Cinemascope

System using anamorphic lens to project an image of aspect ratio 2.35:1.

Cinemascope was 20th Century Fox’s answer to Cinerama and debuted on September 16, 1953 with The Robe.

The anamorphic principle is as follows: a cylindrical lens over a normal spherical lens squeezes a 2X horizontal picture onto a standard 35mm frame.

When projecting through a complimentary lens, this produces a wide picture ratio of 2.55 to 1. with 4-track magnetic sound, or 2.35 to 1 with optical sound (the original CinemaScope used a ratio of 2.66 to 1).