Academy Ratio - History

History

Silent films were shot at a 1.33 aspect ratio (also known as a 4:3 aspect ratio), with each frame using all of the negative space between the two rows of film perforations for a length of 4 perfs. The frame line between the silent film frames was very thin. When sound-on-film was introduced in the late 1920s, the soundtrack was recorded in a stripe running just inside of one set of the perforations and cut into the 1.33 image. This made the image area "taller", usually around 1.19, which was slightly disorienting to audiences used to the 1.33 frame and also presented problems for exhibitors with fixed-size screens and stationary projectors.

From studio to studio, the common attempt to reduce the image back to a 1.33:1 ratio by decreasing the projector aperture in-house met with conflicting results. Each movie theater chain, furthermore, had their own designated house ratio. The first standards set for the new sound-on-film motion pictures were accepted in November, 1929, when all major US studios agreed to compose for the Society of Motion Picture Engineers' (SMPE) designated size of 0.800 in × 0.600 in (20.3 mm × 15.2 mm) returning to the aspect ratio of 1.33:1.

Following this, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) considered further alterations to this 1930 standard. Various dimensions were submitted, and the projector aperture plate opening size of 0.825 in × 0.600 in was agreed upon. The resulting 1.375:1 aspect ratio was then dubbed the "Academy Ratio". On May 9, 1932, the SMPE adopted the same 0.825 in × 0.600 in (21.0 mm × 15.2 mm) projector aperture standard.

All studio films shot in 35mm from 1932 to 1952 were shot in the Academy ratio. However, following the widescreen "revolution" of 1953, it quickly became an obsolete production format. Within several months, all major studios started matting their non-anamorphic films in the projector to wider ratios such as 1.66, 1.75, and 1.85, the last of which is still considered a standard ratio along with anamorphic (2.39). 1.37:1 is not totally obsolete, nonetheless, and can still be found in selected recent films such as Michel Hazanavicius's The Artist, Gus Van Sant's Elephant, Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut, Andrea Arnold's Fish Tank, or Kelly Reichardt's Meek's Cutoff.