Transactions of the Society of Motion Picture Engineers (1922)

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at which the lenses for these color processes have to be used, tends to give a slight degradation of detail compared with the black-andwhite processes in which a smaller stop can be employed. A question of similar nature to definition is that of register between successive pictures. This arises in two different forms, according to whether the pictures are taken simultaneously, as in the Gaumont process, or serially, as in Kinemacolor. If they are taken serially, then a quickly moving object will be in a different position when a red negative is taken, from that which it occupied when the green negative was taken, and it will present on the screen alternate bands of red and green, this defect being apparent as a colored striping of quickly moving objects. When the pictures are taken simultaneously, as in the Gaumont process, then the red picture, being taken from a slightly different standpoint than the green picture, it will not be possible to register both the distance and the near foreground together— a kind of defect which may be called stereoparallax. It is partly in order to diminish this that specially narrow pictures are used in the Gaumont process so that the taking lenses can be placed nearer together. In the Gaumont process this stereoparallax is diminished to a minimum by registering during projection, so that the principal object is registered, the plane of register being shifted as the subject may require. This defect can, of course, be entirely removed by using one lens for taking the two pictures, a result which can be accomplished in various ways. The disadvantage of this is the loss of light, but it is by no means certain that careful attention to the design of the lens system might not enable a system to be made working at the equivalent of //14 and free from stereoparallax. 7. The Color Rendering. Among all processes of color photography, the rendering given by the three-color additive process is supreme. Indeed, under favorable circumstances, the color rendering by this process is almost perfect. The subtractive processes, even the best three-color processes, do not give as good results as regards rendering, as the additive processes, because no dyes can fulfil the theoretical conditions as correctly as the projection filters can. When we turn to the two-color process, as has been explained previously, the position of the additive and subtractive processes in regard to color rendering is reversed, and the color rendering obtainable by means of the two-color subtractive process is intermediate between that of a three-color process and that of a two-color additive process. From this general discussion of the processes of color cinematography, it will be seen that the additive processes, and especially the three-color additive process, while able to give photographic quality and color rendering superior to the subtractive processes, seem to have a somewhat limited field owing to the necessity for the use of a special projecting machine. These are likely to survive for the very best three-color work. For the wide field of general moving picture work, it is probable that a two-color subtractive process having the color in the film so that it can be used in any projector without increase of light must 155