The War of the Worlds

This was chosen as the featured CED for the science fiction
category partly because the Earth and Mars are presently in the
tail end of their nearest orbital proximity in 60,000 years. As
viewers of this movie (and readers of the H.G. Wells novel)
know, the Martians launched their attack on Earth when the
two planets were in such an opposition (it's called conjunction when the two
planets are on opposite sides of the sun). This season also marks the 50th
anniversary of this movie, which was a hit in movie theaters in the Fall of 1953.
"The War of the Worlds" is also the earliest color science fiction movie released on
CED. In fact, it is one of the first color sci-fi movies ever to come out, and that,
coupled with its great special effects courtesy of producer George Pal no doubt
contributed to its theatrical success. Like the Martians in the movie, Hollywood
seems to have a habit of doing things in threes, so War of the Worlds (Paramount)
was followed by two more special effect extravaganzas, This Island Earth
(Universal) in 1955, and Forbidden Planet (MGM) in 1956. After that, there was a
near drought in big-budget, sci-fi special effects until 2001: A Space Odyssey came
along in 1968. Then another void took place until 1977, when Star Wars re-
invigorated the blockbuster special effects that have continued unabated to the
present day.

Coupled with its special effects, this movie also creates a sense of realism by
combining solid science with effective use of quality archive footage. The sense of
accurate science is conveyed right at the start of the movie when Sir Cedric
Hardwicke begins his introductory narration with words similar to the first page
of the novel, followed by a tour of the solar system from the outer planets inward:

"No one would have believed in the middle of the twentieth century that human
affairs were being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's.
Yet, across the gulf of space on the planet Mars, intellects vast and cool and
unsympathetic regarded our Earth with envious eyes, slowly and surely drawing their
plans against us."

The planet Venus is conveniently left out of the solar system tour, as that was the
one planet whose surface conditions could only be speculated upon in the 1950's.
It's omission is interesting, as Venus is the only other planet besides Earth and
Mars that figures into Wells' book. The most effective use of archive footage is that
of the Flying Wing used to deliver the atomic bomb, although unbeknownst to the
public, that airplane ceased to exist a few years before this movie was made. The
Flying Wing's strong resemblance to the present-day B-2 bomber is the one
realistic aspect of this movie that seems to transcend its 1950's setting.

RCA historians will note that 1953 was also a big year for the corporation. RCA
introduced the hugely popular B&W 630TS TV right after World War II in 1946,
initiating the start of the television age, and by 1950 the company proposed a
backwards-compatible, all-electronic color system to the FCC. But in what many
viewed as a draconian move, the FCC selected a partly mechanical "whirling disc"
color system proposed by CBS that was not compatible with the existing B&W
receivers. RCA head David Sarnoff was not about to give up without a fight, and
using his considerable political clout, he forced a second NTSC (National
Television Standards Committee) to convene, and at the same time pressed
scientists and engineers at RCA Labs to improve the all-electronic RCA system.
Sarnoff made the cover of TIME Magazine during this period, and I've wondered
if the mention in this movie of scientist/hero Dr. Clayton Forrester (Gene Barry)
appearing on the cover of TIME was not an indirect homage to him. On December
17, 1953 the FCC announced final approval of the RCA system, prompting David
Sarnoff to truly jump for joy. Since the ratification of the color TV spec in 1953,
televisions have changed dramatically in their internal circuitry. At that time they
were based on vacuum tube technology and contained no transistors. With all the
progress that has been made in electronic technology, it's a testament to the
immutability of the NTSC specification that it is still the prevailing standard for
television transmission 50 years later.

The makers of "The War of the Worlds" took advantage of the press color TV was
getting in the early 1950's by incorporating the technology into the plot of the
movie. At that time the concept of RGB (red-green-blue) color was as high-tech as
something like Wi-Fi computing is today. In the movie, the Martians are using a
cool-looking RGB color camera to remotely look at things from the safety of their
ships, and the Martian eye itself is clearly based on the RGB concept. Although
RCA's first color TV, the CT-100 did not become available until April 1954, the
company did publish a book Practical Color Television in late 1953 going into
great detail on RGB color, and the concept was well covered in publications like
Popular Science. There were no doubt many viewers in those initial audiences
enthralled by the relevance of the Martian technology they were seeing. It will be
interesting to see if the remake of the movie presently under development will
bring it up to 21st century standards or revert to the 19th century technology of
the H.G. Wells book.

Images Related to the Movie and RGB Color

Martian Television
Camera
In a scene 11:07 into
Side 2 of the CED,
Sylvia Van Buren (Ann
Robinson) is startled by
the Martian RGB TV
camera extended from
their ship on a long
gooseneck. The optics of
the Martian camera are
plain to see, while human
TV cameras in 1953, like
the RCA model TK-40,
hid their complex optics
inside bulky casings.

RCA TK-40 Television

Camera
A diagram from the 1953
RCA book Practical
Color Television
showing how the optics
of the company's TK-40
three-tube color TV
camera work. The TK-40
is shown being operated
on the cover of the book.
In this diagram, light
enters the camera through
one of three objective
lenses mounted in a turret
on the outside of the
camera. Zoom optics
were poor in the 1950's,
so these three lenses
provided fixed focal
lengths corresponding to
wide-angle, normal, and
telephoto. The optics of
the camera initially send
the image to point E, a
blue reflecting dichroic
mirror. A dichroic mirror
has the property of
passing all light except
the color it is designed to
reflect. In the case at E,
the dichroic mirror passes
red and green light, but
reflects blue light. Blue
light is reflected to the
face of a front-surface
mirror J which re-reflects
the light, focusing it upon
the face of an image
orthicon camera tube
designed to operate from
only the blue light of the
televised scene. The red
and green light passes
through the blue dichroic
mirror to another dichroic
mirror D, in this case a
red reflecting dichroic
mirror. Green light
continues to pass through
this mirror and is focused
on the face of the green
camera tube. Red light is
reflected by the red
dichroic mirror and is re-
reflected by another
front-surface mirror J to
the face of the red camera
tube.
Live Martian
A live Martian shown
briefly 12:11 into Side 2
of the CED. As can be
seen, the biological eye
of the Martian is very
similar to the electronic
eye of their television
camera. The three-
fingered, one-eyed nature
of these Martians made
them very creepy looking
for a 1950's sci-fi movie,
as most aliens back then
were two-eyed and
somewhat human
looking. These Martians
were so effective that the
same basic design was
used in the 1988 TV
series "War of the
Worlds". But that series
de-emphasized the RGB
nature of the eye, since
by the 1980's it was
somewhat quaint.
RGB Model of Martian
Eye
The RGB model as it
pertains to the Martian
eye, color TV cameras, or
color television tubes in
general. The seven
numbers indicate the
seven colors produced by
mixing red, green, and
blue light in various
combinations at equal
luminosity. To
commemorate the golden
anniversary of the RCA
RGB color standard
during Christmas 2003,
CED Magic sent out a 7-
Color SelectaVision gift
pen containing three
LED's that mix their light
based on this same RGB
model to ideally produce
the seven colors shown in
the following table:

RGB
State Color
Logic
Black
0 000
(all off)
1 100 Red
2 010 Green
3 001 Blue
4 110 Yellow
5 011 Cyan
6 101 Magenta
White
7 111
(all on)

But owners of the gift

pen will note that the
yellow, magenta, and
white positions on the
pen's pushbutton do not
correspond to the
idealized colors shown in
this diagram. This is
because the luminosity of
the green and blue LED's
is considerably higher
than that of the red LED.

Human Luminosity
Response
This diagram from the
1953 RCA book Practical
Color Television shows
the luminosity response
of the human eye, and
also provides an
explanation for why most
representations of the
rainbow (such as the
CED Magic logo) use six
colors. The maximum
responsiveness of the
human eye is right on the
boundary between green
and yellow, so choosing
three colors on either side
of that boundary yields
violet, blue, green,
yellow, orange, and red.
The outdated millimicron
unit used in this diagram
has been replaced by the
equivalent nanometer
(nm) unit.
SelectaVision Logo
But some logos, such as the
SelectaVision engineering
logo, represent the rainbow
with seven colors. This dates
back to Isaac Newton's
discovery of the solar
spectrum using a prism, and is
actually a more scientifically
accurate representation,
breaking visible light down
into seven roughly equal
segments. The mnemonic
ROY G BIV is an easy way to
remember the seven colors:

Color Wavelength Sampl

e
Red 700nm
Orange 650nm
Yellow 600nm
Green 550nm
Blue 500nm
Indigo 450nm
Violet 400nm

Notice in the SelectaVision

logo, RCA swapped the order
of the indigo and violet rings,
probably to create a better
contrast.
 Color Wheel
While RCA's RGB
model represents an
electronic interpretation
of color, the wheel shown
here is an artistic
interpretation using red,
yellow, and blue as the
primary colors. These
primary colors are
represented by the three
quadrilaterals at the
center of the wheel, and
equally mixing them
yields the secondary
colors of violet (R-B),
green (B-Y), and orange
(Y-R) represented by the
three isosceles triangles
at the center. The wheel
itself consists of twelve
colors, represented by the
three primary colors, the
three secondary colors,
and six tertiary colors
produced by mixing a
primary color with an
adjacent secondary color.
Colors opposite one
another on the wheel are
complementary, while
those separated by two or
three color positions are
considered contrasting.

This table lists the CED titles I have classified as science fiction titles. As with
previous genre classifications, the goal here is to assign each CED title to just one
genre for the purpose of arranging the discs on shelves. So when I get around to
the Western genre, a title like Westworld won't be listed, because I already
assigned it to the Sci-Fi genre.

Table of Science Fiction Titles on CED

Title Notes
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
2001: A Space Odyssey (2) [monophonic]
2001: A Space Odyssey (2)*
2001: A Space Odyssey* [PAL]
2010**
Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai, The**
Alien**
Altered States**
Back to the Future***
Barbarella
Battle Beyond the Stars
Battlestar Galactica
Black Hole, The**
Blade Runner**
Brainstorm**
Brainstorm** [PAL]
Capricorn One
Charly
Clockwork Orange, A (2)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (2)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind* [PAL] PAL is Stereo
Cocoon**
Coma
Coma [PAL]
D.A.R.Y.L.**
Dune (2)***
Empire Strikes Back, The**
Endangered Species
Enemy Mine**
Escape From New York
Escape From New York** [PAL] PAL is Stereo
Fantastic Voyage [CBS]
Fantastic Voyage [RCA]
Final Countdown, The
Flash Gordon***
Forbidden Planet
Forbidden Planet [PAL]
Frankenstein
Futureworld
Godzilla
Godzilla 1985
Impulse
Invasion of the Body Snatchers [1956]
Invasion of the Body Snatchers** [1978]
Island of Dr. Moreau, The
It Came from Hollywood
King Kong (2) [1976]
King Kong [1933]
Krull**
Krull** [PAL]
Last Starfighter, The***
Logan's Run
Logan's Run [PAL]
Man Who Fell to Earth, The (2)*
Man With Two Brains, The
Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn**
Mutant**
Mysterious Island, The
Night of the Comet
Outland**
Parasite
Planet of the Apes [FOX]
Planet of the Apes [RCA]
Return of the Jedi (2)**
Rodan
Rollerball
Rollerball* [PAL] PAL is Stereo
Runaway**
Saturn 3
Scanners
Soylent Green
Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone*
Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone* [PAL]
Star Trek - The Motion Picture (2)
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan**
Star Trek III: The Search for Spock**
Star Trek: Vol.1, The Menagerie
Star Trek: Vol.2, City/Battlefield
Star Trek: Vol.3, Trouble with Tribbles/Tholian Web
Star Trek: Vol.4, Space Seed/Changeling
Star Trek: Vol.5, Balance of Terror/Mirror,Mirror
Star Trek: Vol.6, Amok Time/Journey to Babel
Star Wars**
Starman**
Strange Invaders
Swamp Thing
Terminator, The
Thing, The [1951]
Thing, The*** [1982]
Time Machine, The Another Wells/Pal Collaboration
Timerider**
Tron**
Visitor, The [1979]
War of the Worlds, The
Warlords of the Twenty-First Century
Weird Science***
Westworld
Westworld [PAL]
XTRO
Young Frankenstein