“Almost like a real web site”
 

IN7OMM.COM
Search | Contact
News | e-News
Rumour Mill | Stories
Foreign Language
Auf Deutsch

WHAT'S ON IN 7OMM?

7OMM FESTIVAL
Karlsruhe | Gentofte
Krnov | Varnsdorf
Banská Bystrica
Oslo | Bradford

TODD-AO PROCESS
Films | Premiere
People | Equipment
Library | Cinemas
Distortion Correcting
DP70 / AAII Projector
 

VISION, SCOPE & RAMA
1926 Natural Vision
1929 Grandeur
1930 Magnifilm
1930 Realife
1930 Vitascope
1952 Cinerama
1953 CinemaScope
1953 Panavison
1954 VistaVision
1955 Todd-AO
1955 Circle Vision 360
1956 CinemaScope 55
1957 Ultra Panavision 70
1958 Cinemiracle
1958 Kinopanorama
1959 Super Panavision 70
1959 Super Technirama 70
1960 Smell-O-Vision
1961 Sovscope 70
1962
Cinerama 360
1962 MCS-70
1963 70mm Blow Up
1963 Circarama
1963 Circlorama
1966 Dimension 150
1966
Stereo-70
1967 DEFA 70
1967 Pik-A-Movie
1970 IMAX / Omnimax
1974 Cinema 180
1974 SENSURROUND
1976 Dolby Stereo
1984 Showscan
1984 Swissorama
1986 iWERKS
1989 ARRI 765
1990 CDS
1994 DTS / Datasat
2001 Super Dimension 70
2018 Magellan 65

Various Large format | 70mm to 3-strip | 3-strip to 70mm | Specialty Large Format | Special Effects in 65mm | ARC-120 | Early Large Format
7OMM Premiere in Chronological Order

7OMM ON EARTH

Australia | Brazil | Canada | China | Denmark | England | France | Germany | Holland | India | Iran | Israel | Ireland | Mexico | Norway | Poland |  Russia | Spain | Sweden | Turkey | USA |

LIBRARY
7OMM Projectors
People | Eulogy
65mm/70mm Workshop
The 7OMM Newsletter
Back issue | PDF
Academy of the WSW

7OMM NEWS
• 2026 | 2025 | 2024
2023 | 2022 | 2021
2020 | 2019 | 2018
2017 | 2016 | 2015
2014 | 2013 | 2012
2011 | 2010 | 2009
2008 | 2007 | 2006
2005 | 2004 | 2003
2002 | 2001 | 2000
1999 | 1998 | 1997
1996 | 1995 | 1994
 

in70mm.com Mission:
• To record the history of the large format movies and the 70mm cinemas as remembered by the people who worked with the films. Both during making and during running the films in projection rooms and as the audience, looking at the curved screen.
in70mm.com, a unique internet based magazine, with articles about 70mm cinemas, 70mm people, 70mm films, 70mm sound, 70mm film credits, 70mm history and 70mm technology. Readers and fans of 70mm are always welcome to contribute.

Disclaimer | Updates
Support us | Staff
Testimonials
Table of Content
 

 
 
Extracts and longer parts of in70mm.com may be reprinted with the written permission from the editor.
Copyright © 1800 - 2070. All rights reserved.

Visit biografmuseet.dk about Danish cinemas

 

Todd-AO
The Story of a new system of Photography and projection and how it was developed for industry-wide application

Read more at
in70mm.com
The 70mm Newsletter
Written by: Henry S. Woodbridge, President American Optical Company, President of Todd-AO Corporation. Showmen’s Trade Review, October 15, 1955 Date: 01.07.2008
TODD-AO, a wide-angle deep-screen motion picture process, is the new name in the industry and it brings new sight and new sound experiences to movie-goers. It has been designed and developed to be an industry-wide system. Pictures in this process are photographed in the usual way on either large (65/70mm) film or standard film (35mm) as preferred and projected in the usual way from a theatre's regular booth.

The outstanding feature of the many that distinguish TODD-AO's new sight and new sound is the sense of participation - the feeling of emotional and physical participation that audiences feel because TODD-AO enables them to be part of what they see and hear. You react to emotional scenes as if the actors were actually there in the theatre and you are part of the action that takes place, reacting physically as if you were part of that action in fact. This reality is achieved by the unique design of the camera lenses, projector lenses and the deep curve of the screen; all designed to fit one with the other with the precision of a scientific instrument. By means of a special printing process the distortions caused by high angle projection onto deeply curved screens from the regular booths of theatres are magically eliminated. This has never been done before and it is what makes regular projection on a deep screen possible-and the deep-screen is necessary to create reality.

TODD-AO is a system for every theatre, large or small. Do not fail when you go to see “Oklahoma!” in the Rivoli to walk to every corner and part of the theatre so that you may see for yourself that it is a system; for every seat, something that is not true of any other method of projecting moving pictures, including standard film projection. It has taken courage, initiative, and the wonderful American spirit of willingness-to-dare, to take a risk, to bring “Oklahoma!” in TODD-AO to the Rivoli. The story of this achievement is dramatic in its own right. First, Mike Todd went to Dr. Brian O'Brien, then at the University of Rochester, and asked him if he could create a wide-angle, deep-screen motion picture process using one camera and one projector. When Dr. O'Brien who shortly thereafter became Vice-President in charge of Research for American Optical Company, said "yes," Mike Todd went to Joe Schenck, and George Skouras, who joined with him to form Magna Theatre Corporation, the Company that raised the money to produce “Oklahoma!”, and together with American Optical Company financed the development of the system. The two Companies, in turn, formed The TODD-AO Corporation to license producers to make TODD-AO pictures and supply equipment for that purpose and also to sell TODD-AO theatre equipment to exhibitors. Dr. Brian O'Brien started work early in 1953 and has had upwards of one hundred scientists and engineers working with him in the development of the various phases of the system. Dr. Hopkins of the Institute of Optics at the University of Rochester, in particular, worked with him on the famous 128° "Bug-Eye" lens. The Institute was preeminent in the field of wide-angle lenses, having developed the Gunnery training wideangle lens used by the U.S. Navy.
 
More in 70mm reading:

Todd-AO
The Todd-AO Projector

Showmen’s Trade Review, October 15, 1955:
Oklahoma! in Todd-AO
Todd-AO
Magna Theatres
Todd-AO Corporation
Philips Collaborated On Projector Design
Todd-AO Projection and Sound
Six track recording equipment
All-Purpose Sound Reproduction
Rodgers & Hammerstein II
Six track recording equipment

 
From the outset, George Skouras insisted that the concept of this new motion picture system be broadened to make it industry wide - a system for any theatre and for every seat in any theatre with the worst seat as good as the best. The concept has been achieved almost 100%! To accomplish this, Dr. O'Brien developed the special printing process that eliminates distortions and makes possible projection from any theatre's regular booth.

Not long after the development work started, Arthur Hornblow, Jr., joined Magna and through his efforts Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein became interested in making “Oklahoma!” in TODD-AO.

The first tests of this new system made by Mike Todd and Skippy Sanford, our photographic Director, were shown at the Regent Theatre in Buffalo in June 1953 and successfully proved that the system gives audiences a sense of physical participation. Further tests were then undertaken under the direction of Fred Zinnemann, the Oscar winning director, to find out whether or not a story could be successfully told in this new system. The tests were shown in Buffalo on August 14, 1953. In the words of Fred Zinnemann, they demonstrated that for the first time in the history of moving pictures, audiences have the same feeling in viewing a moving picture that they have in seeing a play in a legitimate theatre.

The proof of the success of these tests came when Rodgers and Hammerstein signed to produce “Oklahoma!” in TODD-AO. To increase the sense of reality, an entirely new sound system was developed under the leadership of Fred Hynes, our sound director, in cooperation with Westrex and Ampex. It is a six channel system based on the principle of Sound-Saturation of which Sam Goldwyn said after hearing some “Oklahoma!” songs for the first time "This is better than music", a remark far more accurate than amusing because TODD-AO Sound is more true when reaching the ear than any sound theretofore heard whether in a theatre or a building especially built for music.
 
 
To bring this new System to the moving picture theatres, American Optical Company has developed for TODD-AO projection lenses and, with Philips of Holland, a universal projector that projects 35mm and 70mm film in all the standard versions and can handle any of the sound systems that are in use. It is important to note that TODD-AO is compatible with any sound system so that any theatre putting in TODD-AO equipment can use its present sound installation. Screens, frames and accessory equipment are all available for immediate delivery. Our theatre equipment division is headed by L. Douglas Netter, Jr., known to the leading exhibitors from coast-to-coast.

We in TODD-AO are prepared to serve the industry with an industry system. "The proof of the pudding lies in the eating". The proof of this new industry" wide system, TODD-AO, lies in seeing and hearing it at the Rivoli Theatre in New York where “Oklahoma!” opened on October 10th to be followed by subsequent openings in Los Angeles, Chicago, Detroit, St. Louis this year and forty or more cities in 1956. Already Michael Todd's "Around The World in Eighty Days" is in production and "South Pacific" is planned for production next spring. With TODD-AO, we are on the threshold of a new age in entertainment!
 
 
 
Go: back - top - back issues - news index
Updated 28-07-24