Just as a little bit of ‘background’, ‘Arthouse’, ‘Anamorphics’ came into existence as special lenses perfected by a Dr Henri Chretein, of France many years ago. These lenses were ‘cylindrical’, in that they were ground with a curvature in one direction, only. That had the effect of compressing the (usually), horizontal aspect of the images, leaving the vertical aspect unaffected. Projection of the compressed images, back through the originating (or a similar) lens, had the effect of decompression, back to the original wider-than-standardformat again. ‘Anamorphic’ processes are now able to be carried out by means of camcorder software, when the camcorder is so set, so that the ‘squishing’ action becomes automatic. I have used little else as a format, since the early 1970’s, when I shot a 20-minute film feature dealing with the 1976 International Vintage Car Rally, which took place right here in New Zealand. The format, as I recall, was ‘Vista-vision’. I never had quite the same success with ‘Cinemascope’.
It is my understanding, that video may be shot perfectly well using an anamorphic lens, but it is hardly worth anyone’s trouble with the facility now built-into any reputable camcorder and available on-demand. During the 30 or more, years that I spent waiting for the rest of the world to ‘catch-up’, as it now has done,’Widescreen’ made me something of a social outcast. The Dunedin-based club, from which I have recently resigned, used a wall-projected image, but the mere button-press it took to change the projector to 16:9, was generally ‘too-much-trouble’ for the projectionist, and he wasn’t backward in making that known. Over several years of trying to have stuff ‘seen’, on only one occasion, was it ever shownin the correct aspect-ratio. Generally it was projected as a severely contracted 4:3 on a like-it-or-lump-it basis. When I pointed out the anomaly, the projectionist, pointedly re-commenced from the spot he had broken-off. I was the only club-member who was subjected to that treatment, as all stuff in 4:3 was re-commenced from the beginning. In the end, I voted-with-my-feet’.
Funny thing is, that, at present I have some news for them………and, it’s ‘all bad’. Revenge is sweet.
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