r/Damnthatsinteresting Jul 16 '26

Video The Odyssey IMAX 70mm Setup

30.2k Upvotes

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6.5k

u/SoftLink5162 Jul 16 '26

If they want us to watch Imax so badly make more Imax theatres man. We don't have single true Imax in my country. And that's true for most countries.

2.2k

u/Hey_Neat Jul 16 '26

The problem is they don't make 70mm Projectors anymore. all the ones in use have been refurbished/Frankenstein'd from old projectors.

727

u/SoftLink5162 Jul 16 '26

Why can't they make new ones?

56

u/Ramental Jul 16 '26

Because filming on these cameras sucked. They were noisy and require shitloads of tape. Now they are not as noisy. But you see that the roll weights 400 kg, too.

Nolan is one of the few who can pull such a demand for equipment, but the theaters are not going to order expensive equipment for 1 movie every several years at best.

6

u/remissile Jul 16 '26

But projectors and cameras aren't especially linked. Movies can be shot on IMAX cameras and only released digital, or filmed on digital/70mm/VistaVision (and so on) and be released on 70mm IMAX. The main reason is the costs.

12

u/Ramental Jul 16 '26

Of course you can film digital and show in cinemas on 70mm, but you will not get any of the supposed quality. Similarly with filming on 35mm, the improvement is there, but not as much to make it worth.

70mm projectors only make sense if the movie was filmed on 70mm originally.

1

u/remissile Jul 16 '26

Of course.

1

u/Refute1650 Jul 17 '26

Movies can be shot on IMAX cameras and only released digital,

Correct

or filmed on digital/70mm/VistaVision (and so on) and be released on 70mm IMAX.

Incorrect

1

u/remissile Jul 17 '26

One Battle After Another had an IMAX 70mm release.

2

u/YnwaMquc2k19 Jul 16 '26

IMAX did commission a next generation of film cameras with modern features per feedbacks from the likes of Nolan and Jordan Peele.

1

u/CapitalScarcity5573 Jul 17 '26

they can't make a digital one with same lens?

2

u/Ramental Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26

They do. Alexa 65 is just one such example. It is already specialized for wide aspect ratio of over 2:1, but with anamorphic lens you can squeeze to get the same 2.76:1 or similar

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arri_Alexa

AFAIK Dune and Project Hail Mary were filmed with that camera.

1

u/CapitalScarcity5573 Jul 17 '26

thanks, Dune had some ncie cinematography