Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: TRANSFERRING VISTAVISION 35 TO IMAX

This is topic TRANSFERRING VISTAVISION 35 TO IMAX in forum Large Format Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Matthew Bailey (Member # 601) on 10-31-2000, 04:45 PM:

I am wondering what would be needed to
transfer vistaVision 35 prints to IMAX?

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 10-31-2000, 06:34 PM:

DKP70mm Inc (a Imax company) has a 15perf optical printer and I know back in the late 70 we had them do a test of a reel of 10 commandments printed from the vv neg to the 15 perf print
It can be done

Posted by Dick Vaughan (Member # 540) on 11-01-2000, 05:30 AM:

Gordon

I saw that blow up. Grain the size of baseballs

Matthew

Quality will depend on a number of factors
a) Do you want to blow up a portion of Vistavision frame to fill the 1570 frame or are you going to letterbox the original aspect ratio?
b) The age and speed of the original stock
etc.

The person I would approach would be Chris Reyna at Imagica in LA .e-mail him at chrisr@imagicausa.com.

Imagica USA Inc.
5320 McConnell Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90066
Phone: 310-305-8081
Fax: 310-305-7563

His company do all sorts of blow ups and transfers.

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 11-01-2000, 07:56 AM:

I believe the recent 15-perf 70mm film "Michael Jordan to the Max" had quite a bit of footage "blown up" from 35 mm camera negative:
http://www.mjtothemax.com/mj.html

As Dick Vaughan notes, the image quality depends on the type of negative film used, and the quality of the cinematography. But even the area of an 8-perf VistaVision or a full frame "Super 35" negative won't match the quality of 65 mm origination. Look at the usable image areas available:

IMAX 15-perf 70mm: 2.74 x 1.91 inches (69.60 x 48.5 mm)

8-perf 35 mm VistaVision Negative: 1.472 x 0.997 inches

"Super 35" Full Camera Aperture: 0.980 x 0.735 inches

Imagica USA (Chris Reyna) ( http://www.imagica.com/company/group-e.html ), CFI ( http://www.cfi-hollywood.com/ ) or David Keighley Productions 70 MM Inc. ( http://www.imax.com/corporate/companies.html ) are very expert in this type of lab work.

But, as always, "Size DOES Matter".

------------------
John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Eastman Kodak Company
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7419
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: 716-477-5325 Fax: 716-722-7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 11-01-2000, 08:56 AM:

Yes but it was a 1950's negative source as well. Even guiness would get a little flat after that many years

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 11-01-2000, 09:52 AM:

"The Ten Commandments" was likely shot on the old EASTMAN Color Negative film 5248, an EI 25 camera negative introduced in 1952. Not surprising that the grain was "the size of baseballs" on a huge screen. Today's Kodak VISION Color Negative films have vastly superior sharpness and graininess, even though they are all much faster.

Any of today's Kodak Color Negative films would look great in the VistaVision format:
http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/products/camera.shtml

(And they look even better in 65 mm formats )

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 11-02-2000, 01:26 PM:

This post really doesn't belong in Film-Yak.

Transferring to Film Handler's Forum.