It holds no film and takes no pictures. Yet it is the first camera put to work on set.

Look through enough behind-the-scenes photos from Christopher Nolan's shoots and one odd object keeps catching your eye. Surrounded by giant movie cameras, the thing the director actually holds to his eye is a black medium-format film camera. Look closer and there is an IMAX logo on the body. It is a Pentax 67.

A small camera next to 300 pounds

Product photo of the IMAX Keighley camera. The carbon body is engraved IMAX KEIGHLEY, with a viewfinder attached at the side.
Keighley, the new camera IMAX built for 《The Odyssey》. Image ⓒ IMAX Corporation

《The Odyssey》, released this past July, is the first feature shot entirely on IMAX film. IMAX built a new camera for it, called the Keighley. It is named after David Keighley, who oversaw IMAX image quality for more than half a century, and his wife Patricia. Development took two years after 《Oppenheimer》, and with the motor noise tamed, the camera can now record synchronized dialogue.

The camera body on its own is not especially heavy. With accessories and a 1,000-foot load of film, it comes to a little over 25 kg. The trouble is dialogue scenes. To fully kill the motor noise, it has to go inside a soundproof blimp, and that box alone weighs 240 pounds. All in, it is 300 pounds, about 136 kg. It has to ride on a dolly reinforced with steel plate, and moving it takes a crew of more than six.

But the director needs to see the frame before shooting. Is this the right angle? The right lens? Where does the actor sit in the frame? You cannot drag a 136 kg rig around every time you ask.

Why the Pentax 67?

Product photo of a stock Pentax 67, with the PENTAX logo on the pentaprism and a Takumar 105mm lens mounted.
The Pentax 67 before modification, a Japanese medium-format SLR introduced in 1969. Image courtesy of 5ft.mag

The reason is aspect ratio. The Pentax 67 negative is 56×70mm, a ratio of about 1.25:1. IMAX 15/70 film has an aspect ratio of 1.43:1. They are not identical, but it is closer to the squarish IMAX frame than any other still camera on the market. A 35mm camera, stretched out at 3:2, gives you no sense of the IMAX frame.

What IMAX changed

Cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema holds a modified Pentax 67 body in both hands. The space where the shutter was removed and the custom mount are visible.
The modified body in the hands of cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema. The space where the shutter came out and the custom mount are plain to see. Image ⓒ Universal Pictures · Syncopy (image quality enhanced)

IMAX did not use the camera as is. Since it never needs to take a picture, they removed the focal-plane shutter assembly and fitted a custom flange adapter in its place. With that adapter, the director and cinematographer can mount the actual cine and IMAX lenses used for the shoot straight onto this small body.

Close-up of the modified Pentax 67. The body is engraved IMAX and a large cine lens is mounted.
The IMAX engraving on the body and the cine lens mounted on it. The case behind it reads IMAX VIEWFINDER, too. Image ⓒ Universal Pictures · Syncopy (image quality enhanced)

The focusing screen is etched with 15/70 IMAX frame lines. Look through the finder and you see exactly where the real IMAX frame cuts off. A camera with no film in it, a camera that takes no pictures. A camera made only for looking.

How it works on set

On the set of The Odyssey. Nolan looks through the finder in front of an actor, with an IMAX equipment case on the right.
On the set of 《The Odyssey》. He checks the frame right in front of the actor. An IMAX case sits on the right. Image ⓒ Universal Pictures · Syncopy

The method is simple. Once the set is ready, the director takes the camera up to the actors. He raises it to his eye, moves his body to find the angle, and swaps lenses to try them. When he finds the spot, only then does the heavy main camera move into place.

Cinematographer Hoytema holds the modified Pentax and talks with Nolan. Crew and equipment are lined up around them.
Hoytema and Nolan, working out the angle over a single finder. Image ⓒ Universal Pictures · Syncopy
Hoytema adjusts the lens mounted on the modified Pentax while Nolan watches beside him.
Changing lenses. Because they mount the very lens they will shoot with, the field of view matches exactly. Image ⓒ Universal Pictures · Syncopy

You often see the director and cinematographer taking turns at the same finder. It is a different kind of conversation from huddling around a monitor and pointing at the screen. What one person saw, the other checks from the same spot, at the same eye level.

Not Nolan's invention

Nolan lies flat on the sand, holding a camera to his eye and aiming it at an actor. Crew and equipment are beside him.
On the set of 《Dunkirk》. Lying in the sand, he frames the shot at the actor's eye level. Image ⓒ Universal Pictures · Syncopy

Nolan did not start this practice. According to IMAX cinematographer James Neihouse (ASC), using a Pentax 6×7 fitted with an IMAX mount as a director's viewfinder is a long-standing practice in the industry. Before the modification, people actually loaded film and shot stills with it as well.

So this is no new technology. It is a way of working that has carried on for decades on set. However good digital monitors get, there are moments when nothing replaces an optical finder held to the eye.

Holding it to your eye

Nolan points in a direction with his finger and Matt Damon looks that way. The modified Pentax 67 is between them.
Nolan and Matt Damon (who plays Odysseus). That camera sits between them. Image ⓒ Universal Pictures · Syncopy

Film sets in the digital age are crowded with monitors. Directors sit in chairs and watch screens. Yet the director working in the biggest format in the world, when it comes time to set the frame, raises a half-century-old film camera to his eye.

Pressing a camera to your face and moving your body to find the angle. Anyone who shoots film knows that motion. The Pentax Nolan carries does not even have film in it, but what he does with it is what we do when we take a camera out on the weekend. Raise it to your eye, set the frame, and wait until it feels right.

Poster for the film The Odyssey.
《The Odyssey》 (2026), the first feature shot entirely on IMAX film. Image ⓒ Universal Pictures

The frames of a film shot on a 136 kg camera are decided with one handheld film camera. That order of things stays with me.