Widest Aspect Rationsin use TODAY realisticaly

[Lakis Amarantithis]

I started using anamorphics filming at 6k and I love the image. Aspect ratio: 2.91 image dimension: 9216 x 3160. I wish I had a 10k 82" led 2.91 tv...

What are the widest formats theaters can go today? And in 3D?

thanks

 

[David Mullen ASC]

DCI specs limit you to 2.40 for theatrical release, and most theater screens are either 2.40, 1.85 or in between, other than the classic 1.43 IMAX screens. This has meant that "The Hateful 8", which was a 2.76 : 1 aspect ratio due to the Ultra Panavision 70 format, had to be letterboxed to 2.76 within a 2.40 DCP, and when projected in 70mm, had black borders above and below.

 

[Lakis Amarantithis]

DCI specs limit you to 2.40 for theatrical release, and most theater screens are either 2.40, 1.85 or in between, other than the classic 1.43 IMAX screens. This has meant that "The Hateful 8", which was a 2.76 : 1 aspect ratio due to the Ultra Panavision 70 format, had to be letterboxed to 2.76 within a 2.40 DCP, and when projected in 70mm, had black borders above and below.

Thank you very much David for the reply and this information. So from what I understand everything goes as long as it looks nice and it's contained in a 2.40 DCP, is that the max or more extreme ratio you have seen in say the last 10 years in major movies?

Thank you!

 

[Marc Wielage]

I got the Iscorama 54 and 42 recently and paired them with all kinds of Nikon AIS, Leicas R's and some Canons Ls... and I get a 2.91 ratio as they are 1.5x, in 6k some look "sharp" even at a 9k image and paired with the proper diopters give an "ok" I think pic. I would love to do a movie with this aspect (2.91).. from your experience do you think it'll look good if I mix anamorphics with regular lenses that are cropped to fit the format?

There's a point in framing where I think picture height is more important than picture width. Bear in mind that every time you do a closeup in an extremely wide aspect ratio, you wind up with tons of empty space on either side of the person's face. I think there are not that many kinds of stories that need to be told in aspect ratios this wide; you should consider where and how most of your audience is going to see your project and then determine how best to frame it. If they're all going to be watching on TV and iPads and computer screens and all that stuff, a much wider frame is just going to subject them to larger letterboxed borders.

 

[Lakis Amarantithis]

There's a point in framing where I think picture height is more important than picture width. Bear in mind that every time you do a closeup in an extremely wide aspect ratio, you wind up with tons of empty space on either side of the person's face. I think there are not that many kinds of stories that need to be told in aspect ratios this wide; you should consider where and how most of your audience is going to see your project and then determine how best to frame it. If they're all going to be watching on TV and iPads and computer screens and all that stuff, a much wider frame is just going to subject them to larger letterboxed borders.

Hi Marc and thank you for the reply.
I respectfully disagree. I watched yesterday for nth time.... Once Upon A Time In The West [1968] Western, from Sergio Leone and I want you to look at the last shots of just the face of Charles Bronson and how that empty face is filled little by little with the full face of him and then just the eyes. In my opinion usually the top and bottom part (that is cut in the anamorphic ratio) is the unimportant one. If you look normally in every day life also same thing happens. Of course there is a point that wide is too wide but for me even the 2.91 that I am filming these days looks fantastic!
I care only for the big screen, I understand it's more money the other way and probably wiser.

 

[PatrickFaith]

I've watched a bit of barco escape, that's 5:1 but that's more of field of view rather then aspect ratio thing.

On the anamorphic front, if i'm primarily in a raw workflow I'll shoot at 1.5 sensor ratio and get a solid 3:1 aspect ratio when I view it in nuke. What I almost always do in raw is run it through a node to keep max high (so I go to a standard format dcp which is 4096x1716). I really like the 4096x1716 as my general standard wide format because I can do all sorts of things with it.

For prores workflow I think the 3:1 aspect ratio is problematic, so I go with quadhd on that most of the time, I'd say that ends up 1080p 99% of the time for me.

One problem I have on the 1.5 sensor ratio( which is 3:1 on the monitor) when shooting is I find it hard to pull focus because of the narrow view on the camera screen. If I'm pulling focus I'll almost always go 6:5.

My preferred sensor size though is 3 wide and 2 high, this works I think great for circular lenses and also gives a clean 3.0 for anamorphic. From a sensor viewpoint most of the anamorphic lenses are built for a 18+mm height, and I find red 15.8 mm a problem when I need to frame things horizontially for a wide shot(where I'm close in).

My preferred field of view is 180 degrees though, which to me means VR cinema. [ I btw find 360 somewhat claustrophobic ] When will VR cinema take off, who knows, but my bet is it will be common in 2017 and fully mainstream by 2020. So it's just starting to be economical to shoot for 180 & 360 degree field of view for distribution. The problem I have with 3:1 aspect ratio is it really needs to be projected on a spherical space rather then a plane, which I think will start to be common in late 2017 for headsets but I can't see physical theaters awaby from planer screens(cost of the old wrap around theaters is just too much). Again if your shooting 3:1 with a raw workflow, it's so easy to just flip that to a 2.4 workflow by cropping to the height. I like what the dolby cinema folks are doing, but I don't know when theater will support that at volume if ever.

For vfx workflow, I do most of that at 4096x2048 spherical format, but that's not a viewing format ... more of a VFX DI format.

 

[Lakis Amarantithis]

Hi Patrick, yes that escape looks amazing. I love technology and hope the VR will be as you say, maybe not so soon but some day for sure. The faster the better for me and if it's 3D then it'll be awesome.

Here are some tests I did today. Each one is 9093 x 3160 pixels and sharp, no CA at all.

 

[Marc Wielage]

I respectfully disagree. I watched yesterday for nth time.... Once Upon A Time In The West [1968] Western, from Sergio Leone and I want you to look at the last shots of just the face of Charles Bronson...

If your project is going to be in as many theaters as Sergio Leone's brilliant Westerns, more power to you. Westerns with wide vistas are among the few kinds of films I can think of that work very well in widescreen. Though I gotta say, I watched Hateful 8 and had to say it was kind of bizarre that 80% of the movie took place in a (large) wood cabin, yet was shot in 2.76 Ultra Panavision.

Virtual Reality brings up a whole new set of pros and cons, and I'm only talking about typical commercials, music videos, documentaries, scripted dramas, comedies, and so on. Special-venue shoots, theme park rides, video games... that's kind of a separate deal.

 

[Lakis Amarantithis]

If your project is going to be in as many theaters as Sergio Leone's brilliant Westerns, more power to you. Westerns with wide vistas are among the few kinds of films I can think of that work very well in widescreen. Though I gotta say, I watched Hateful 8 and had to say it was kind of bizarre that 80% of the movie took place in a (large) wood cabin, yet was shot in 2.76 Ultra Panavision.

Virtual Reality brings up a whole new set of pros and cons, and I'm only talking about typical commercials, music videos, documentaries, scripted dramas, comedies, and so on. Special-venue shoots, theme park rides, video games... that's kind of a separate deal.

I wish the masses were ready for VR but the masses move slow or extremely slow. As a result VR will not move and move to the next few levels as I wished it would because of mass funds. That's too bad because otherwise VR would have moved 20 times faster to the next steps etc. The 3D is by far not mastered, moreover VR. Too bad.

I watched Ghandi few days ago is a fantastic movie and the DP/Cinematographer knows how to frame for the wide aspect very good I think.

 

[Frank Glencairn]

Virtual Reality brings up a whole new set of pros and cons, and I'm only talking about typical commercials, music videos, documentaries, scripted dramas, comedies, and so on. Special-venue shoots, theme park rides, video games... that's kind of a separate deal.

So if you don't like the action, you can look elsewhere - not a bad idea, when I think of 90% of last years movies.

 

[Tristan Pemberton]

I started using anamorphics filming at 6k and I love the image. Aspect ratio: 2.91 image dimension: 9216 x 3160. I wish I had a 10k 82" led 2.91 tv...

What are the widest formats theaters can go today? And in 3D?

thanks

I recently produced some content for an event that was 7000 x 1200. Nearly 6:1 on a 20m (70') wide screen. It had a fantastic impact and the audience really felt immersed.

Of course this was not in a cinema/theatre. And it required four projectors blended together to reproduce that one huge image. Most of the digital content was motion graphics, but when footage was used it was upscaled (and cropped) from 4k which - when a little sharpening was added - looked pretty good. I would have loved to have shot the footage in 6k or even 8k just to see what it looked like as I don't get to see screens of that resolution/aspect ratio very often.

 

[David Mullen ASC]

Years ago, I was in Washington D.C. near the FBI Headquarters (recognizable because of "The X Files"!) and I saw a building with a banner that said "70MM INSIDE!!!" Being a film nerd, I had to check it out. It was the U.S. Navy Museum and they had a curved 3:1 screen showing a documentary on life aboard an aircraft carrier, made by MacGillivray Freeman. I suspected that I was just seeing 5-perf 70mm cropped from 2.20 : 1 to 3 : 1 for a pseudo Cinerama effect, and after the screening I got to talk to the projectionist who confirmed it.

Funny thing was that I have a friend who used to joke that Ernest Borgnine was in every movie, just that he was off-camera in half of them... just before the screening, where some WW2 vets from a particular aircraft carrier were attending, someone came out an announced that Ernest Borgnine (also a Navy vet) was in the audience.