from 'Motion Picture World' reprinted on David Pierce's Silent Film Bookshelf website.

Luke McKernan of the British Universities' Film and Video Council is currently working on a PhD thesis about Charles Urban: some of his research related to Kinemacolor can be found here.

I've never seen any restored Kinemacolor, though a film of the 1911 Delhi Durbar does survive in the National Film and Television Archive in London (there are frame enlargements in Coe's book). The WWI propaganda feature film 'Britain Prepared' (1915) was also made in Kinemacolor, though AFAIK, only black and white elements survive.

I would imagine that if one were attempting to make a new negative on tripack colour stock, the Desmetcolour method, which is used extensively by archives for making new prints of tinted and toned originals, could be adapted for the purpose without too much difficulty. I guess you would need to tweak the grading of the filters used to offset the fact that the original element was shot on orthochromatic stock and through a filter in the first place. Apart from that, I can't see that the process wouldn't work 'as is'.

BTW, while we've been having the thread about spelling, Urban did, being an American expat, spell 'Kinemacolor' the American way, i.e. without the 'u'.

Posted by Matthew Bailey (Member # 601) on 12-17-2001, 07:26 PM:

Now I have it figured out. To make a Kinema color film with a camera loaded with color film,LCD slides or LCD filters like those used in LCD projectors for example would need to be synced with the camera.
Same with a projector running B&W film.

Posted by Howard Johnson (Member # 62) on 12-18-2001, 04:49 AM:

Matthew ,an interesting book with a chapter on Kinemacolor is "A Million & One Nights" by Terry Ramsaye originally published in USA in 1926 I have the reprint by Frank Cass & Co. in UK 1964. The first test filming was of G. Albert Smith's children in 1906 in his garden near Brighton (only 9 miles from where I live). The book has an enormous amount of information about the earliest days of film production in USA.

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 12-18-2001, 08:07 AM:

Marty Hart's "American Widescreen Museum" website has some information on early color processes:
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/oldcolor/oldcolor.htm
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/oldcolor/additive.htm
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/oldcolor/subtract.htm
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/oldcolor/koda2.htm
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/oldcolor/cinecolor2.htm
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/oldcolor/technicolor1.htm

------------------
John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7525A
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: 716-477-5325 Cell: 716-781-4036 Fax: 716-722-7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com
Web site: http://www.kodak.com/go/motion