Panavision Inc. is an American motion picture equipment company founded in 1954 specializing in cameras and lenses, based in Woodland Hills, California.

Formed by Robert Gottschalk as a small partnership to create anamorphic projection lenses during the widescreen boom in the 1950s, Panavision expanded its product lines to meet the demands of modern filmmakers.

Robert Gottschalk founded Panavision in late 1954, in partnership with Richard Moore,[1] Meredith Nicholson, Harry Eller, Walter Wallin, and William Mann;[2] the company was formally incorporated in 1954.

Panavision was established principally for the manufacture of anamorphic projection lenses to meet the growing demands of theaters showing CinemaScope films.

[7] In its initial conception, the cumbersome system required three cameras for shooting and three synchronized projectors to display a picture on one wide, curved screen.

Along with the logistical and financial challenges of tripling equipment usage and cost, the process led to distracting vertical lines between the three projected images.

[8] Looking for a high-impact method of widescreen filmmaking that was cheaper, simpler, and less visually distracting, 20th Century Fox acquired the rights to a process it branded CinemaScope: in this system, the film was shot with anamorphic lenses.

By the time the first CinemaScope movie—The Robe (1953)—was announced for production, Gottschalk, Moore and Nicholson had a demo reel of work with their anamorphic underwater system.

[6] Gottschalk learned from one of his vendors that Bausch & Lomb, whom Fox had contracted to manufacture CinemaScope lenses, was having difficulty filling the lens orders for theatrical anamorphic projection equipment.

[3] Early CinemaScope camera lenses were notoriously problematic in close-ups with an optical aberration that was commonly known as "the mumps": a widening of the face due to a loss of anamorphic power as a subject approaches the lens.

In January 1959, the posters for the 70 mm release of Disney's Sleeping Beauty carried the notation "Process lenses by Panavision" next to the Super Technirama 70 logo.

Such pressures led Fox to completely abandon CinemaScope for Auto Panatars that year; Von Ryan's Express was the studio's first picture with Panavision lenses.

When Panavision eventually brought its own camera designs to market, it was relatively unconstrained by retrofitting and manufacturing costs, as it was not directly competing on sales price.

[21] Panavision would soon expand into markets beyond Hollywood, eventually including New York, Europe, Australia, Hong Kong, and Southeast Asia.

[citation needed] During this period, the company's R&D department focused on retrofitting the industry standard 35 mm camera, the Mitchell BNC.

[25] Albert Mayer led the next major project: the creation of a lightweight reflex camera adaptable to either handheld or studio conditions.

A revolutionary camera that operated quietly, the Panaflex eliminated the need for a cumbersome sound blimp, and could synchronize handheld work.

After Gottschalk's death, Warner Communications sold the company to a consortium headed by Ted Field,[21][31] John Farrand, and Alan Hirschfield.

The company was sold to Lee International PLC for $100 million in 1987, but financing was overextended and ownership reverted to the investment firm Warburg Pincus two years later.

The gauge was not widely readopted, and only two major Hollywood films were shot with the new 65 mm Panavision process: Far and Away (1992) and Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet (1996).

[citation needed] In 1992, Panavision launched a project to develop a camera that involved rethinking every aspect of the company's existing 35 mm system.

Additionally, we will immediately expand our presence in key Southeast Asia markets, where television and film activity are expect to grow rapidly.

Overall, the transaction enables us to control a true worldwide distribution network for Panavision’s camera systems and related products, one of our most important strategic objectives.

After aborted attempts to create a film-style video camera in the 1970s and 1980s, Panavision joined the digital revolution in July 2000, establishing DHD Ventures in partnership with Sony.

The new company's objective was to raise the quality of high definition digital video to the standards of top-level Hollywood motion-picture production.

[38] This Panavision HD-900F, was used in the making of Lucasfilm's Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones (2002), described as "the first digital major feature film".

[citation needed] This led to the 2004 introduction of the Genesis HD—a full bandwidth (4:4:4) HD-SDI camera with improved colorimetry- and sensitometry-related specs.

[42] Subsequent to the completion of major design work on the Genesis, Panavision bought out Sony's 49 percent share of DHD Ventures and fully consolidated it in September 2004.

[55] On September 13, 2018, Saban Capital Acquisition Corp. announced the purchase of Panavision and Sim Video International in a $622 million cash and stock deal.

Saban Capital Acquisition Corp. intended to change its name to Panavision Holdings Inc. and was expected to continue to trade on the Nasdaq stock exchange.