User:Tranquitas/Multi-image

Multi-image is the now largely obsolete practice and business of using 35mm slides projected by single or multiple projectors onto one or more screens in synchronization with an audio voice-over or music track. Multi-image productions are also known as multi-image slide presentations, slides shows and diaporamas and are a specific form of multimedia or audio-visual production.

Soft-edge masking and overlap for projected panoramas.

One of the hallmarks of multi-image was the use of the wide screen panorama. Precisely overlapping slides were placed in slide mounts with soft-edge density masks; when the resulting images were projected, the images would blend seamlessly on the screen to create the panorama. By cutting and dissolving between images in the projectors, animation effects were created in panorama format.

The term multi-image is sometimes used to describe digital photo image computer programs that combine or change images on-screen, for photo montages, and image stitching.

Description

Multi-Image presentations were a unique form of communication to audiences of various sizes, to meet a variety of communication and entertainment needs. The use of projected photographic images such as lantern slides for entertainment and instruction has a long history, dating back to the early 1800s. Others, such as L. Frank Baum had a traveling show (1908) that included slides, film, and actors describing the land of Oz. Throughout the years improvements in technology took place and applications for multi-image continued to expand. During the 1960s, automated synchronized audio and slides modules became more common and found use in instructional environments and large churches.

In general, multi-image can be defined as being:

• Based largely on analog production tools and technologies including art and audio production and film-based photography. 35mm slide film has high resolution and color range and are based on grain and dye-clouds rather than on a fixed raster pattern, which when projected often is preceived as being more realistic, uniform, and detailed than digital images.
• Multi-disciplinary in terms of the types of skills required to create and stage multi-image presentations.
• Venue driven; multi-image presentations had specific requirements for the equipment and spaces they were designed for and presented in.

Multi-Image Business

Multi-image as a business thrived during the 1970 and 1980’s. Multi-image presentations ranged from single projector shows run by an audio cassette, such as in a Caramate projector-viewer[1] to large events for business meetings and conventions where multiple shows would be presented and often were rear-projected by 24 or more projectors.

Creating and presenting multi-image productions involved a relatively large number of specialized skills, equipment, and facilities to produce. During the height of multi-image, a number of types of businesses were directly engaged in the industry which employed thousands of specialists that ranged from producers and designers, writers, artists, typesetters, photographers, photo lab technicians, audio technicians, programmers, staging specialists as well as others associated with these disciplines.

The logo of the Association for Multi-Image, later the Association for Multi-Image International.

Association for Multi-Image International logo.

A professional organization, The Association for Multi-image International (AMI) was created and had numerous active chapters around the world. The AMI held an annual convention and multi-image competition. Other organizations such as the National Audiovisual Association (NAVA) which held the COMMTEX International trade show and publications such as the Audio Visual Communication Review strongly supported the multi-image industry.

Multi-image presentations were produced through a wide range of companies, including:

• Companies that specifically were established as multi-image production companies and could offer full services to clients. Most of these companies have either closed or changed their business model to focus on marketing or event planning, video, or computer based presentations.
• Companies that offered multi-image as a portion of their overall work, such as ad agencies, marketing, and creative services companies.
• Companies who specialized in one or more of the general disciplines used in the production of multi-image and offered multi-image as a service, such as photographers and photo labs.
• Individual contractors who served as producers, directors, designers or provided other talent needed to create multi-image presentations.

Many large corporations had within their company multi-image production divisions or production units set up to produce multi-image slides and productions for use by those companies. Educational institutions also made extensive use of multi-image and employed multi-image specialists within their institutions.

An entire industry grew around supplying the tools and equipment needed to supply and support multi-image production.

• Corporations who manufactured and sold basic equipment and materials used in the production of multi-image, such as 35mm slide projectors, film, slide mounts, soft-edge density masks and other items. The list of suppliers for the multi-image industry was extensive with a number of companies attaining international importance for the products they produced.
• Manufacturers of highly specialized multi-image equipment such as optical slide cameras and slide projector programming hardware. Precise camera systems were developed for the multi-image market featuring pin-registered film movements capable of making multiple exposures, controlled back-lit color light sources, motorized multi-axis compounds for precise positioning of artwork, and long-roll film loads. Slide projector programming computers and dissolve equipment and software was developed to synchronize the slides with the audio by providing precise time control over slide tray positioning and lamp fade rates needed to create multi-image animation.
• Other major types of hardware, materials and services were used in multi-image production such as photo typesetting machines, film processors, slide projector stands, shipping cases, projection screens, audio production and playback equipment, and staging scaffolds and lighting rigs.

Multi-Image presentations were largely venue driven and requiring sufficient space for projection and control over the environmental lighting in the projection and viewing space. Numerous companies provided staging equipment and staff to run the presentations. Hotels, convention centers, and other venues created space specifically set up to meet the requirements of the presentations and the audience experience. Schools and businesses frequently maintained multi-image services within their institutions which were staffed with AV specialists. Smaller presentations such as single projector slide synchronized shows often were duplicated for wider distribution. Many photo processing labs specialized in creating duplicate slide sets.

Since most large productions were shown a limited number of times, in order to archive and distribute a presentation and to show the production to potential clients, video transfers often was made, requiring specialized equipment. Several companies developed around providing transfer services to multi-image producers.

The multi-image industry as a whole was dramatically changed by personal computing. Driven by changes in technology and by economic considerations, multi-image has almost entirely replaced by video presentations and by readily available computer based technologies such as using laptop computers running PowerPoint and projecting through digital projectors. Visual presentation and photo and graphics editing software programs have allowed a wider range of communicators quick, flexible, and easy access to the tools and technologies needed to create presentations. Digital photography has reduced the need for laboratory services and complex equipment. The expansion and ease of use of desktop computing quickly brought a close to the multi-image industry.

Multi-Image Production Technologies

Typical workflow for multi-image production.

Typical multi-image workflow

The art and business of multi-image drew from many older existing technologies. When a multi-image project was initiated, various overall management roles were required to provide direction, planning, and project management. These roles generally involved the activities similar to those found in other media industries, such as creative, visual, and technical directors, producers, production managers, and writers.

Often individuals with the various production skills would fill these roles as well as performing their production roles. Multi-image productions in general were deadline driven and it was common that the production process would be non-linear, allowing for multiple activities to take place with overlapping roles.

Art and Design

The visual quality of a presentation was based on using photographs or artwork created for use in the presentation as source material. 35mm slides could be used directly as they were originally taken. Often the original photographs were masked or duplicated for positioning and sizing. In some instances, 35mm cameras modified for pin-registertion were used to create animated sequences.

Through the use of multiple projectors set up to project onto a screen area, over-projected images could be designed as animations. Typical multi-image animation effects included fading from one photograph or graphic to another, progressively building text to form a completed statement, inserting images or graphics into frames or windows on screen, step by step movement of images across the screen area, and superimposing text or images onto a background. The visual effects were synchronized to music or voice and based on the capabilities and limitations of the slide projectors and dissolve units.

Artwork produced for multi-image presentations in general was based on one of two forms of top-lit reflective copy artwork: 1.) materials that were produced and copied as flat art directly to slides to be used in the production or 2.) color or image separated and layered photomechanical art that would be copied to high-contrast masks which were then used to create slides. This second process was called optical slide printing and was based on many of the basic principles from photomechanical prepress art used in offset printing, silk-screen printing, and cel animation.

Flat art was created by using a variety of standard graphic illustration techniques, using pen and ink, airbrush, paints, from clip art, colored paper, transfer lettering such as Letraset, and by copying from existing materials on a copy stand or on optical slide camera. Cel art, such as found in cel animation was also used.

Art used in optical slide printing was based on the use of high-contrast photomechanical materials such as PMTs[2], black and white type, rubylith and other materials. Phototypesetting was done by a variety of means including the Visual Graphics Corporation PhotoTypositor[3] and the Compugraphic EditWriter[4] at companies that specialized in providing typography. When making artwork for multi-image presentations, photographs, transparencies, and film images or continuous tone film or airbrushed masks could also be used as part of the camera-ready artwork.

The color or image separated layers of artwork were pin-registered using a variety of standard pin systems including 1/4 inch, Oxberry, and Acme. The artwork was created on a light table or animation disc to provide back lighting.

Often the art was created based on a grid system. A copy of the optical slide camera grid or reticle was used to align the artwork elements. The use of the grid for alignment could be used to accurately position images and art elements throughout the process from the creation of the artwork to the final projected images. This process also allowed layers of the artwork to be interchangeable from slide to slide, images or graphic elements could be carefully placed on the screen relative to other images, and for combining parts of images or graphics by separate slides as in an animated sequence.

Audio Production

The audio track of a multi-image show provided a framework for the timing of the presentation and for the sequencing and animations of the slides. These were produced generally on 1/4 inch audio tape on multi-track tape recorders such as models by TEAC which allowed for having two tracks or channels for stereo sound and one for the synchronization or clicktrack which was used to encode and playback the signals for the dissolve units. The audio and synchronization tracks were normally separated by a blank track to prevent any carryover of the synchronization cues into the audio playback. Audio editing of the music or voice-over was done manually to create a scratch track, usually with a cutting block and tape. Once the audio edits were completed, the final version would be copied onto another tape, either to 1/4 inch, cassette or other format so that there tape used to run the presentation would be a fresh uncut tape.

Printing with Light

Completed artwork was copied under top lights on a pin-registered camera on a high contrast film such as Kodaline or Kodalith to create 35mm mattes used in the optical slide printing process. When needed, pin-registered positive mattes known as countermattes were made by contact printing from the mattes. When a set of mattes and countermates were completed, the optical slide camera was used to assemble the separate images onto a single frame of film by making multiple exposures through the mattes. Accuracy in positioning the separate elements of the slide is made possible by the film sprockets, which were also used to position the finished color slides and masks in the slide mounts.

Maron 1600 camera table, large format 12-field compound, and colorhead.

Copy camaras and optical slide cameras usually had motorized movement of the camera on the column toward and away from the table to allow for resizing the image on the camera on the Z-axis. Fully finctional optical slide cameras had compounds for positioning both artwork and the mattes relative to the lens and camera head. A compound will have left to right (horizontal) X-axis and top to bottom (vertical) Y-axis movement capabilities as well as rotation (theta-axis). Compounds were often motorized with micro-stepping motors to allow for smooth programmable and repeatable positioning. Higher end optical slide cameras had the ability to create and save programs. Light sources for copying artwerk generally were quartz halogen lights. Backlighting was generally provided by the use a darkroom photographic enlarger colorhead modified for use with the camera. This form of controlled light provide colored light balanced for the color sensitivity of the film used and provided color light for the separate exposures that are made through the mattes.

The optical slide camera could be used to create a number of types of slides and special effects commonly used in multi-image presentations:

• Duplicates: copies of transparencies
• Copy slides: slides made by top-light copying of artwork or illustrations
• Title burns: made by making multiple exposures through a series of mattes, such as text slides
• Color on color slides: Similar to burn slides but with a color background, often requiring countermattes
• Step and repeat: Using a compound, making a series of exposures where the compound of the camera is moved slightly between each exposure
• Movements: long exposures made from a backlit matte, the shutter is open while the compound and the camera move the matte creating a streaking effect
• Glow effects: using a light diffusing material while exposing the backlight through a matte to create soft edges around the image on the matte
• Filter effects: using color, star and other types of camera filters for special effects
• Image effects: by either manipulating the mattes and countermattes of by positioning transparencies while duplicating them, posterizations, inserts, split frames, and panoramas can be created
• Camera effects: Some optical slide cameras have the capabilities for in-camera mattes, bi-packing, and rotoscoping

Typical multi-color burn slide Burn Slide

Typical step and repeat slide Step and repeat Slide

Typical movement or zoom slide Movement Slide

Typical glow slide, with multiple glows Glow Slide

Slides created by these methods and combinations of these methods were made to align and animate when projected, creating what was considered the visual multi-image experience.

Film Processing

Film processing requires specific facilities, equipment, and skill needed to maintain consistent results. Film processors for developing transparency film require maintaining processing control which was based on good practices in chemical mixing and storage, accurate time, temperature and agitation during the process and the use of control strips. Control strips were run with the film and read on a densitometer to determine their variation from a standard so that corrections could be made

Computer Graphics

The use of computer graphics replaced much of the manual activity in creating the artwork and converting the art into slides. Service bureaus offering production work from large workstations such as Dicomed and Genigraphics[5] dominated larger markets. Smaller producers using desktop software such as Photoshop, Persuasion, Harvard Graphics and PowerPoint allowed many slide producers to quickly create slides which were imaged on film recorders such as Management Graphics, Lasergraphics[6], Poloroid, Celco[7], and CCG[8]).

Assembly and Programming

Light tables with racks for slides were used for viewing and editing slides before putting hte slides in the trays.

Light table with multi-image slides. Copyright: Images, Images, Images, Michael F. Kinny and Raymond Schmitt, Eastman Kodak Company, 1983, page 38

Completed slides were mounted into pin-registered slide mounts. Up to three pieces of film could be mounted into a slide mount which allowed slides to contain the image film chip and masks to allow for inserting and over-projecting. Slides were edited and arranged for programming on light tables.

Programming of multi-projector multi-image shows was generally done on one of several systems such as Arion, Audio-Visual Laboratories (AVL), Clearlight[9], Dataton[10], and Multivision. Slides were placed in projector trays, projectors were set up on a "grid" so that a rough alignment was made of the projectors onto the screen area. The programming itself was done on a system that allowed for input by the programmer and dissolve units which were attached to the projectors and controlled the functions of the projectors based on the programming instructions. Programming could also be used to control room lights, rewind of the audio tape and resetting of the projectors, and to trigger other effects that might be used in the presentation such as a strobe light.

There were two basic slide projector programming controls: a set of instructions to position the slide in the projector and a set of instructions for the slide projector lamp. These controls would be used to define the cues. The cues would often designate an action for more than one projector such as with a dissolve between two slides which would require simultaneously fading up on one lamp and fading down another lamp.

Slide Tray	Multi-Image Programming Timing Based on Slide Positioning
Forward	Lift the current slide from the projector gate into the slide tray, rotate the tray one position and drop the next slide into the gate. During this process a shutter at the slide gate in the projector is used prevent projecting while the lamp remains lit. The average time to cycle from slide to slide varies from 0.9 to 1.5 seconds, depending on the projector.
No Movement	The slide projector would be instructed to make no tray move during a cue or series of cues.
Reverse	Lift the current slide from the projector gate into the slide tray, rotate the tray one position in reverse and drop the previous slide into the gate. During the cycle the shutter will close and open in the same manner as a forward movement.
Use of shutter	The slide projector shutter at the slide gate could be controlled to block light without controlling voltage to the lamp. The shutter cycle time varies from projector to projector, averaging at about 0.2 seconds to cycle from open to closed.

Projector Lamp	Multi-Image Programming Effects Based on Lamp Intensity
Lamp On and Off	The projector lamp can be instructed to turn on and off. When programmed one or more projectors, can be made to produce several basic effects including: Cut - Lamp is turned on or off quickly. When two projectors are involved, the lamp in one projector is turned off while the lamp in a second is turned, made to appear that these two actions are made at the same time. A cue based on a cut will usually also include a slide tray advance. Hard Cut - By first using the slide projector shutter, the transition between two projectors can be made faster than by controlling the lamp on and off. Soft Cut - Similar to a dissolve, but usually takes place in less than a second. Alternate - Similar to a cut but with no slide tray advance.
Lamp Fade	Fade - A timed, controlled operation where the projector lamp is either turned on or off over a set period of time, producing the effect of the slide image slowly appearing or disappearing on the screen. Dissolve - Two or more projectors cross fading. Freeze - During a fade process, the intensity or light output of the lamp in any projector can be stopped in time at a given light intensity for a given period of time. This capability can be used to produce complex multi-projector dissolves.
Wait	Add timing to a sequence during programming either to add padding to a programmed effect or as a temporary timing pad that will be resolved as the programming is completed.

Through synchronizing the audio and the visual effects and combining visual slide effects, the programming process could create a single continuous show that was saved to memory. Once the programming was completed, the most common way to preserve the programming information was to record the programming cues onto the audio track so that the show could be run synchronized with the audio playback.

On the Road

Room environment, room lighting, scaffolding and stands, drapes and lights, alignment, show-time, theatric special effects like pyrotechnics, breakaway screens, breakdown and optical transfers trucks driven through screens

Notiable Multi-Image Names

The following lists contain names of companies and individuals that may no longer be in the multi-image business or are now doing business under different names and ownership.

Companies specializing in Multi-Image

• Caribiner International
• DD&B Studios
• Donna Lawrence Productions
• Eyesongs[11][12]
• Image Stream (Los Angles, CA)
• Jack Morton Worldwide[13]
• Jam Handy Organization[14].
• Maritz[15]
• Media Loft
• Metavision [16]
• Mind's Eye (San Francisco)
• Multivision Productions[17]
• Odyssey Visual Design
• Photo-Synthesis
• The Image Exchange
• Watts Silverstein (Seattle, WA)

Multi-Image Hardware and Supplies

• Arion
• Audio-Visual Laboratories (AVL)
• Chief Manufacturing Inc.[18]
• Clearlight[19]
• Dataton[20]
• Dicomed[21]
• Double M Industries
• DSC Labs[22]
• Eastman Kodak (projectors)[23]
• Forox[24]
• Gepe[25]
• Hope
• Homrich
• Hostert[26]
• Image Marketing Corp[27]
• Kreonite[28]
• Marron Carrel (Maron)[29]
• Multivision
• Oxberry[30]
• Sickles (Mangum Sickles)
• Slidemagic (Maximillian Kerr Associates)
• Slide Transfer Service, Inc.
• Wess Plastics[31]
• Wing-Lynch

Notable Individuals in Multi-Image

• Andre Proulx[32]
• Bob Rowan
• Brien Lee[33]
• Christopher Korody[34]
• David Incencio
• Doug Mesney[35]
• Gar Benedick[36]
• Graham Emonson
• Jack Hollingsworth[37]
• Julien Biere[38]
• Keith Lanpher[39]
• Ken Burke[40]
• Marlyn Kulp
• Roger L. Gordon
• Ted Evans[41]
• Ted Iserman
• Todd Gipstein[42]
• Tony Korody[43]

External links

• Migration Productions