American Cinematographer - December 2015 - 42

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Wide Wide West

An Alpha 18K
bounces off a
bleached-muslincovered frame
as John and
Daisy enter
Minnie's
Haberdashery.

with these lenses," he adds. "There was
no purpose putting anything in front of
them other than NDs or 81 EFs for
exterior work."
The production carried a wide
range of focal lengths, "with our widest
lens being 35mm," Tavenner states.
"We did some close-ups on a 50mm
that were just glorious, and some on a
200mm that were equally so. I'd say we
had a good range between 40mm and
135mm, with 50mm, 75mm and
100mm serving as our workhorse focal
lengths."
As the only remaining laboratory
in the world capable of processing
65mm/70mm film, FotoKem was
uniquely situated to take charge of
processing the production's 65mm
42

December 2015

negative, printing 70mm-film dailies,
and conducting the final photochemical color-timing work.
The company used its 65mm
Millennium telecine and a custom color
pipeline, which incorporated their
proprietary nextLab and Cineviewer
systems, to provide digital dailies to
editorial that emulated 70mm print
film. Those digital dailies also served as
a location-reference-matching tool for
Richardson while he worked onstage in
Los Angeles.
"In terms of shooting 65mm, we
had the infrastructure," explains
Andrew Oran, vice president of operations for FotoKem's large-format division. "For shooting 65mm on a large
scale and coming up with a pipeline to
American Cinematographer

emulate film [for the DCP version], we
needed some refinement to make sure
that it was perfect. We had worked in
Ultra Panavision 70 twice before,
because we created new HD masters for
Khartoum and It's a Mad, Mad, Mad,
Mad World. So we knew the format, and
we'd done 70mm prints on those titles
as well. But we obviously hadn't done an
Ultra Panavision show from scratch.
"The 2.76:1 aspect ratio was not
a challenge for us," Oran continues.
"With the right lens, it does it itself on
the projector, and the same tools we
have in digital to produce dailies that
unsqueeze a 'Scope image work to
unsqueeze an Ultra Panavision image."
Kodak, meanwhile, provided
reams of four different Kodak Vision3
65mm stocks: 500T 5219, 250D 5207,
200T 5213 and 50D 5203. The
company made the 5219 in longer
2,000' and 1,800' rolls, as compared to
the standard 1,000' rolls, so that
Tarantino could film long-running
dialogue scenes. That in turn necessitated Panavision's creation of three
customized 2,000' 65mm magazines.
The 1,800' rolls were ultimately deemed
the most efficient, and were the
preferred option for the production.
Since producing this special order,
Kodak has added the longer rolls to its
standard offerings.
Panavision provided special oversized matte boxes and sunshades
designed to accommodate the extrawide format. The company also collaborated with Schneider Optics to design
and produce 100 Ultra Panavision
projection lenses - which would ultimately be needed for the roadshow
theaters across the country - in addition to a specially designed print lens for
the eventual film-print master.
"None of it could have been done
without these great partners," McIntosh
relates. "We were doing 70mm, but
didn't have a giant, luxurious wallet, and
yet they were good about [tackling the
projects] that allowed us to apply
Quentin's vision. Panavision didn't just
do rentals - they took equipment out
of deep storage and brought it back to

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - December 2015