Ansco Reversal Film - Man on the Eiffel Tower

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John Mc Keown

Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 9:06 am

Guest

Hi all.

In Charles Higham's book, HOLLYWOOD CAMERAMEN, Stanley Cortez says this
about filming THE MAN ON THE EIFFEL TOWER (1949):

"The film was released on Ansco Reversal film, and it looked odd. It went
through nine emulsions, and I was none too pleased."

I'm lamentably ignorant about these things, but nine emulsions seems a lot
even to me. How did this happen? Can anyone explain to me or care to have a
guess?

Thanks in advance!

John.

J. Theakston

Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 9:06 am

Guest

On Apr 17, 10:06 am, "John Mc Keown"
<john.mcmenolikespamkeown...@ntlworld.com> wrote:

Quote:

"The film was released on Ansco Reversal film, and it looked odd. It went
through nine emulsions, and I was none too pleased."

I'm lamentably ignorant about these things, but nine emulsions seems a lot
even to me. How did this happen? Can anyone explain to me or care to have a
guess?

I think you're confusing Cortez's hyperbole with fact. That would be
attuned to me saying "Yeah, it looked like crap after we went through
a *million* passes."

The Ansco prints of titles I've seen are quite pleasing, if not indeed
a little contrasty. It would seem more likely that perhaps they had
two or three steps at most, but I could be wrong!

J. Theakston

Scott Dorsey

Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 9:25 am

Guest

John Mc Keown <john.mcmenolikespamkeown220@ntlworld.com> wrote:

Quote:

In Charles Higham's book, HOLLYWOOD CAMERAMEN, Stanley Cortez says this
about filming THE MAN ON THE EIFFEL TOWER (1949):

"The film was released on Ansco Reversal film, and it looked odd. It went
through nine emulsions, and I was none too pleased."

I'm lamentably ignorant about these things, but nine emulsions seems a lot
even to me. How did this happen? Can anyone explain to me or care to have a
guess?

It's ALMOST that bad for typical Hollywood releases today, because they
want to strike so damn many prints that they need ukubillion generations
of IP and IN after the timed intermediate.

If you're doing composited effects and optical dissolves, add a couple more
generations for that....

The only issue with doing the prints on a reversal stock is that you need to
have a positive image printing master. In 1949 when there wasn't a wide
variety of fine Eastman intermediate stocks available, that could have been
a nightmare, though.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Guest

Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 9:50 am

On Apr 17, 10:06 am, "John Mc Keown"
<john.mcmenolikespamkeown...@ntlworld.com> wrote:

Quote:

Guest

Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 9:59 am

On Apr 17, 10:06 am, "John Mc Keown"
<john.mcmenolikespamkeown...@ntlworld.com> wrote:

Quote:

---I think you're confusing generations with emulsion batchs. There
can be inconsistencies between batches of film stock.
That would be more common in the early days of monopack color. Today
it's more likely to occur in print stocks.
The lab will test each batch and adjust printer filter packs to keep
the prints consistentant.

---Leo Vale

Guest

Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 10:07 am

On Apr 17, 10:06 am, "John Mc Keown"
<john.mcmenolikespamkeown...@ntlworld.com> wrote:

Quote:

---I think you're confusing generations with emulsion batches.
There are some inconsistencies between different batches of emulsions.
In the early days of monopack color stocks the batch to batch
inconsistancies were greater than they would be today
& today it's easier to correct them in printing.

---Leo Vale

Martin Hart

Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 1:39 pm

Guest

In article <fu7mll$98r$1@panix2.panix.com>, kludge@panix.com says...

<SNIP>

Quote:

The only issue with doing the prints on a reversal stock is that you need to
have a positive image printing master. In 1949 when there wasn't a wide
variety of fine Eastman intermediate stocks available, that could have been
a nightmare, though.
--scott

The original camera film would have been Ansco color reversal. This
would be printed to a similar Ansco color reversal release print film.
This technology did not become popular and within a year or so, Ansco
was marketing a negative/positive process based on Agfa film.

Ansco's color reversal film was a bit more contrasty than Kodachrome.
It yielded beautiful, highly saturated colors. I still have some of
this film that my father shot around 1951. It's faded a bit but not so
far that you can't make a decent duplicate of it.

Marty
--
The American WideScreen Museum
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/

in Technicolor®

Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 3:45 pm

Guest

"J. Theakston" <tomservorobot@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:e4522c19-340d-4ead-a68b-3698ac96e9c5@u69g2000hse.googlegroups.com...

Quote:

On Apr 17, 10:06 am, "John Mc Keown"
john.mcmenolikespamkeown...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
"The film was released on Ansco Reversal film, and it looked odd. It went
through nine emulsions, and I was none too pleased."

I'm lamentably ignorant about these things, but nine emulsions seems a
lot
even to me. How did this happen? Can anyone explain to me or care to have
a
guess?

I think you're confusing Cortez's hyperbole with fact. That would be
attuned to me saying "Yeah, it looked like crap after we went through
a *million* passes."

The Ansco prints of titles I've seen are quite pleasing, if not indeed
a little contrasty. It would seem more likely that perhaps they had
two or three steps at most, but I could be wrong!

J. Theakston

Cortez's comment is just vague enough to be totally confusing and he might
have been speaking with or interviewed by a non-technical writer who didn't
know enough to clarify it. Like most folks here, when you think of 9
emulsions, you are probably referring to batches of emulsion, which is
usually reserved for ON stock. Print stock is usually compensated for with
printing filter adjustments. Or did Cortez have some influence with the
manufacturer who was trying to get the stock "perfected" and was making
adjustments. Another thought I had was what he was referring to actually
the number of answer prints that had to be struck before a good print was
produced?

M

Theo Gluck

Posted: Fri Apr 18, 2008 10:05 am

Guest

In article <fu7mll$98r$1@panix2.panix.com>,
kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) wrote:

- snip -

Quote:

However -

with the advent of a digital intermediate - once all of your effects are
composited and the final color tweak is done, you can render out a first
generation digital negative (some labs refer to it as a DON - "DIGITAL
ORIGINAL NEGATIVE") or - in fact several digital negatives so in theory
every print is struck from an "original negative". Some DIs can look
rather poor, but there are many that look very good indeed. This means
you can opt eliminate the IP/IN process when going to release printing.
But many do opt to go IP/IN from the 'DON"

Theo

John Mc Keown

Posted: Sat Apr 19, 2008 8:18 am

Guest

Thanks for all the replies! It's been interesting reading.

John.

"<<LV>>" <leoavale@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:59080518-e62e-48f2-99ab-02087e358218@m44g2000hsc.googlegroups.com...
On Apr 17, 10:06 am, "John Mc Keown"

---I think you're confusing generations with emulsion batches.
There are some inconsistencies between different batches of emulsions.
In the early days of monopack color stocks the batch to batch
inconsistancies were greater than they would be today
& today it's easier to correct them in printing.

---Leo Vale

Guest

Posted: Wed Apr 23, 2008 11:54 pm

On Apr 18, 12:06 am, "John Mc Keown"
<john.mcmenolikespamkeown...@ntlworld.com> wrote:

Quote:

According to A History of Motion Picture Color Technology by Roderick
T Ryan the Ansco Color
process which was introduced commercially in 1945 made use of three
films , the original camera reversal color film,
a duplicating film and a release print film. Each of these films was a
multi-layer
reversal color film which contained three light sensitive emulsions
sensitized to red,
green and blue light respectively and coated on a single film support.
(page 123)
The ANSCO Color negative process was introduced in 1953 and co existed
with the color reversal process for a number of years.
The last feature film shot in this process was Lust For life.
Anscochrome another color reversal film was available in at least ten
different emulsions and was on the market for many
years after the demise of the negative process.

Regards,
Peter mason

Peter

Posted: Thu Apr 24, 2008 12:47 pm

Guest

On 2008-04-24 02:54:04 -0700, cinemad@hotmail.com said:

Quote:

... the Ansco Color
process which was introduced commercially in 1945 made use of three
films , the original camera reversal color film,
a duplicating film and a release print film. Each of these films was a
multi-layer
reversal color film which contained three light sensitive emulsions
sensitized to red,
green and blue light respectively and coated on a single film support ...

Well, at least they had an end-to-end process in 35mm, which Kodak did not.

The "Monopack Agreement" prohibited Kodak from selling single-film
(i.e., monopack, in its generic sense) color films in so-called
"professional" sizes (taken literally to mean "35mm and larger") to
anyone but Technicolor, which would then resell it, with professional
services included, to its clients.

This same agreement prohibited Technicolor from offering such products
in so-called "non-professional" sizes (taken literally to mean "smaller
than 35mm") [ * ] .

Given that duplicating and release print stocks are used primarily in
professional motion picture post-production, there was, therefore,
little need for such stocks in 35mm, as Technicolor, which had a "lock"
on 35mm, always first made separation negatives from the reversal
originals, and thereafter made dye-transfer prints through its usual
processes.

Kodak performed the processing of the reversal original (literally,
Kodachrome Commercial on a special BH-perfed base) photo-chemically.
Technicolor performed all other processing photo-mechanically.

Now, for 16mm, there was indeed a need for a release print stock, and
one was available. I don't know about a duplicating stock as most 16mm
prints from reversal originals were made directly from the Kodachrome
Commercial originals, usually composited as A/B or A/B/C rolls.

By the mid-1950s, such prints were being made by the negative-positive
process, by first preparing an internegative from the composited
reversal originals.

This meant that producers had to have three processing lines: reversal
color original, color intermediate (equivalent to color negative, but
Kodak had yet to release a color negative film in 16mm), and color
release print, whereas formerly only two lines were necessary: reversal
color original and reversal color release print.

[ *] And, which is why Technicolor 16mm prints from this era were first
made on a 35mm base, and were then reperforated and slit down to 16mm.

Later, made as 35/32mm double-rank prints on a 35mm base, but with 32mm
perforations which conformed to 16mm release print standards.

It took an amendment to the Monopack Agreement to allow Technicolor to
make 16mm prints in this more direct, more cost-effective manner.

I believe, as a quid pro quo, Kodak received the right to make certain
negative-positive materials, these being the earliest incarnation of
Eastmancolor.

But, it would be another three or so years before Eastmancolor was
ready for "prime time", and even then there were quality issues, so
that Three-Strip remained the dominate process for non-anamorphic
productions, particularly for those producers who could not take
financial risks, such as Universal, then a second-string producer, who
would make the very last Three-Strip feature, in 1955.

--
CinemaScope®: The Modern Miracle You See without Special Glasses!
--
Peter

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