War of the Worlds — Page 4

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Originally posted by: ricarleite

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Originally posted by: Mavimao

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Older films shot in Cinemascope had some weird distortion issues which is why there are very little close ups in these films. It got better with Panavision but you still notice some weird issues, especially at the edges of frames.

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The best example of this is the home releases of "Its a mad mad mad mad world", it's very distorted at the edges.

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Except IAMMMMW isn't scope; it's Ultra Panavision, a 70mm anamorphic format "adapted" for Cinerama, with a native aspect ratio of 2.76:1, although it was never shown this wide (usually matted to 2.5:1).
The weird distortion issues relating early CinemaScope came from the lenses using an anamorphosis system that altered the shape of the lens itself, resulting in what were known as CinemaScope "mumps" in the middle of the screen; this is why close ups in the centre of the screen were generally avoided. Later CS lenses used a prismatic system to "squeeze" the image, so mumps were not an issue.