The Cine Technician (1953-1956)

48 THE CINETECHNICIAN March-April, 1952 ". . . possibilities limited only by the imagination . . ." semi-transparent objects will appear naturally in a finished Travelling Matte shot. And what of the future? In what way will the Travelling Matte Process benefit the Motion Picture Industry? Our future plans include making Travelling Mattes in colour and in developing the Robot Tripod Head. We have already perfected a Pilot Print technique, whereby the customer may select his own balance between foreground and background, and so obtain exactly what he wants and not what we think he should have. The Motion Picture Industry as a whole will benefit by the Travelling Matte Process in the same way that the cameraman benefited by the introduction of sound, with the need for sensitometric control, by giving an opportunity to use new methods of story telling. This Process is available to everyone, its use is not restricted to any one producer; in short, it is a service open to anyone in any studio, large or small, for any purpose from advertising films to mighty epics in any country. Those who worked on the development of this Process believe that it will be a great benefit to film makers, while many producers and directors have already begun to use it as an integral part of normal production. Just a moment, please, we have something else to show you. As a Post Script. Since making this demonstration film, experiments have been made with the object of eliminating sets. The purpose of this scene is to demonstrate that in certain cases all that need be built is the floor on which the scene is played. The size and proportion of the floor are determined by the background, which in this case was taken from a still photograph — the interior of a Portuguese castle. To this has been added the floor seen previously, resulting in this composite picture. As a natural development of this principle of having no set we experimented with the idea of painting a small background. The special value of the painted background being that the painting is made to fit the foreground action which has already been shot. For example, in this test shot, we have used the same floor and put it on the deck of a ship. We hope that the unconventional presentation of our Stop Press News will be compensated for by its news value. LETTER FROM BOMBAY — continued the daily tasks they are forgotten in the common aim of making the best they know how to. One bright exception to the lack of representation is provided by the people who " ghost " the voices of the stars and others. They belong to what is known as the " Play-Back Singers' Assocation." Nobody cares a hoot if a star's speaking voice is in violent contrast to his or hex singing voice, nor do picture-goers worry overmuch about " sync." If I were asked my deepest impression of Indian film workers, I should reply first their cheerfulness and second, their amazing faculty for improvisation. My best wish for them is that somehow a way will be found to break the chain that binds them to such stereotyped forms of production. When that is done, they may surprise the West, because it has been truly said " India is full of art and seething with artistes." MAGNETIC SOUND— continued however, is the difficulty of handling it, especially by those accustomed to 35 mm. film, which of course is much more robust. Amplifier design for magnetic recording has problems different from those found with photographic recording, and considerable correction is often required for different types of magnetic coating and playback. To sum up, there are indications that magnetic recording will play an increasing part in the technique of film production, and it is claimed that the costly and risky methods of recording direct on photographic film will sooner or later be obsolete. It will undoubtedly make a great economy in film stock and processing, and also increase the speed of film production. It must be remembered, however, that this does not imply an economy in technicians or the need for less skilful handling and servicing of equipment, but it will increase the versatility of the sound department and may remove some of the hazards of the present system. ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING The A.C.T's Annual General Meeting is to be held on Saturday and Sunday. 26th and 27th of April, at the St. Pancras Town Hall. The session on Saturday will begin at ten o'clock in the morning and end at five o'clock in the afternoon. On Sunday, business will commence at ten o'clock and continue until the agenda is complotod. In view of the importance to all film technicians of A.C.T's activities and policies, all members are urged to attend for the two sessions. The next A.C.T. Technical Lecture will be on Wednesday, 26th March, at the Hammer Theatre, Wardour Street, at 7.30. The subject of the lecture will be a comparison between Cine and Television Cameras; and the lecturers will be D. R. Campbell and George Hill.