From: reiher@ficus.cs.ucla.edu (Peter Reiher)
Subject: Technicolor (was: REVIEW: THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS)
Keywords: author=Oswalt
Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 92 16:47:24 GMT

In article <1992Sep29.134220.10432@cbnewsj.cb.att.com> sun!megatest!jao (John Oswalt) writes:
>     This brings up a pet peeve of mine.  I have seen many Technicolor
>movies made in the 30's, 40's, and 50's, and the color in them is far
>superior to that in the movies made today.  I recently saw a restored
>print of LEAVE HER TO HEAVEN, which was made in Technicolor in 1945.
>When I compare that movie, which contains a lot of upstate New York
>scenery, with this one, I just shake my head.  Why, Hollywood, did you
>abandon a process which produces such beautiful true-to-life colors, for
>the washed-out look of today?  With all the millions spent on movie
>production you would think that they could use good film.

The reasons the original Technicolor process was abandoned were cost
and difficulty of use.  The beautiful Technicolor films of the thirties
and forties were shot using 3-strip Technicolor.  In this process, the
beam of light entering the camera was split into three beams.  Each beam
was passed through a filter so that only light of a single color came 
through.  The filtered light then hit a strip of black-and-white film,
producing a black-and-white image of the scene in light of only one color.
Each beam exposed a different strip of film.

In processing the film, the three negatives were combined into a single
print, with special dyes applied based on the relative exposure of each
of the three strips.  Since each strip encoded color information for a
different color, it was possible to (sort of) recreate the original color
of the scene.  In actuality, the process was not able to capture certain
colors very well, and heightened other colors.  On the whole, the result
was much more brilliant and beautiful color than one typically finds
in today's films.  (Note that I have probably made some minor mistakes
in the details of the process.  I can never remember whether the three
negatives were combined into a single color negative, for instance, or
whether a color positive was produced from the three black-and-white
negatives.  I'm sure someone will be kind enough to correct any mistakes
I've made.)

There were serious disadvantages to this process.  Three times as much
film was used in shooting as in shooting with the one strip processes
(color negatives) used today.  The development process was considerably
more expensive.  It was a proprietary process, and the Technicolor company
charged a pretty penny to use their cameras and developing facilities.

Most significant, perhaps, was the fact that you needed a camera large 
enough to contain three separate strips of film, the optics necessary 
to split and filter the light beam, and the mechanism to keep the three 
strips in synchronization.  Technicolor cameras were large and heavy, 
compared to normal cameras.  One can suppose that, had they kept working 
at it, methods would have been found to make them somewhat lighter and 
more portable, but the fact that you need three of almost everything that 
a normal camera needs one of is pretty much inescapable.  I cannot imagine 
a 3-strip Technicolor Steadicam being possible, for instance.  So, one 
could almost certainly not use this process for the shots in "The Last 
of the Mohicans" where the camera races through the forest with Hawkeye.  
Since one wouldn't want to have the look of the film suddenly change in 
those sequences, if you'd shot the film in 3-strip Technicolor, you 
probably would have had to shoot those scenes differently.  This points
out something that we often forget - the technical limitations of certain
machines and methods place limits on the ability of writers, directors,
and cinematographers to realize their visions.

Technicolor did have some major advantages, beyond its look.  It lasts
much better than the color films used in the fifties, for instance.  If
you've ever seen a print of a film from the fifties or sixties that looks
like it was made in pink-and-white you are seeing the result of color
fading.  The dyes used in the process fade unevenly, with the red dye
lasting longer than the others.  The dyes used in Technicolor last much
longer, so a Technicolor print struck in 1939 still looks brilliant and
beautiful today.  (Assuming it isn't full of splices, scratches, and the
like.)  A few years back, I saw a special showing of David O. Selznick's
own print of "Gone With the Wind", and it was stunningly beautiful.

Also, assuming one saves the original three black-and-white negatives, 
and assuming they don't fall apart, one can always restore the color to 
its original state by going back to them and redoing the entire process.  
(That's in principle, I believe, as I think there are no longer any 
facilities in the U.S. capable of making a Technicolor print from the
negatives.)  So Technicolor is superior for film preservation purposes.
On the other hand, saving three black-and-white negatives takes up as
much room in your temperature and moisture controlled archive vault as 
storing one color negative.

--
		Peter Reiher
		reiher@wells.cs.ucla.edu