British Kinematography (1953)

34 Vol. 22, No. 2 REVIEW OF TECHNICAL DEVELOPMENTS IN 1952 I. COLOUR AS in other years little of revolutionary importance has taken place in colour motion pictures during 1952. The trend of progress in this field is gradual and it is probable that a year is too short a period for anything novel to become really established or for its importance to be properly assessed. If patent literature is examined without any reference to actual practice it is only too easy to assume that in a very short time many preconceived ideas, which have been widely held, will go by the board. This is a dangerous trap too often fallen into ; a fair length of time usually elapses between the patenting of an idea and its commercial use. Many patents which seem excellent enough on paper will not have any practical worth, and indeed may never have been intended for practical use by the patentee. Jn the past year a number' of patents have been published in Britain for apparatus to handle stripping monopack negative materials, Kodak, Technicolor and Republic all being represented. But this does not mean that such films will shortly be in use even though they have a number of desirable qualities. These films have the great advantage, from the point of view of handling in the studio or on location, that they give three colour separations without the use of the three-strip camera. In other words, apart from their lower speed they are used in similar fashion to black and white materials. But from the point of view of the laboratory they present some problems which are worthy of serious consideration. The difficulty of faultless stripping of the two upper layers on to separate supports, in total darkness, with the maintenance of perfect register would seem to be a hazardous operation when pro duction negative, which represents the only concrete asset for some several thousands of pounds per day production costs, is being handled in this way.1 So far no production has been photographed on stripping tripack material and no print made from such separation negatives has been publicly shown in spite of the fact that an excellent material of this type was described in 1949 by John G. CapstafT of Eastman Kodak2 and by now a considerable footage of this film must have been coated. However, in addition to the machine which was described to the S.M.P.T.E. by CapstafT, both Technicolor and Twentieth CenturyFox are reported as having installed during the year machines to handle stripping monopack. Colour Negative Monopacks Many manufacturers of sensitized materials, including Ilford, Imperial Chemical Industries, General Aniline (Ansco) and Gevaert hold patents on colour negative monopacks which use coloured couplers or other integral masking methods. Such aids are necessary to improve the quality of the colour reproduction given by these films and enable duplicate negatives of at least tolerable quality to be made. But so far the only commercial material to appear is Eastman Colour Negative and the associated internegative film.3 The camera film was used quite extensively during the year, principally in the United States, but also by Wessex Film Productions, London Film Productions and Denham Laboratories in this country for tests. In the United States Warner Bros.4 have used Eastman Colour Negative for four feature productions during the year, the release