Session Restoration of the "Cinemascope 55" Widescreen Format

Presenters

Daniel DeVincent and Simon Lund
Cineric, Inc., New York

Schawn Belston
20th Century Fox


ABSTRACT

When the 35mm Cinemascope format became popular in the mid-1950's, 20th Century Fox film corporation decided to create a unique format that they called Cinemascope 55. This format was a 55mm wide by 8 perforations high image produced using custom made anamorphic lenses. Since the format was used on only two films, "The King and I" and "Carousel", and the 55mm format was not a successful one, preservation of these titles from the original negatives has been problematic.

This presentation will outline the steps needed to work from the original 55mm camera negatives to restore the films. A new 55mm wet gate optical printing system was developed. This new system had to deal with the issues of smaller than normal perforations, recombination of badly shrunken separation masters, repairing severely faded opticals, and repairing torn sections of the negative that could only be remedied with 4K scanning and digital manipulation. Illustrating this presentation will be a newly made film, shot in scope, detailing the step-by-step processes involved in the development, machine engineering and printing techniques used to complete the project. The project highlights common and inherent archival issues related to creation and implementation of methodologies for preservation of obsolete or unique formats.


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SPEAKER BIOS

Schawn Belston

Schawn is currently Vice President, Asset Management at Twentieth Century Fox. Schawn began his career in feature post production. In 1997, he started a Film Preservation program at Twentieth Century Fox. This program has expanded in commitment and scope over the years, and currently includes the management of all film and television assets, photographs, posters, and props owned by Fox Filmed Entertainment. Under his tenure, the studio has restored many notable films, including GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES, CARMEN JONES, THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL, THE SAND PEBBLES, THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW and ALIEN.

Daniel DeVincent

Daniel is currently Director of Digital Imaging at Cineric, Inc., in New York, where he oversees the quality control and throughput of color imaging. He has been a color timer since 1980 in the motion picture laboratory industry. He began working in digital imaging in 1994 and has been with Cineric since 2001.

Simon Lund

Simon is currently the Director of Technical Operations at Cineric, Inc, in New York. He began his career as an optical printer in 1995.