title: Christopher Lambert

text: Lambert was married to American actress Diane Lane from 1988 until their divorce in 1994. Their daughter, Eleanor Jasmine, was born in 1993. Lambert married American actress Jaimyse Haft in 1999, and they divorced in 2000. From 2007 to 2014, he dated French actress Sophie Marceau.


title: Christopher Lambert

text: Lambert has profound myopia and can't see without his glasses. He cannot wear contact lenses and often has to perform while virtually blind, which has led to injuries while performing his own stunts.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt, also known as the August Coup, was a failed attempt by hardliners of the Soviet Union's Communist Party to forcibly seize control of the country from Mikhail Gorbachev, who was Soviet President and General Secretary of the Communist Party at the time. The coup leaders consisted of top military and civilian officials, including Vice President Gennady Yanayev, who together formed the State Committee on the State of Emergency (GKChP). They opposed Gorbachev's reform program, were angry at the loss of control over Eastern European states and fearful of the USSR's New Union Treaty which was on the verge of being signed. The treaty was to decentralize much of the central Soviet government's power and distribute it among its fifteen republics.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The GKChP hardliners dispatched KGB agents, who detained Gorbachev at his holiday estate but failed to detain the recently elected president of a newly reconstituted Russia, Boris Yeltsin, who had been both an ally and critic of Gorbachev. The GKChP was poorly organized and met with effective resistance by both Yeltsin and a civilian campaign of anti-Communist protestors, mainly in Moscow. The coup collapsed in two days, and Gorbachev returned to office while the plotters all lost their posts. Yeltsin subsequently became the dominant leader and Gorbachev lost much of his influence. The failed coup led to both the immediate collapse of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) and the dissolution of the USSR four months later.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Following the capitulation of the GKChP, popularly referred to as the "Gang of Eight", both the Supreme Court of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) and President Gorbachev described its actions as a coup attempt.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Since assuming power as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1985, Gorbachev had embarked on an ambitious reform program embodied in the twin concepts of "perestroika" and "glasnost", or economic/political restructuring and openness. These moves prompted resistance and suspicion on the part of hard-line members of the "nomenklatura". The reforms also unleashed forces and movements Gorbachev did not expect. Specifically, nationalist agitation on the part of the Soviet Union's non-Russian minorities grew, and there were fears that some or all of the union republics might secede. In 1991, the Soviet Union was in a severe economic and political crisis. Scarcity of food, medicine, and other consumables was widespread, people had to stand in long lines to buy even essential goods, fuel stocks were as much as 50% lower than the estimated amount needed for the approaching winter, and inflation exceeded 300% per year, with factories lacking the cash needed to pay salaries.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: In 1990, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Armenia had already declared the restoration of their independence from the Soviet Union. In January 1991, a violent attempt to return Lithuania to the Soviet Union by force took place. About a week later, a similar attempt was engineered by local pro-Soviet forces to overthrow Latvian authorities. There were continuing armed ethnic conflicts in Nagorno Karabakh and South Ossetia.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Russia declared its sovereignty on 12 June 1990 and thereafter limited the application of Soviet laws, in particular those governing finance and the economy, on Russian territory. The Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR adopted laws that contradicted Soviet laws (the so-called War of Laws).


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: In the unionwide referendum on 17 March 1991, boycotted by the Baltic states, Armenia, Georgia, and Moldova, a supermajority of residents in the other republics expressed the desire to retain the renewed Soviet Union, with 77.85% voting in favor. Following negotiations, eight of these nine republics (but not Ukraine) approved the New Union Treaty with some conditions. The treaty was to make the Soviet Union a federation of independent republics called the Union of Soviet Sovereign Republics, with a common president, foreign policy, and military. Russia, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan were to sign the Treaty in Moscow on 20 August 1991.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: British historian Dan Stone wrote the following about the plotters' motivation: The coup was the last gasp of those who were astonished at and felt betrayed by the precipitous collapse of the Soviet Union's empire in Eastern Europe and the swift destruction of the Warsaw Pact and Comecon that followed. Many feared the consequences of Gorbachev's German policies above all, not just for leaving officers unemployed but for sacrificing gains achieved in the Great Patriotic War to German revanchism and irredentism – after all, this had been the Kremlin's greatest fear since the end of the war.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The KGB began considering a coup in September 1990. Soviet politician Alexander Yakovlev began warning Gorbachev about the possibility of one after the 28th Party Congress in June 1990. On 11 December 1990, KGB Chairman Vladimir Kryuchkov made a "call for order" over the Moscow Programme television station. That day, he asked two KGB officers to prepare measures to be taken in the event a state of emergency was declared in the USSR. Later, Kryuchkov brought Soviet Defense Minister Dmitry Yazov, Central Control Commission Chairman Boris Pugo, Premier Valentin Pavlov, Vice President Gennady Yanayev, Soviet Defense Council deputy chief Oleg Baklanov, Gorbachev secretariat head Valery Boldin, and CPSU Central Committee Secretary Oleg Shenin into the conspiracy.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: When Kryuchkov complained about the Soviet Union's growing instability to the Congress of People's Deputies, Gorbachev attempted to appease him by issuing a presidential decree enhancing the powers of the KGB and appointing Pugo to the Cabinet as Minister of Internal Affairs. Foreign Secretary Eduard Shevardnadze resigned in protest and rejected an offered appointment as vice president, warning that "a dictatorship is coming." Gorbachev was forced to appoint Yanayev in his place.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Beginning with the January Events in Lithuania, members of Gorbachev's Cabinet hoped that he could be persuaded to declare a state of emergency and "restore order," and formed the State Committee on the State of Emergency (GKChP).


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 17 June 1991, Soviet Premier Pavlov requested extraordinary powers from the Supreme Soviet. Several days later, Moscow Mayor Gavriil Popov informed U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union Jack F. Matlock Jr. that a coup against Gorbachev was being planned. When Matlock tried to warn him, Gorbachev falsely assumed that his own Cabinet was not involved and underestimated the risk of a coup. Gorbachev reversed Pavlov's request for more powers and jokingly told his Cabinet "The coup is over," remaining oblivious to their plans.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 23 July 1991, several party functionaries and literati published a piece in the hardline "Sovetskaya Rossiya" newspaper, entitled "A Word to the People", that called for decisive action to prevent calamity.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Six days later, on 29 July, Gorbachev, Russian President Boris Yeltsin and Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev discussed the possibility of replacing hardliners such as Pavlov, Yazov, Kryuchkov and Pugo with more liberal figures, with Nazarbayev as Prime Minister (in Pavlov's place). Kryuchkov, who had placed Gorbachev under close surveillance as Subject 110 several months earlier, eventually got wind of the conversation from an electronic bug planted by Gorbachev's bodyguard, Vladimir Medvedev. Yeltsin also prepared for a coup by establishing a secret defense committee, ordering military and KGB commands to side with RSFSR authorities and establishing a "reserve government" in Sverdlovsk under Deputy Prime Minister Oleg Lobov.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 4 August, Gorbachev went on holiday to his dacha in Foros, Crimea. He planned to return to Moscow in time for the New Union Treaty signing on 20 August. On 15 August, the text of the draft treaty was published, which would have stripped the coup planners of much of their authority.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 17 August, the members of the GKChP met at a KGB guesthouse in Moscow and studied the treaty document. Decisions were made to introduce a state of emergency from 19 August, to form a State Emergency Committee, and require Gorbachev to sign the relevant decrees or to resign and transfer powers to Vice President Yanayev. They believed the pact would pave the way for the Soviet Union's breakup, and decided it was time to act. The next day, Baklanov, Boldin, Shenin, and Soviet Deputy Defense Minister General Valentin Varennikov flew to Crimea for a meeting with Gorbachev. Yazov ordered General Pavel Grachev, commander of the Soviet Airborne Forces, to begin coordinating with KGB Deputy Chairmen Viktor Grushko and Genii Ageev to implement martial law.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 4:32 pm on 18 August, the GKChP cut communications to Gorbachev's dacha, including telephone landlines and the nuclear command and control system. Eight minutes later Lieutenant General Yuri Plekhanov, Head of the Ninth Chief Directorate of the KGB, allowed the group into Gorbachev's dacha. Gorbachev realized what was happening after discovering the telephone outages. Baklanov, Boldin, Shenin and Varennikov demanded that Gorbachev either declare a state of emergency or resign and name Yanayev as acting president to allow the members of the GKChP "to restore order" to the country.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Gorbachev has always claimed that he refused point-blank to accept the ultimatum. Varennikov has insisted that Gorbachev said: "Damn you. Do what you want. But report my opinion!" However, those present at the dacha at the time testified that Baklanov, Boldin, Shenin and Varennikov had been clearly disappointed and nervous after the meeting with Gorbachev. Gorbachev is said to have insulted Varennikov by pretending to forget his name, and to have told his former trusted advisor Boldin "Shut up, you prick! How dare you give me lectures about the situation in the country!" With Gorbachev's refusal, the conspirators ordered that he remain confined to the dacha. Additional KGB security guards were placed at the dacha gates with orders to stop anybody from leaving.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 7:30 pm, Baklanov, Boldin, Shenin and Varennikov flew to Moscow, accompanied by Plekhanov. His deputy, Vyacheslav Generalov, remained "on the farm" in Foros.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 8 pm, Yanayev, Pavlov, Kryuchkov, Yazov, Pugo and Soviet Supreme Soviet Chairman Anatoly Lukyanov gathered in the Kremlin cabinet of the Prime Minister, discussing and editing the documents of the State Emergency Committee. At 10:15 pm, they were joined by Baklanov, Shenin, Boldin, Varennikov and Plekhanov. It was decided to publicly declare Gorbachev ill. Yanayev hesitated, but the others convinced him that leadership and responsibility would be collective.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: GKChP members ordered that 250,000 pairs of handcuffs from a factory in Pskov be sent to Moscow, also ordering 300,000 arrest forms. Kryuchkov doubled the pay of all KGB personnel, called them back from holiday, and placed them on alert. Lefortovo Prison was emptied to receive prisoners.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The members of the GKChP met in the Kremlin after Baklanov, Boldin, Shenin and Varennikov returned from Crimea. Yanayev (who had only just been persuaded to join the plot), Pavlov and Baklanov signed the so-called "Declaration of the Soviet Leadership", which declared a state of emergency in the entirety of the USSR and announced that the State Committee on the State of Emergency (Государственный Комитет по Чрезвычайному Положению, ГКЧП, or "Gosudarstvenniy Komitet po Chrezvichaynomu Polozheniyu", "GKChP") had been created "to manage the country and effectively maintain the regime of the state of emergency". The GKChP included the following members:


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Yanayev signed the decree naming himself acting Soviet President, using the pretense of Gorbachev's inability to perform presidential duties due to "illness". However, Russian investigators later identified Kryuchkov as the key planner of the coup. Yanayev later claimed that he had been forced to participate in the coup under the threat of arrest. The eight aforementioned GKChP members became known as the "Gang of Eight".


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The GKChP banned all Moscow newspapers except for nine party-controlled newspapers. It also issued a populist declaration which stated that "the honour and dignity of the Soviet man must be restored."


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 1 am, Yanayev signed documents on the formation of the State Committee for the State of Emergency (GKChP), consisting of himself, Pavlov, Kryuchkov, Yazov, Pugo, Baklanov, Tizyakov and Starodubtsev. Included in the documents was the "Appeal to the Soviet people".


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The GKChP members present signed GKChP Resolution No. 1, which introduced the following: a state of emergency "in certain areas of the USSR" lasting six months from 4 am Moscow time on 19 August; the prohibition of rallies, demonstrations and strikes; suspension of the activities of political parties, public organizations and mass movements that impede the normalization of the situation; and the allocation of of land to all interested city residents for personal use.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 4 am, the Sevastopol regiment of KGB border troops surrounded Gorbachev's presidential dacha in Foros. By order of Soviet Air Defense Chief of Staff Colonel-General Igor Maltsev, two tractors blocked the runway on which the President's aircraft were located: a Tu-134 jet and Mi-8 helicopter.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Starting at 6 am, all of the GKChP documents were broadcast over state radio and television. The KGB immediately issued an arrest list that included newly elected Russian SFSR President Boris Yeltsin, his allies, and the leaders of the umbrella activist group Democratic Russia. The Russian SFSR-controlled Radio Rossii and Televidenie Rossii, plus Ekho Moskvy, the only independent political radio station, were taken off the air. However, the latter station later resumed its broadcasts and became a source of reliable information during the coup. The BBC World Service and Voice of America were also able to provide continuous coverage. Gorbachev and his family heard the news from a BBC bulletin on a small Sony transistor radio that had not been seized. For the next several days, he refused to take food from outside the dacha to avoid being poisoned, and took long outdoor strolls to dispute reports of his ill health.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Under Yanayev's orders, units of the Tamanskaya mechanized infantry and Kantemirovskaya armored division rolled into Moscow, along with airborne troops. Around 4,000 soldiers, 350 tanks, 300 armoured personnel carriers and 420 trucks were sent to Moscow. Four Russian SFSR people's deputies were detained by the KGB at a Soviet Army base near the capital. However, almost no other arrests were made by the KGB during the coup. Ulysse Gosset and Vladimir Federovski later alleged that the KGB was planning to carry out a much larger wave of arrests two weeks after the coup, after which it would have abolished almost all legislative and local administrative structures under a highly centralized Council of Ministers. Yanayev instructed Foreign Minister Alexander Bessmertnykh to make a statement requesting formal diplomatic recognition from foreign governments and the United Nations.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The GKChP conspirators considered detaining Yeltsin upon his return from a visit to Kazakhstan on 17 August but failed when Yeltsin redirected his flight from Chkalovsky Air Base northeast of Moscow to Vnukovo Airport southwest of the city. Afterwards, they considered capturing him at his dacha near Moscow. The KGB Alpha Group surrounded his dacha with Spetsnaz, but for undisclosed reasons did not apprehend him. The commanding officer, Viktor Karpukhin, later alleged that he had received an order from Kryuchkov to arrest Yeltsin but disobeyed it, although his account has been questioned. The failure to arrest Yeltsin proved fatal to the plotters' plans. After the announcement of the coup at 6:30 am, Yeltsin began inviting prominent Russian officials to his dacha, including Leningrad Mayor Anatoly Sobchak, Moscow Deputy Mayor Yury Luzhkov, Colonel-General Konstantin Kobets, RSFSR Prime Minister Ivan Silayev, RSFSR Vice President Alexander Rutskoy, and RSFSR Supreme Soviet Chairman Ruslan Khasbulatov.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Yeltsin initially wanted to remain at the dacha and organize a rival government, but Kobets advised his group to travel to the White House, Russia's parliament building, to maintain communications with coup opponents. They arrived and occupied the building at 9 am. Together with Silayev and Khasbulatov, Yeltsin issued a declaration "To the Citizens of Russia" that condemned the GKChP's actions as a reactionary anti-constitutional coup. The military was urged not to take part in the coup, and local authorities were asked to follow laws from the RSFSR President rather than the GKChP. Although he initially avoided the measure to avoid sparking a civil war, Yeltsin also subsequently took command of all Soviet military and security forces in the RSFSR. The joint declaration called for a general strike, with the demand to let Gorbachev address the people. This declaration was distributed around Moscow in the form of flyers, and disseminated nationwide through medium-wave radio and Usenet newsgroups via the RELCOM computer network. "Izvestia" newspaper workers threatened to go on strike unless Yeltsin's proclamation was printed in the paper.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The GKChP relied on regional and local soviets, mostly still dominated by the Communist Party, to support the coup by forming emergency committees to repress dissidence. The CPSU Secretariat under Boldin sent coded telegrams to local party committees to assist the coup. Yeltsin's authorities later discovered that nearly 70 percent of the committees either backed it or attempted to remain neutral. Within the RSFSR, the oblasts of Samara, Lipetsk, Tambov, Saratov, Orenburg, Irkutsk, and Tomsk and the krai of Altai and Krasnodar all supported the coup and pressured "raikom" to do so as well, while only three oblasts aside from Moscow and Leningrad opposed it. However, some of the soviets faced internal resistance against emergency rule. The Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republics of Tatarstan, Kabardino-Balkaria, Checheno-Ingushetia, Buryatia, and North Ossetia all sided with the GKChP. Soviet Armed Forces officers seized control of city halls and government buildings around the country claiming to be in control, as well as television stations in the Baltic states.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The Soviet public was divided on the coup. A poll in the RSFSR by Mnenie on the morning of 19 August showed that 23.6 percent of Russians believed the GKChP could improve living standards, while 41.9 percent had no opinion. However, separate polls by Interfax showed that many Russians, including 71 percent of Leningrad residents, feared the return of mass repression. The GKChP enjoyed strong support in the Russian-majority regions of Estonia and Transnistria, while Yeltsin enjoyed strong support in Sverdlovsk and Nizhny Novgorod.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 10 am, Rutskoy, Silayev, and Khasbulatov delivered a letter to Lukyanov demanding a medical exam of Gorbachev by the World Health Organization and a meeting between themselves, Yeltsin, Gorbachev, and Yanayev within 24 hours. Rutskoy later visited Patriarch Alexy II of Moscow, spiritual leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, and convinced him to declare support for Yeltsin. Meanwhile, in Leningrad, Military District Commander Viktor Samsonov ordered the formation of an emergency committee for the city, chaired by Leningrad First Secretary Boris Gidaspov, to circumvent Sobchak's democratically elected municipal government. Samsonov's troops were ultimately blocked by hundreds of thousands of demonstrators supported by the police, which forced Leningrad Television to broadcast a statement by Sobchak. Workers at the Kirov Plant went on strike in support of Yeltsin. Moscow First Secretary Yuri Prokofev attempted a similar maneuver in the capital but was rebuffed when Boris Nikolskii refused to accept the office of Mayor of Moscow. At 11 am, RSFSR Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev held a press conference for foreign journalists and diplomats, and gained the support of most of the West for Yeltsin.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: That afternoon, Moscow citizens began gathering around the White House, erecting barricades around it. In response, Yanayev declared a state of emergency in Moscow at 4 pm. He declared at a 5 pm press conference that Gorbachev was "resting". He said: "Over these years he has got very tired and needs some time to get his health back." Yanayev's shaking hands led some people to think he was drunk, and his trembling voice and weak posture made his words unconvincing. Victoria E. Bonnell and Gregory Frieden noted that the press conference allowed spontaneous questioning from journalists who openly accused the GKChP of carrying out a coup, as well as the lack of censorship by news crews, who did not hide Yanayev's erratic motions the way they had with past leaders such as Leonid Brezhnev, making the coup leaders appear more incompetent to Soviet audiences. Gorbachev's security detail managed to construct a makeshift television antenna so he and his family could watch the press conference. After viewing the conference, Gorbachev expressed confidence that Yeltsin would be able to stop the coup. That night, his family smuggled out a videotape of Gorbachev condemning the coup.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Yanayev and the rest of the State Committee ordered the Cabinet of Ministers to alter the five-year plan of the time to relieve the housing shortage. All city dwellers were each given to combat winter shortages by growing fruits and vegetables. Due to the illness of Valentin Pavlov, the duties of the Soviet head of the government were entrusted to First Deputy Prime Minister Vitaly Doguzhiyev.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Meanwhile, the Soviet forces carrying out the coup began to suffer from mass defections to the RSFSR as well as soldiers refusing to obey orders to shoot civilians. Yeltsin asked his followers not to harass the soldiers and offered amnesty for any military servicemen who defected to oppose the coup. Major Evdokimov, chief of staff of a tank battalion of the Tamanskaya Division guarding the White House, declared his loyalty to the leadership of the Russian SFSR. Yeltsin climbed one of the tanks and addressed the crowd. Unexpectedly, this episode was included in the state media's evening news. Soviet Armed Forces officers loyal to the GKChP tried to prevent defections by confining soldiers to their barracks, but this only limited the availability of forces to carry out the coup.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 8 am, the Soviet General Staff ordered that the Cheget briefcase controlling Soviet nuclear weapons be returned to Moscow. Although Gorbachev discovered that the GKChP's actions had cut off communications with the nuclear duty officers, the Cheget was returned to the capital by 2 pm. However, Soviet Air Force Commander-in-Chief Yevgeny Shaposhnikov opposed the coup and claimed in his memoirs that he and the commanders of the Soviet Navy and the Strategic Rocket Forces told Yazov that they would not follow orders for a nuclear launch. After the coup, Gorbachev refused to admit that he had lost control of the country's nuclear weapons.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At noon, Moscow military district commander General Nikolai Kalinin, whom Yanayev appointed military commandant of Moscow, declared a curfew in Moscow from 11 pm to 5 am, effective 20 August. This was understood as a sign that an attack on the White House was imminent.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The defenders of the White House prepared themselves, most being unarmed. Evdokimov's tanks were moved from the White House in the evening. The makeshift White House defense headquarters was headed by General Kobets, a Russian SFSR people's deputy. Outside, Eduard Shevardnadze, Mstislav Rostropovich, and Yelena Bonner delivered speeches in support of Yeltsin.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: In the afternoon, Kryuchkov, Yazov and Pugo finally decided to attack the White House. This decision was supported by other GKChP members (with the exception of Pavlov, who had been sent to his dacha due to drunkenness). Kryuchkov's and Yazov's deputies, KGB general Gennady Ageyev and Army general Vladislav Achalov, planned the assault, codenamed "Operation Grom" (Thunder), which would gather elements of the Alpha Group and Vympel elite special forces units, supported by paratroopers, Moscow OMON, Internal Troops of the ODON, three tank companies and a helicopter squadron. Alpha Group commander General Viktor Karpukhin and other senior unit officers, together with Airborne deputy commander Gen. Alexander Lebed mingled with the crowds near the White House and assessed the possibility of such an operation. Afterwards, Karpukhin and Vympel commander Colonel Boris Beskov tried to convince Ageyev that the operation would result in bloodshed and should be cancelled. Lebed, with the consent of his superior Pavel Grachev, returned to the White House and secretly informed the defense headquarters that the attack would begin at 2 am the following morning.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: While the events were unfolding in the capital, Estonia's Supreme Council declared at 11:03 pm the full reinstatement of the independent status of the Republic of Estonia after 51 years.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: State-controlled TASS dispatches from 20 August emphasize a hardline approach against crime, especially economic crimes and the Russian mafia, which the GKChP blamed on increasing trade with the West. Draft decrees were later discovered which would have allowed military and police patrols to shoot "hooligans," including pro-democracy demonstrators.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At about 1 am, not far from the White House, trolleybuses and street cleaning machines were used to barricade a tunnel against arriving Taman Guards infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs), commanded by Captain Sergey Surovikin (who later rose to army general and commander of Russian forces in the 2022 war in Ukraine). Three men were killed in the ensuing clash: Dmitry Komar, Vladimir Usov, and Ilya Krichevsky; several others were wounded. Komar, a 22-year-old Soviet-Afghan War veteran, was shot and crushed trying to cover a moving IFV's observation slit. Usov, a 37-year-old economist, was killed by a stray bullet while coming to Komar's aid. The crowd set fire to an IFV and Krichevsky, a 28-year-old architect, was shot dead as the troops pulled back. According to journalist and democracy campaigner Sergey Parkhomenko, who was in the crowd defending the White House, "those deaths played a crucial role: both sides were so horrified that it brought a halt to everything." Alpha Group and Vympel did not move to the White House as planned, and Yazov ordered the troops to pull out of Moscow. Reports also surfaced that Gorbachev had been placed under house arrest in Crimea. During the final day of her family's exile, Raisa Gorbacheva suffered a minor stroke.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Between 8 am and 9 am, the GKChP members met in the Defence Ministry and, not knowing what to do, decided to send Kryuchkov, Yazov, Baklanov, Tizyakov, Anatoly Lukyanov, and Deputy CPSU General Secretary Vladimir Ivashko to Crimea to meet Gorbachev, who refused to meet them when they arrived.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 10 am, the session of the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR opened in the White House, at which President Yeltsin spoke.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 1 pm, the Soviet Cabinet of Ministers circulated a statement about its non-involvement in the putsch. At 1:20 pm, Kryuchkov, Yazov, Baklanov, Tizyakov, Lukyanov and CPSU Central Committee Deputy General Secretary Vladimir Ivashko left for the airport, getting stuck in a traffic jam created by the Taman Division armored vehicles returning to their base.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 2 pm, the CPSU Central Committee Secretariat issued a statement demanding that the GKChP clarify the fate of the head of the Communist Party, Mikhail Gorbachev.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 2:30 pm, Soviet Minister of Internal Affairs Boris Pugo signed the last GKChP order—a cypher telegram to the regional departments of internal affairs with a demand to strengthen the security of television and radio organizations and report on all violations of the GKChP Resolution on information control.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 4:08 pm, the plane with the GKChP delegation landed in Crimea. Around 4 pm, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, chaired by the heads of the chambers of the union parliament, adopted a resolution in which it declared illegal the removal of the Soviet President from his duties and their transfer to the Vice President, and in this vein demanded that Yanayev cancel the decrees and emergency orders based on them as legally invalid from the moment they were signed.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 4:52 pm, a group of Russian deputies and public figures led by RSFSR Vice President Alexander Rutskoy, as well as Soviet Security Council members Yevgeny Primakov and Vadim Bakatin, flew to Gorbachev's dacha in Foros. They were accompanied by 36 officers of the RSFSR Ministry of Internal Affairs armed with machine guns, under the command of RSFSR Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs Andrei Dunaev.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Eight minutes later, at 5 pm, the GKChP delegation arrived at the presidential dacha. President Gorbachev refused to receive it and demanded that communication to the outside world be restored. At the same time, Yanayev signed a decree dissolving the State Emergency Committee and declaring all of its decisions invalid.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 8:10 pm, Rutskoy and his delegation went to see Gorbachev. According to eyewitnesses, the meeting was cordial and joyful, allowing them to momentarily forget divisions between Soviet and Russian authorities.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: From 9:40 to 10:10 pm, Gorbachev received Lukyanov and Ivashko in the presence of Rutskoy and Primakov, accusing the USSR Supreme Soviet Speaker of treason, and the party deputy of inaction during the putsch.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Around 10 pm, RSFSR Prosecutor General Valentin Stepankov signed an arrest warrant for the Emergency Committee members.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: That day, the Supreme Council of the Republic of Latvia declared its sovereignty officially completed with a law passed by its deputies, confirming the independence restoration act of 4 May as an official act. In Estonia, just a day after the restitution of the country's full independence, the Tallinn TV Tower was taken over by Soviet Russian airborne troops. But while television broadcasts were cut for a time, the radio signal was kept on the air after a handful of Estonian Defence League (the unified paramilitary forces of Estonia) members barricaded themselves in the tower's broadcasting studio. That evening, as news from Moscow about the coup's failure reached Tallinn, the Russian paratroopers left the TV tower and the Estonian capital.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At one minute past midnight, Gorbachev, his family and assistants flew to Moscow on Rutskoy's plane. The GKChP members were sent back on a different plane; only Kryuchkov flew in the presidential plane, under police custody (according to Rutskoy, "they [would] definitely not be shot down with him on board"). Upon arrival, Kryuchkov, Yazov and Tizyakov were arrested on the airfield, which was illegal under Soviet law as officials representing the central government could only be arrested and tried under Soviet law, which prevailed over the laws of the constituent republics.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: At 2 am, when Gorbachev arrived at Moscow's Vnukovo Airport, television showed live footage of him walking down the airstairs wearing a knitted sweater. Later, he would be criticized for not going to the White House, but to rest at his dacha.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Pugo and his wife committed suicide on 23 August. Pavlov, Starodubtsev, Baklanov, Boldin, and Shenin would all be taken into custody within the next 48 hours.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Since several heads of the regional executive committees supported the GKChP, on 21 August 1991 the Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR adopted Decision No. 1626-1, which authorized Russian President Boris Yeltsin to appoint heads of regional administrations, although the Constitution of the Russian SFSR did not empower the president with such authority. The Russian Supreme Soviet passed another decision the following day declaring the old imperial colors Russia's national flag; it replaced the Russian SFSR flag two months later.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On the night of 24 August, the Felix Dzerzhinsky statue in front of the KGB building at Dzerzhinskiy Square (Lubianka) was dismantled, while thousands of Moscow citizens took part in the funeral of Dmitry Komar, Vladimir Usov and Ilya Krichevsky, the three citizens who had died in the tunnel incident. Gorbachev posthumously awarded them with the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Yeltsin asked their relatives to forgive him for not being able to prevent their deaths.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Gorbachev initially tried to defend the CPSU, proclaiming at a 22 August press conference that it still represented a "progressive force" despite its leaders' participation in the coup. Gorbachev resigned as CPSU General Secretary on 24 August. Vladimir Ivashko replaced him as acting General Secretary, but resigned on 29 August when the Supreme Soviet of the USSR suspended the activities of the party throughout the country. In a decree, Yeltsin ordered the transfer of the CPSU archives to the state archive authorities, and nationalized all CPSU assets in the Russian SFSR (these included not only party committee headquarters but also assets such as educational institutions and hotels). The party's Central Committee headquarters were handed over to the Government of Moscow. On 6 November, Yeltsin issued a decree banning the party in Russia. These decrees issued by Yeltsin were illegal under Soviet law.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 24 August 1991, Mikhail Gorbachev created the so-called "Committee for the Operational Management of the Soviet Economy" (Комитет по оперативному управлению народным хозяйством СССР), to replace the USSR Cabinet of Ministers headed by Valentin Pavlov, a GKChP member. Russian Prime Minister Ivan Silayev headed the committee. Gorbachev's decree on replacing the Cabinet of Misters was illegal under Soviet law as it required approval from the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, but no approval by the Supreme Soviet was ever given.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: That same day, Ukraine's Verkhovna Rada adopted the Act of Independence of Ukraine and called for a referendum on support of the Act of Independence.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 25 August, the Supreme Soviet of the Byelorussian SSR announced its Declaration of Sovereignty as a constitutional law.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 28 August, the Supreme Soviet of the USSR dismissed Prime Minister Pavlov and entrusted the functions of the Soviet government to the Committee for the Operational Management of the Soviet Economy. The next day, Supreme Soviet Chairman Anatoly Lukyanov was arrested.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 5 September, the Congress of People's Deputies of the Soviet Union adopted Soviet Law No. 2392-1 "On the Authorities of the Soviet Union in the Transitional Period", under which the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union replaced the Congress of People's Deputies and was reformed. Two new legislative chambers—the Soviet of the Union (Совет Союза) and the Soviet of Republics (Совет Республик)—replaced the Soviet of the Union and the Soviet of Nationalities (both elected by the USSR Congress of Peoples Deputies). The Soviet of the Union was to be formed by the popularly elected USSR people's deputies and would consider only issues concerning civil rights and freedoms and other issues which did not fall under the jurisdiction of the Soviet of Republics. Its decisions would have to be reviewed by the Soviet of Republics. The Soviet of Republics was to include 20 deputies from each union republic, plus one deputy to represent each autonomous region of each union republic (both Soviet people's deputies and republics' people's deputies) delegated by the legislatures of the union republic. Russia was an exception with 52 deputies. However, the delegation of each union republic was to have only one vote in the Soviet of Republics. The laws were to be first adopted by the Soviet of the Union and then by the Soviet of Republics, which would set procedures for the central government, approve the appointment of central ministers and consider inter-republic agreements.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Also created was the Soviet State Council (Государственный совет СССР), which included the Soviet President and the presidents of union republics. The "Committee for the Operational Management of the Soviet Economy" was replaced by the USSR Inter-republic Economic Committee (Межреспубликанский экономический комитет СССР), also headed by Ivan Silayev.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 27 August, the Supreme Soviet of Moldova declared the independence of Moldova from the Soviet Union. The Supreme Soviets of Azerbaijan and Kyrgyzstan did the same on 30 and 31 August, respectively. On 6 September, the newly created Soviet State Council recognized the independence of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Estonia had declared re-independence on 20 August, Latvia the following day, while Lithuania had already done so on 11 March the previous year. On 9 September, the Supreme Soviet of Tajikistan declared the independence of Tajikistan from the Soviet Union. Also in September, over 99% percent of voters in Armenia voted for independence of the republic in a referendum. The immediate aftermath of the vote was the Armenian Supreme Soviet's declaration of independence on 21 September. On 27 October, the Supreme Soviet of Turkmenistan declared the independence of Turkmenistan from the Soviet Union. On 1 December, Ukraine held a referendum, in which more than 90% of residents supported the Act of Independence of Ukraine.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: By November, the only Soviet Republics that had not declared independence were Russia, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. That same month, seven republics (Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, and Tajikistan) agreed to a new union treaty that would form a confederation called the Union of Sovereign States. However, this confederation never materialized.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 8 December, Boris Yeltsin, Leonid Kravchuk and Stanislav Shushkevich—the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus (which had adopted the name in August 1991)—as well as the prime ministers of the three republics, met in Minsk, Belarus, where they signed the Belovezha Accords. These declared that the Soviet Union had ceased to exist "as a subject of international law and geopolitical reality." It repudiated the 1922 union treaty that established the Soviet Union and established the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in the Union's place. On 12 December, the Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR ratified the accords and recalled the Russian deputies from the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. Although this has been interpreted as the moment that Russia seceded from the Union, Russia took the position that it was not possible to secede from a state that no longer existed. The lower chamber of the Supreme Soviet, the Council of the Union, was forced to halt its operations, as the departure of the Russian deputies left it without a quorum.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Doubts remained about the legitimacy of the 8 December accords, since only three republics took part. Thus, on 21 December in Alma-Ata, the Alma-Ata Protocol expanded the CIS to include Armenia, Azerbaijan and the five republics of Central Asia. They also pre-emptively accepted Gorbachev's resignation. With 11 of the 12 remaining republics (all except Georgia) having agreed that the Union no longer existed, Gorbachev bowed to the inevitable and said he would resign as soon as the CIS became a reality (Georgia joined the CIS in 1993, only to withdraw in 2008 after its war with Russia; the three Baltic states were never a part of the commonwealth, instead joining both the European Union and NATO in 2004.)


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 24 December 1991, the Russian SFSR—now renamed the Russian Federation—with the concurrence of the other republics of the Commonwealth of Independent States, informed the United Nations that it would inherit the Soviet Union's membership in the UN—including the Soviet Union's permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. No member state of the UN formally objected to this step. The legitimacy of this act has been questioned by some legal scholars as the Soviet Union itself was not constitutionally succeeded by the Russian Federation, but merely dissolved. Others argued that the international community had already established the precedent of recognizing the Soviet Union as the legal successor of the Russian Empire, and so recognizing the Russian Federation as the Soviet Union's successor state was valid.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 25 December, Gorbachev announced his resignation as President of the Soviet Union. The red hammer and sickle flag of the Soviet Union was lowered from the Senate building in the Kremlin and replaced with the tricolour flag of Russia. The next day, 26 December, the Soviet of Republics, the upper chamber of the Supreme Soviet, formally voted the Soviet Union out of existence (the lower chamber, the Council of the Union, had been left without a quorum after the Russian deputies withdrew), thus ending the life of the world's first and oldest socialist state. All former Soviet embassies became Russian embassies, and Russia received all nuclear weapons located in other former republics by 1996. A constitutional crisis in late 1993 escalated into violence, and the new Russian constitution that came into force at the end of the year abolished the last vestiges of the Soviet political system.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: On 1 November 1991, the RSFSR Congress of People's Deputies issued Decision No. 1831-1 "On the Legal Support of the Economic Reform" whereby the Russian president (Boris Yeltsin) was granted the right to issue decrees required for economic reform even if they contravened existing laws. Such decrees entered into force if they were not repealed within 7 days by the Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR or its Presidium. Five days later, Boris Yeltsin, in addition to his duties as president, assumed those of the prime minister. Yegor Gaidar became deputy prime minister and simultaneously economic and finance minister. On 15 November 1991, Boris Yeltsin issued Decree No. 213 "On the Liberalization of Foreign Economic Activity on the Territory of the RSFSR", whereby all Russian companies were allowed to import and export goods and acquire foreign currency (all foreign trade had previously been tightly controlled by the state). Following the issuance of Decree No. 213, on 3 December 1991 Boris Yeltsin issued Decree No. 297 "On the Measures to Liberalize Prices", whereby from 2 January 1992 most previously existing price controls were abolished.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The GKChP members and their accomplices were charged with treason in the form of a conspiracy aimed at capturing power. However, by January 1993, they had all been released from custody pending trial. The trial in the Military Chamber of the Russian Supreme Court began on 14 April 1993. On 23 February 1994, the State Duma declared amnesty for all GKChP members and their accomplices, along with the participants of the October 1993 crisis. They all accepted the amnesty, except for General Varennikov, who demanded the continuation of the trial and who was finally acquitted on 11 August 1994. The Russian Procuracy also wanted to charge former Deputy Defense Minister Vladislav Achalov, but the Russian Supreme Soviet refused to lift his immunity. Additionally, the Procuracy refrained from charging numerous other individuals accused of complicity in the coup, including the Army Chief of Staff.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: Thousands of people attended the funeral of Dmitry Komar, Ilya Krichevsky, and Vladimir Usov on 24 August 1991. Gorbachev posthumously made the three Heroes of the Soviet Union for their bravery in "blocking the way to those who wanted to strangle democracy.".


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: In 1991, a parliamentary commission tasked with investigating causes for the attempted coup was established under Lev Ponomaryov, but was dissolved in 1992 at Ruslan Khasbulatov's insistence.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The Five Eyes is an intelligence alliance consisting of the United States and the core Anglosphere founded during World War II that quickly shifted focus to the Eastern Bloc as the Cold War began. During the Cold War, the five nations (United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand) were inexorably linked. Although Australia and New Zealand were not NATO members (membership is only open to North Atlantic countries), they were allied to the US and the UK through ANZUS. New Zealand steered a more independent course as negotiations to host American nuclear materials broke down.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: This section includes reactions from nations that were officially Marxist–Leninist at the time, not former Warsaw Pact members that had begun transitioning to a multi-party system. Many but not all of these states formerly supported the Coup, others left ambivalent or unofficial support changing their position when the coup failed.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: The Warsaw Pact had dissolved in July, and its members had rapidly changed, with Marxist–Leninist pro-Soviet governments deposed or elected out of office. As a result, all criticized or expressed weary sentiments about events in Moscow. Some former pact members deployed armed forces to strategically important areas.


title: 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt

text: "The Event (2015 film)" (Событие) is a 2015 Russian documentary by Sergei Loznitsa that uses footage shot 19–24 August 1991 by camera operators of the Saint Petersburg Documentary film studio to tell the story of the coup as it unfolded in Leningrad.


title: MiHoYo

text: miHoYo Co., Ltd. () is a Chinese video game development and publishing company. In addition to games, the company has created various products such as animated series, novels, comics, music, and merchandise.


title: MiHoYo

text: The company is the creator of "Genshin Impact", an open-world action role-playing game released in 2020, which is one of the highest grossing mobile games. miHoYo also developed the game "Honkai Impact 3rd".


title: MiHoYo

text: Aiming to expand its content production, technology research, and publications outside China, miHoYo launched the brand HoYoverse under its subsidiary Cognosphere Pte., Ltd. in February 2022. Since then, miHoYo has been doing business globally under the brand and has operations in Singapore, United States, Canada, Japan, and South Korea.


title: MiHoYo

text: miHoYo also operates under the subsidiaries Shanghai miHoYo Yingtie Technology Co., Ltd. () and Shanghai miHoYo Tianming Technology Co., Ltd. (). The former is the publisher of "Genshin Impact", "", and "Zenless Zone Zero"; the latter is the developer of "Tears of Themis".


title: MiHoYo

text: The letters "H" and "Y" in miHoYo's name come from the names of Cai Haoyu and Luo Yuhao, and the letter "O" was added based on the fact that names of famous companies such as Facebook, Google and Microsoft contain that letter. Due to "HoYo" already being registered, "mi" from the VOCALOID software Hatsune Miku was prepended to the name. Hatsune Miku got picked because of her popularity among otakus.


title: MiHoYo

text: miHoYo began with three computer science students from Shanghai Jiao Tong University who shared an interest in technology and ACG (anime, comics, and games) culture: Cai "Hugh" Haoyu (), Liu "Forrest" Wei (), and Luo Yuhao (). Before establishing the miHoYo name, the three have worked on projects together. Their first project was an open-source literature community which won them scholarships worth CNY 200,000 at a competition.


title: MiHoYo

text: In 2010, the team developed an isometric tile-based game engine called the "Misato Engine" or "Misato2D" using Adobe Flash Player. Katsuragi Misato, a character from the Japanese franchise "Neon Genesis Evangelion", inspired the name. Using an upgraded version of the engine, they developed a game called "Legend of Saha" () for a Flash game development competition held during the second China Game Developers Conference (CGDC) in July of that year. The team won a cash prize of CNY 30,000 provided by Shanda Games. Shanda Games later outsourced them to develop a mini-game called "Bubble Hero" ().


title: MiHoYo

text: In January 2011, the three students set up the miHoYo studio in the D32 university dormitory at their campus. Later that year, Liu Wei, representing the group, participated in the New Entrepreneur Talents () competition and won third place. miHoYo got awarded a 50-square-meter office, located at No. 100 Qinzhou Road, with a term of six months and a CNY 100,000 interest-free loan from the Eaglet Program () of the Shanghai Technology Entrepreneurship Foundation for Graduates (). They moved from the dormitory to the office in December. Each person had a desk against the wall, and a large table filled with comics and light novels sat at the center of the room.


title: MiHoYo

text: No one had artistic ability, so Zhang Qinghua (), also known as CiCi, was contacted on Tencent social media. At that time, Zhang was an undergraduate student at the Guangdong University of Technology, School of Art and Design, Department of Animation. He was in the second half of his senior year when he met miHoYo's founders at his internship. The first character he got commissioned to design was Kiana Kaslana, the main character of "FlyMe2theMoon". As the only artist on the team, he created every artwork for their early titles.


title: MiHoYo

text: miHoYo launched "FlyMe2theMoon" on 28 September 2011, on the App Store as an independent developer. "Fly Me to the Moon", the ending theme song of the "Neon Genesis Evangelion" anime series, served as the basis of the game's concept. It inspired the team to create a puzzle game about a "magical girl flying [to] the moon." The game got developed using the Cocos2D software and the Box2D physics engine. The game's song titled "Moon Trip" was composed by VOCALOID music producer Yu Jianliu () and Lemonjolly wrote the lyrics. Yu used the Hatsune Miku voicebank for the song.


title: MiHoYo

text: "FlyMe2theMoon" received little financial success, and the three founders only had a monthly income of CNY 4,000. In search of an investor, Wei Liu represented the team in various university startup contests. The non-mainstream status of anime and gaming culture in China posed a challenge, and that their group was only composed of university graduates also made it difficult. After being turned down in these contests, they eventually got an angel investment of CNY 1,000,000 from Hangzhou Skye Network Technology Co., Ltd. (). It was miHoYo's only outside funding.


title: MiHoYo

text: On 13 February 2012, Shanghai miHoYo Network Technology Co., Ltd. () got officially established. Jin Zhicheng (), a member of the "FlyMe2theMoon" development team, left in March to take up a job offer at Cisco Systems (China) Research & Development Co., Ltd. (). He transferred his equities to Liu Wei and Luo Yuhao. During that time, Jin did a small amount of program development work and did not participate in company management. Qinghua Zhang first worked as an artist at 4399 Network Co., Ltd. () before he joined miHoYo Co., Ltd. in February 2012 as an art director and a supervisor. Cai Haoyu legally represents the company and serves as its chairman and general manager; he is also the controlling shareholder and the actual controller. Liu Wei and Luo Yuhao serve as directors. Cai is largest shareholder of miHoYo as he controls 41% of its shares; Liu and Luo control 22.6% and 21.4%, respectively. Hangzhou Miyi Investment Co., Ltd. () has the remaining 15% of the shares.


title: MiHoYo

text: Moving on from "FlyMe2theMoon", the team envisioned a more successful game. Inspired by the side-scrolling shooter game "Zombie Town" and their shared interest in the Japanese anime-manga series "Highschool of the Dead", they created their first game since the company's founding, "Houkai Gakuen", also known as "Zombiegal Kawaii". The project began in December 2011, and it took the team three months to create four or five demos for the game. The game got developed with the Unity engine (versions 3.2 to 3.5) and the Autodesk Maya computer graphics software. Within the next eight months, they expanded the gameplay with adjusted values and added systems. The game's first version came in November 2012, and the first public testing was in December.


title: MiHoYo

text: "Houkai Gakuen 2" or "Guns Girl Z", a pick-up-and-play arcade action game, got launched in June 2013. Later in August, the team began working on server architecture design and generation. The work on the peripheral system and game graphics came in November. Compared to "Houkai Gakuen", the development time of "Houkai Gakuen 2" was shorter because it used the underlying data, art assets, and core gameplay of the previous game, thus shortening the research and development needed. The core gameplay was further developed by copying and then converting the system of the game "Puzzle and Dragons" () into an action game, a process that took three months. The content taken from "Houkai Gakuen" got expanded with the addition of new characters, weapons, and clothing sets. The testing came on 26 January 2014, and then the game got released in March on the Bilibili platform.


title: MiHoYo

text: Though the game had some financial success, it had many technical problems such as top-up failure and server downtime. For a team only composed of seven people, this was hard. Later, the company ended up employing its players as staff. Within the same year, the "Honkai Impact 3rd" project began at the same time the company envisioned creating the "Honkai universe."


title: MiHoYo

text: The "Honkai Impact 3rd" project began in June 2014. On 6 July, Cai Haoyu attended the GameLook Game Open Day conference in Shanghai, where he made a speech on the development and promotion of "Houkai Gakuen 2." In the speech, he mentioned that the team was working on the third version of "Houkai Gakuen" and that its core gameplay was in progress.


title: MiHoYo

text: In March 2015, miHoYo started developing its engines for the game. They created a physics-based animation system; it can simulate the performance of various bodies based on physical formulas, showing more realistic character movements and destructive scene effects. It can also correct abrupt transitions between animations, making the animations smoother and more natural. In addition, miHoYo developed its technologies for 3D modeling, light mapping, and real-time and pre-rendering systems. Content production for the game began in October 2015. Creative influences on the combat gameplay were the game series "Bayonetta" and "Devil May Cry". The development team also studied games like "Guilty Gear Xrd" that used 3D cel-shading. Since no member on the team knew how to do 3D projects, transitioning from 2D to 3D was a challenge. Creating the artwork, model, and animation of Kiana Kaslana took six months. After a test run, the team discarded the work and restarted from scratch to establish the current system.


title: MiHoYo

text: "Honkai Impact 3rd" had its internal iOS beta in March 2016, launched in September, publicly tested, and then released in October. Recurring characters such as Kiana Kaslana, Raiden Mei, and Bronya Zaychik appear in a story different from previous games. Its gameplay involves role play and hack-and-slash action and also features gacha mechanics. In addition to the game, it got followed by multiple supplementary media such as an anime series, graphic novels, comics, and promotional videos. Though miHoYo's early titles were successful within Asia, the company did not reach global success until the release of "Honkai Impact 3rd". Months after its release in Mainland China, the following servers opened: 22 February 2017, for Japan; 18 May 2017, for Taiwan; 17 October 2017, for South Korea; 1 November 2017, for Southeast Asia; 28 March 2018, for North America and Europe. After being a mobile-exclusive game, "Honkai Impact 3rd" was made available for PC on 26 December 2019.


title: MiHoYo

text: Within two years after the release of "Honkai Impact 3rd", the seven-person company grew to include around 200 employees. Over 100 were involved in research and development. The average age of these employees was 29 years old; people under the age of thirty accounted for 84% of the company's employees. Four years later, the employee count grew to over 1,000.


title: MiHoYo

text: On 15 February 2017, miHoYo filed for an initial public offering (IPO) to the China Securities Regulatory Commission when the company was planning to raise over a billion Yuan. During the process, several concerns were under attention, including the company's dependence on a single intellectual property, the "Honkai" series. The main source of miHoYo's revenue was "Houkai Gakuen 2", accounting for 96.34%. The risk is that the company may not be able to continue to launch new products to meet the needs of players or update the content of their games, and they could face the loss of users. Another issue is that the company might fail to grasp changes in preferences, and the "Honkai" series loses appeal. On 19 December, miHoYo submitted an updated prospectus that included "Honkai Impact 3" in its revenue, accounting for 98.82% with "Houkai Gakuen 2". Due to unknown reasons, miHoYo withdrew its IPO application in 2020.


title: MiHoYo

text: In November 2018, miHoYo launched its official gamer community Miyou Club (), also known as miHoYo BBS. While used to disseminate official game information and event peripherals, it also features practical tools for players, such as calculators and character-building simulations. It also serves as a content creation platform for players. miHoYo Forums, the global counterpart of miHoYo BBS, launched on 16 January 2020. It got announced as the official forum for "Genshin Impact". Later, it got a new brand, "HoYoLAB." The HoYoLAB app had its closed beta testing starting on 1 June 2021, and launched on 15 July. In the Chinese forums, the mascot Miyouji () got revealed on 30 April 2020. Miyouji has different themed costumes following miHoYo's games, such as "Houkai Gakuen 2", "Honkai Impact 3rd", "Tears of Themis", and "Genshin Impact". Alongside Miyouji is the rabbit that appears in the forum's logo. HoYoLAB's mascot is Mimo, who also appears as the logo.


title: MiHoYo

text: "Genshin Impact" began its development in January 2017 with the working title "" (). At that time, producer Cai Haoyu considered creating a new project to enhance miHoYo's core research and development capabilities and present products with significant quality improvement to players in the future. The idea of creating an open-world game came out of that. During the next seven months, the team tried several prototypes. After Cai played Nintendo's "", the team took inspiration from the game's world exploration experience. Other inspirations came from the random events of "Grand Theft Auto", the strategy in "", and game developer Naughty Dog.


title: MiHoYo

text: The production team initially had 150 people. They underestimated the difficulty of creating an open world, so it grew to 300 people by mid-2019, then 500 by April 2020, and then 700 by February 2021. The research and development cost of the project began with 25 million USD and then exceeded 100 million, which was recouped two weeks after the game's release. Much of the game's budget got invested in music production. Yu-Peng Chen (), also known as Chen Zhiyi (), joined the project as a music producer and composed the scores for the Mondstadt and Liyue regions. Zhang Qinghua served as the senior art director.


title: MiHoYo

text: "Genshin Impact" had its first beta testing in June 2019, focused on core gameplay mechanisms and the Mondstadt region. In early 2020, the overseas promotion of the game got affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Development also got delayed by a month as working from home was almost impossible, and employees could not access office equipment. The second beta testing came in March and featured Liyue, and then the third beta testing came in July. The game got released on 28 September 2020.


title: MiHoYo

text: In September, miHoYo established strategic cooperation with Zhangjiajie () to promote cultural tourism in the city with the help of "Genshin Impact". The topography of Zhangjiajie's karst landscapes inspired the level designs of Jueyun Karst and Mt. Tianheng. After the agreement, two life-size Teleport Waypoints got installed at the Zhangjiajie National Forest Park () and Huangshi Village (). Next, miHoYo cooperated with Huanglong () for ecological environment protection. Huanglong's multicolored pools served as the inspiration for the level design of Luhua Pool.


title: MiHoYo

text: In November, miHoYo and the China Social Welfare Foundation () jointly launched the Yiqi Shouhu () charity program. During the event, all profits from "Tears of Themis" charity gift packs got donated to the foundation as relief for children with autism.


title: MiHoYo

text: On 4 March, miHoYo signed an agreement of strategic cooperation with Ruijin Hospital () to build the miHoYo Joint Laboratory of Encephalopathy Center of Ruijin Hospital (), also called the Ruijin-miHoYo Laboratory. The two parties will combine their respective advantages in medical research and information technology to jointly develop brain-computer interface technology research. Lü Baoliang (), a professor from the Department of Computer Science and Engineering of Shanghai Jiao Tong University, heads the laboratory; he was also the supervisor of miHoYo co-founder Cai Haoyu's master's thesis. The laboratory began with the research project "Clinical Research on Brain-Computer Interface Neuromodulation and Treatment of Refractory Depression."


title: MiHoYo

text: In May, miHoYo established the Communist Youth League Committee under Shanghai miHoYo Network Technology Co., Ltd. The committee aims to integrate youth into company development and partake in the innovation and publicization of traditional Chinese culture. The committee created comics and travel maps with the help of "Genshin Impact" material to promote Xuhui District cultural tourism landmarks. The character Paimon got formally named "Xuhui Youth Culture Star Promoter."


title: MiHoYo

text: On 12 July, the Xinhuo Charity Program () got jointly launched by the China Youth Development Foundation and Shanghai miHoYo Network Technology Co., Ltd. The project is committed to paying attention to and supporting the development of youth education. The first phase involved Tongzi Primary School () in Yunnan Province, which got support from various aspects such as hardware conditions, educational facilities, teacher training, etc. The project also aims to provide school uniforms for all students and launch a teacher training program for seventeen primary schools in Yanjin County.


title: MiHoYo

text: On 23 July, miHoYo delivered disaster relief supplies to Xinmi County in Henan Province. Henan Province experienced flooding due to heavy rainfall, affecting hundreds of people.


title: MiHoYo

text: In August, miHoYo Technology (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. got selected as a "Key National Cultural Export Enterprise" along with "Genshin Impact" as a "Key National Cultural Export Project" for the 2021-2022 period. Previously, the company and "Honkai Impact 3rd" got selected for those titles in 2019. The annual "List of National Cultural Export Key Enterprises and Key Projects" is organized by the offices of the Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Culture and Tourism, and the Central Propaganda Department.


title: MiHoYo

text: In September, Shanghai miHoYo Network Technology Co., Ltd. got promoted from a party branch to a party committee under the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The committee has five members, including Liu Wei as the committee secretary and miHoYo vice president Yin Chunbo ().


title: MiHoYo

text: On 26 November, the Internet Society of China () released the China Internet Enterprise Comprehensive Strength Index () for 2021. miHoYo got listed as one of "China's Top 100 Internet Enterprises with Comprehensive Strength"; miHoYo ranked 23rd on the list, 1st among Shanghai game companies, and 3rd among Shanghai internet companies. It was also the fifth consecutive time miHoYo got included in the list.


title: MiHoYo

text: In early 2022, miHoYo and NIO Capital led the first funding round for Energy Singularity, raising nearly CNY 400 million. Energy Singularity was established in 2021 in Shanghai, China. The company focuses on the research and development of HTS (High-Temperature Superconductor) magnets, plasma physics, and artificial intelligence technologies to commercialize fusion energy. Using the funded capital, the company will develop an experimental tokamak device planned to be operational by 2024.


title: MiHoYo

text: In February, Shanghai experienced a COVID-19 outbreak that led to a city-wide lockdown until June. In March, miHoYo responded to the critical stage of the epidemic control by purchasing batches of supplies and donating them to the Caohejing () and Hongmei () communities in Xuhui District. In April, the second batch of supplies included 10,000 sets of protective equipment, 10,000 bottles of hand sanitizer gel, 40,000 N95 masks, and 100,000 pieces of disinfection wipes. miHoYo also donated pillows and peripheral products for children at a makeshift hospital at Shilong Road (). In response to employees' needs, the company distributed food packages and epidemic prevention supplies to employees affected by the lockdown. The packages included fruits, vegetables, and disinfection and protection materials. Also provided were mental health counseling services.


title: MiHoYo

text: On 20 May, miHoYo participated in a funding round for Oriental Space Technology (Shandong) Co., Ltd. (), which raised CNY 400 million. The company focuses on aerospace technology and will develop a launch vehicle and a reusable liquid oxygen and kerosene rocket engine using the raised funds. The plan is for the rocket to launch in mid-2023.


title: MiHoYo

text: On 8 July, Shanghai miHoYo Network Technology Co., Ltd. had its first trade union congress. miHoYo vice president Yin Chunbo got elected as the chairman of the first session of miHoYo's trade union committee. Among those in attendance at the inaugural meeting was Chairman Zhu Weihong () of the Xuhui District Federation of Trade Unions (). Zhu stated that miHoYo's establishment of a trade union not only helps safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of employees, promotes the high-quality development of enterprises and industries, but also serves the economic development of trade union organizations.


title: MiHoYo

text: On 15 August, miHoYo released a video about the second phase of the Xinhuo Charity Program, which showed the completed construction of Tongzi Primary School's new building from the first phase. Students can study in the multimedia classrooms of the building with upgraded hardware. Furthermore, new street lamps got installed on the campus for the safety of the students at night. The second phase also included the construction of a waterway, flush toilet, bathroom, and solar-powered water stations for the student and staff dormitory in Bazha Village Central Primary School () in Qinghai Province (). The construction expects completion in the second half of 2022.


title: MiHoYo

text: In August 2022, miHoYo obtained information security certifications for ISO/IEC 27001 and ISO/IEC 27701 issued by the British Standards Institution (BSI). According to miHoYo's official announcement published in October 2022, the company had "undergone a comprehensive assessment, including strict on-site audits."


title: MiHoYo

text: In November, miHoYo collaborated with the Taofen Foundation () to jointly launch the Yuejian Weiming () charity project. More than 37,000 books worth 2 million Yuan got donated to a number of primary schools in Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture and Lancang Lahu Autonomous County of Yunnan Province. Aside from books, postcards written by "Tears of Themis" players were also given to students.


title: MiHoYo

text: On November 24, the Shanghai Cultural and Creative Industry Promotion Association () and Shanghai First Financial Media Co., Ltd. ()—under the guidance of the Shanghai Municipal Committee Propaganda Department—announced Shanghai miHoYo Yingtie Technology Co., Ltd. as one of the Top Ten Cultural Enterprises, company co-founder Liu Wei as one of the Top Ten People of the Year, and "Genshin Impact" as one of the Top Ten Cultural Brands of Shanghai.


title: 100 metres

text: The 100 metres, or 100-meter dash, is a sprint race in track and field competitions. The shortest common outdoor running distance, the dash is one of the most popular and prestigious events in the sport of athletics. It has been contested at the Summer Olympics since 1896 for men and since 1928 for women. The inaugural World Championships were in 1983.


title: 100 metres

text: The reigning 100 m Olympic or world champion is often named "the fastest man or woman in the world". Fred Kerley and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce are the reigning world champions; Marcell Jacobs and Elaine Thompson-Herah are the men's and women's Olympic champions.


title: 100 metres

text: On an outdoor 400-metre running track, the 100 m is held on the home straight, with the start usually being set on an extension to make it a straight-line race. There are three instructions given to the runners immediately before and at the beginning of the race: "on your marks," "set," and the firing of the starter's pistol. The runners move to the starting blocks when they hear the 'on your marks' instruction. The following instruction, to adopt the 'set' position, allows them to adopt a more efficient starting posture and isometrically preload their muscles: this will help them to start faster. A race-official then fires the starter's pistol to signal the race beginning and the sprinters stride forwards from the blocks. Sprinters typically reach top speed after somewhere between 50 and 60 m. Their speed then slows towards the finish line.


title: 100 metres

text: The 10-second barrier has historically been a barometer of fast men's performances, while the best female sprinters take eleven seconds or less to complete the race. The current men's world record is 9.58 seconds, set by Jamaica's Usain Bolt in 2009, while the women's world record of 10.49 seconds set by American Florence Griffith-Joyner in 1988 remains unbroken.


title: 100 metres

text: US athletes have won the men's Olympic 100 metres title more times than any other country, 16 out of the 28 times that it has been run. US women have also dominated the event, winning 9 out of 21 times.


title: 100 metres

text: At the start, some athletes play psychological games such as trying to be last to the starting blocks.


title: 100 metres

text: At high level meets, the time between the gun and first kick against the starting block is measured electronically, via sensors built in the gun and the blocks. A reaction time less than 0.1 s is considered a false start. The 0.2-second interval accounts for the sum of the time it takes for the sound of the starter's pistol to reach the runners' ears, and the time they take to react to it.


title: 100 metres

text: For many years a sprinter was disqualified if responsible for two false starts individually. However, this rule allowed some major races to be restarted so many times that the sprinters started to lose focus. The next iteration of the rule, introduced in February 2003, meant that one false start was allowed among the field, but anyone responsible for a subsequent false start was disqualified.


title: 100 metres

text: This rule led to some sprinters deliberately false-starting to gain a psychological advantage: an individual with a slower reaction time might false-start, forcing the faster starters to wait and be sure of hearing the gun for the subsequent start, thereby losing some of their advantage. To avoid such abuse and to improve spectator enjoyment, the IAAF implemented a further change in the 2010 season – a false starting athlete now receives immediate disqualification. This proposal was met with objections when first raised in 2005, on the grounds that it would not leave any room for innocent mistakes. Justin Gatlin commented, "Just a flinch or a leg cramp could cost you a year's worth of work." The rule had a dramatic impact at the 2011 World Championships, when current world record holder Usain Bolt was disqualified.


title: 100 metres

text: Runners usually reach their top speed just past the halfway point of the race and progressively decelerate to the finish. Maintaining that top speed for as long as possible is a primary focus of training for the 100 m. Pacing and running tactics do not play a significant role in the 100 m, as success in the event depends more on pure athletic qualities and technique.


title: 100 metres

text: The winner, by IAAF Competition Rules, is determined by the first athlete with their torso (not including limbs, head, or neck) over the nearer edge of the finish line. There is therefore no requirement for the entire body to cross the finish line. When the placing of the athletes is not obvious, a photo finish is used to distinguish which runner was first to cross the line.


title: 100 metres

text: Climatic conditions, in particular air resistance, can affect performances in the 100 m. A strong head wind is very detrimental to performance, while a tail wind can improve performances significantly. For this reason, a maximum tail wind of 2.0 m/s is allowed for a 100 m performance to be considered eligible for records, or "wind legal".


title: 100 metres

text: Furthermore, sprint athletes perform a better run at high altitudes because of the thinner air, which provides less air resistance. In theory, the thinner air would also make breathing slightly more difficult (due to the partial pressure of oxygen being lower), but this difference is negligible for sprint distances where all the oxygen needed for the short dash is already in the muscles and bloodstream when the race starts. While there are no limitations on altitude, performances made at altitudes greater than 1000 m above sea level are marked with an "A".


title: 100 metres

text: The 10-second mark had been widely considered a barrier for the 100 metres in men's sprinting. The first man to break the 10 second barrier was Jim Hines at the 1968 Summer Olympics. Since then, numerous sprinters have run faster than 10 seconds.


title: 100 metres

text: Only male sprinters have beaten the 100 m 10-second barrier, the vast majority of them being of West African descent. Namibian (formerly South-West Africa) Frankie Fredericks became the first man of non-West African heritage to achieve the feat in 1991 and in 2003 Australia's Patrick Johnson (an Indigenous Australian with Irish heritage) became the first sub-10-second runner without an African background.


title: 100 metres

text: In 2010, French sprinter Christophe Lemaitre became the first Caucasian to break the 10-second barrier. In 2017, Azerbaijani-born naturalized Turkish Ramil Guliyev followed and in 2018, Filippo Tortu became the first Italian to run under 10s.


title: 100 metres

text: In the Prefontaine Classic 2015 Diamond League meet at Eugene, Su Bingtian of China ran a time of 9.99 seconds, becoming the first East Asian athlete to officially break the 10-second barrier. On 1 August 2021, Su improved his Asian record at the Olympic semifinal in Tokyo with a time of 9.83. On 9 September 2017, Yoshihide Kiryū became the first man from Japan to break the 10-second barrier in the 100 metres, running a 9.98 (+1.8) at an intercollegiate meet in Fukui.


title: 100 metres

text: British sprinter Adam Gemili, an athlete with an Iranian-Moroccan ethnic background, became the first sprinter of Middle-Eastern and North African ancestry to legally break the barrier on 7 June 2015, having done so earlier in the same season with an excessive wind reading.


title: 100 metres

text: On 3 July 2022, Yupun Abeykoon became the first Sri Lankan as well as first South Asian sprinter in history ever to break 10 second barrier when he won the Resisprint International 2022 title in Switzerland. Yupun's achievement also meant Sri Lanka became the 32nd country in the world to have a sub-10 sprinter and Yupun also became the 167th member of the sub-10 club.


title: 100 metres

text: Major 100 m races, such as at the Olympic Games, attract much attention, particularly when the world record is thought to be within reach.


title: 100 metres

text: The men's world record has been improved upon twelve times since electronic timing became mandatory in 1977. The current men's world record of 9.58 s is held by Usain Bolt of Jamaica, set at the 2009 World Athletics Championships final in Berlin, Germany on 16 August 2009, breaking his own previous world record by 0.11 s. The current women's world record of 10.49 s was set by Florence Griffith-Joyner of the US, at the 1988 United States Olympic Trials in Indianapolis, Indiana, on 16 July 1988 breaking Evelyn Ashford's four-year-old world record by .27 seconds. The extraordinary nature of this result and those of several other sprinters in this race raised the possibility of a technical malfunction with the wind gauge which read at 0.0 m/s- a reading which was at complete odds to the windy conditions on the day with high wind speeds being recorded in all other sprints before and after this race as well as the parallel long jump runway at the time of the Griffith-Joyner performance. All scientific studies commissioned by the IAAF and independent organisations since have confirmed there was certainly an illegal tailwind of between 5 m/s – 7 m/s at the time. This should have annulled the legality of this result, although the IAAF has chosen not to take this course of action. The legitimate next best wind legal performance would therefore be Griffith-Joyner's 10.61s performance in the final the next day.


title: 100 metres

text: Some records have been marred by prohibited drug use – in particular, the scandal at the 1988 Summer Olympics when the winner, Canadian Ben Johnson was stripped of his medal and world record.


title: 100 metres

text: Jim Hines, Ronnie Ray Smith and Charles Greene were the first to break the 10-second barrier in the 100 m, all on 20 June 1968, the Night of Speed. Hines also recorded the first legal electronically timed sub-10 second 100 m in winning the 100 metres at the 1968 Olympics. Bob Hayes ran a wind-assisted 9.91 seconds at the 1964 Olympics.


title: 100 metres

text: Any performance with a following wind of more than 2.0 metres per second is not counted for record purposes. Below is a list of wind-assisted times (equal or superior to 9.80). Only times that are superior to legal bests are shown:


title: 100 metres

text: Any performance with a following wind of more than 2.0 metres per second is not counted for record purposes. Below is a list of wind-assisted times (equal or superior to 10.81). Only times that are superior to legal bests are shown:


title: IMAX

text: IMAX is a proprietary system of high-resolution cameras, film formats, film projectors, and theaters known for having very large screens with a tall aspect ratio (approximately either 1.43:1 or 1.90:1) and steep stadium seating.


title: IMAX

text: Graeme Ferguson, Roman Kroitor, Robert Kerr, and William C. Shaw were the co-founders of what would be named the IMAX Corporation (founded in September 1967 as Multiscreen Corporation, Limited), and they developed the first IMAX cinema projection standards in the late 1960s and early 1970s in Canada.


title: IMAX

text: IMAX GT is the large format as originally conceived. It uses very large screens of and, unlike most conventional film projectors, the film runs horizontally so that the image width can be greater than the width of the film stock. It is called a 70/15 format. It is used exclusively in purpose-built theaters and dome theaters, and many installations limit themselves to a projection of high quality, short documentaries.


title: IMAX

text: The high costs involved in the construction and maintenance of the dedicated buildings and projectors suggested the introduction of several compromises in the following years.


title: IMAX

text: To reduce costs, the IMAX SR and MPX systems were introduced in 1998 and 2004, respectively. The smaller projectors were used to retrofit existing theaters, so as to make IMAX available to multiplex and existing theaters, though losing much of the quality of the GT experience.


title: IMAX

text: Later came the introduction of the IMAX Digital 2K and IMAX with Laser 4K in 2008 and 2015 respectively, still limited in respect to the 70 megapixels of equivalent resolution of the original 15/70 film. Both technologies are purely digital and suitable to retrofit existing theaters. Since 2018, the Laser system has been employed to retrofit full dome installations, with limited results due to the large area of a dome screen.


title: IMAX

text: The IMAX film standard uses 70 mm film run through the projector horizontally. This technique produces an area that is about 8.3 times as large as the 35 mm format, and about 3.4 times as large as 70 mm film run through the projector vertically.


title: IMAX

text: The desire to increase the visual impact of film has a long history. In 1929, Fox introduced Fox Grandeur, the first 70 mm film format, but it quickly fell from use. In the 1950s, the potential of 35 mm film to provide wider projected images was explored in the processes of CinemaScope (1953) and VistaVision (1954), following multi-projector systems such as Cinerama (1952). While impressive, Cinerama was difficult to install and maintain, requiring careful alignment and synchronization of the multiple projectors. During Expo 67 in Montreal, the National Film Board of Canada's "In the Labyrinth" and Ferguson's "Man and the Polar Regions" both used complex multi-projector, multi-screen systems. Each encountered technical difficulties that led them to found a company called "Multiscreen", with the goal of developing a simpler approach.


title: IMAX

text: The single-projector/single-camera system they eventually settled upon was designed and built by Shaw based upon a novel "Rolling Loop" film-transport technology purchased from Peter Ronald Wright Jones, a machine shop worker from Brisbane, Australia. Film projectors do not continuously flow the film in front of the bulb, but instead "stutter" the film travel so that each frame can be illuminated in a momentarily-paused still image. This requires a mechanical apparatus to buffer the jerky travel of the film strip. The older technology of running 70 mm film vertically through the projector used only five sprocket perforations on the sides of each frame; however, the IMAX method used fifteen perforations per frame. The previous mechanism was inadequate to handle this intermittent mechanical movement that was three times longer, and so Jones's invention was necessary for the novel IMAX projector method with its horizontal film feed. As it became clear that a single, large-screen image had more impact than multiple smaller ones and was a more viable product direction, Multiscreen changed its name to IMAX. Co-founder Graeme Ferguson explained how the name IMAX originated:


title: IMAX

text: ... the incorporation date [of the company was] September 1967. ... [The name change] came a year or two later. We first called the company Multiscreen Corporation because that, in fact, was what people knew us as. ... After about a year, our attorney informed us that we could never copyright or trademark Multivision. It was too generic. It was a descriptive word. The words that you can copyright are words like Kleenex or Xerox or Coca-Cola. If the name is descriptive, you can't trademark it so you have to make up a word. So we were sitting at lunch one day in a Hungarian restaurant in Montreal and we worked out a name on a placemat on which we wrote all the possible names we could think of. We kept working with the idea of maximum image. We turned it around and came up with IMAX.


title: IMAX

text: The name change actually happened more than two years later, because a key patent filed on January 16, 1970, was assigned under the original name Multiscreen Corporation, Limited. IMAX Chief Administration Officer Mary Ruby was quoted as saying, "Although many people may think "IMAX" is an acronym, it is, in fact, a made-up word."


title: IMAX

text: "Tiger Child", the first IMAX film, was demonstrated at Expo '70 in Osaka, Japan. The first permanent IMAX installation was built at the Cinesphere theatre at Ontario Place in Toronto. It debuted in May 1971, showing the film "North of Superior". The installation remained in place during Ontario Place's hiatus for redevelopment. The Cinesphere was renovated while Ontario Place was closed and re-opened on November 3, 2017, with IMAX 70 mm and IMAX with laser illumination.


title: IMAX

text: During Expo '74 in Spokane, Washington, an IMAX screen that measured was featured in the US Pavilion (the largest structure in the expo). It became the first IMAX Theatre to not be partnered with any other brand of movie theatres. About five million visitors viewed the screen, which covered the viewer's total visual field when looking directly forward. This created a sensation of motion in most viewers, and motion sickness in some.


title: IMAX

text: Another IMAX 3D theatre was also built in Spokane; however, its screen size is less than half. Due to protests, the City of Spokane officials decided to work with the IMAX Corporation to demolish the theatre, under the condition they renovate the former US Pavilion itself into IMAX's first permanent "outdoor" giant-screen theatre. The plan was to use material on the inside of the structure similar to that used when first constructed. However, it was expected to last only five years, due to weather conditions destroying previous materials. Concept art has been released in videos featured on Spokane's renovation site, and its budget revealed that seating is planned for more than 2,000.


title: IMAX

text: The first permanent IMAX Dome installation, the Eugene Heikoff and Marilyn Jacobs Heikoff Dome Theatre at the Reuben H. Fleet Science Center, opened in San Diego's Balboa Park in 1973. It doubles as a planetarium theater. The first permanent IMAX 3D theatre was built in Vancouver, British Columbia, for "Transitions" at Expo '86, and was in use until September 30, 2009. It was located at the tip of Canada Place, a Vancouver landmark.


title: IMAX

text: In 2008, IMAX extended its brand into traditional theaters with the introduction of Digital IMAX, a lower-cost system that uses two 2K digital projectors to project on a 1.90:1 aspect ratio screen. This lower-cost option, which allowed for the conversion of existing multiplex theater auditoriums, helped IMAX to grow from 299 screens worldwide at the end of 2007 to over 1,000 screens by the end of 2015. , there were 1,302 IMAX theatres located in 75 countries, of which 1,203 were in commercial multiplexes.


title: IMAX

text: The switch to digital projection came at a steep cost in image quality, with 2K projectors having roughly an order of magnitude less resolution than traditional IMAX film projectors. Maintaining the same 7-story screen size would only make this loss more noticeable, so many new theaters were instead built with significantly smaller screens. These newer theaters with much lower resolution and much smaller screens soon began to be referred to by the derogatory name "LieMAX", particularly because the company still marketed the new screens similarly to the old ones, without making the major differences clear to the public, going so far as to market the smallest "IMAX" screen, having 10 times less area, similarly to the largest while persisting with the same brand name.


title: IMAX

text: Since 2002, some feature films have been converted into IMAX format for displaying in IMAX theatres, and some have also been (partially) shot in IMAX. By late 2017, 1,302 IMAX theatre systems were installed in 1,203 commercial multiplexes, 13 commercial destinations, and 86 institutional settings in 75 countries, with less than a quarter of those having the capability to show 70mm film at the resolution of the large format as originally conceived.


title: IMAX

text: The IMAX cinema process increases the image resolution by using a larger film frame; in relative terms, a frame of IMAX format film has three times the theoretical horizontal resolution of a frame of 35 mm film. To achieve such increased image resolution, which IMAX estimates at approximately 12,000 lines (6,000 line pair modulations) of horizontal resolution (12K), 65 mm film stock passes horizontally through the IMAX movie camera, 15 perforations at a time. At 24 frames per second, this means that the film moves through the camera at per minute (just over 6 km/h). In a conventional 65 mm camera, the film passes vertically through the camera, five perforations at a time, or per minute. In comparison, in a conventional 35 mm camera, 35 mm film passes vertically through the camera, at four (smaller) perforations at a time, which translates to per minute.


title: IMAX

text: In the Todd-AO 70 mm-format of widescreen cinema, the image area of a 65 mm film-frame is ; in the IMAX-format of widescreen cinema, the film-frame dimensions are . To match the standard image resolution of the moving image produced with the film-speed of 24 frames per second, an IMAX film requires three times the length of (negative) film stock required for a 65 mm film of comparable scope and cinematic technique.


title: IMAX

text: In March 2022, IMAX announced a new initiative in cooperation with Kodak, Panavision, and FotoKem to develop "a new fleet of next generation IMAX film cameras", with a goal to deploy the first four units in the next two years. Christopher Nolan and Jordan Peele are among a group of advisors, made up of filmmakers and cinematographers, assisting in identifying new specs and features for the prototype development phase.


title: IMAX

text: In 2011, IMAX announced a 4K 3D digital camera. The camera was developed alongside Vision Research and AbelCine, integrating two Phantom 65 engines. A prototype camera was used for the documentary "Born to be Wild", in which approximately 10% of the finished film was shot with the system. The company has said they have no intention of replacing the higher resolution film cameras with the new digital camera, but the latter can be used in scenes that require a lightweight or relatively small 3D camera. While IMAX has completed the production camera and has placed it in service on several films, they have no plans to produce an IMAX film solely with the new digital system. "" is the first feature film partially filmed with the Phantom 65 IMAX 3D camera.


title: IMAX

text: In 2015, IMAX announced a 2D digital camera that was developed alongside Arri, the camera being based on the latter company's Arri Alexa 65 technology. The first production to use the camera was "". The Russo brothers have stated that they solely used the Arri Alexa IMAX on "" (2018) and "" (2019).


title: IMAX

text: For "", two ARRI Alexa IMAX cameras were combined in a rig to provide native 3D, with the film containing 98% of IMAX footage.


title: IMAX

text: In September 2020, IMAX launched the "Filmed In IMAX" program, which certifies high-quality digital cameras that can be used to create IMAX-format films. As the scope of certified cameras expands, it will be easier for filmmakers to create films to meet the projection needs of the IMAX giant screen theater. None of the certified cameras in the table below yet does 12K. The Blackmagic URSA Mini Pro 12K is not in the table below because it is not yet certified.


title: IMAX

text: "" (shot with the Sony CineAlta Venice) and "Dune" (shot with the Arri Alexa LF and Mini LF) were among the first films that used IMAX-certified cameras. Other films between 2021 and 2023 that captured with this program are "The Suicide Squad" (shot with the Red Ranger Monstro and Komodo), "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings" (shot with the Arri Alexa LF and Mini LF), "The Battle at Lake Changjin" and "The Battle at Lake Changjin II" (shot with the Red Ranger Monstro), "Eternals" (shot with the Arri Alexa LF and Mini LF), "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" (shot with Panavision Millennium DXL2), "" (Shot with the Arri Alexa LF and Mini LF), "" (Shot with the Sony CineAlta Venice), "The Marvels" (Shot with the Arri Alexa LF and Mini LF) and "" (Shot with the Arri Alexa LF and Mini LF).


title: IMAX

text: The IMAX format is generically called "15/70" film, the name referring to the 15 sprocket holes or perforations per frame. The film's bulk and weight require horizontal platters, rather than conventional vertically mounted film reels. IMAX film is fed through the projector horizontally, and the film is drawn from the inner circumference of the platter, not from the outer circumference like in conventional film reels. A system is in place to keep the film in the outer circumference from flying outwards due to centrifugal force while the platter is spinning. IMAX film is shipped to theaters in several small reels that are spliced into one continuous length that is then wound into a platter, a process that may take hours to complete. Films may be several kilometers in length: "Avatar", which was 2:45 hours in duration, was close to long. Platters are handled using special forklifts. IMAX platters range from diameter to accommodate 1 to 2.75 hours of film. Platters with a 2.5 hour feature film weigh . IMAX uses ESTAR-based print film in their 15/70 rolling-loop film projection systems. ESTAR-based print film provides greater precision. The chemical development process does not change the size or shape of ESTAR print film, and IMAX's pin registration system ("especially that of the camera mechanism") does not tolerate either sprocket-hole or film-thickness variations, but the film can still swell or shrink under varying temperature and humidity. This requires projection booths to be kept at a temperature of between 20 and 23.8 °C and a humidity of 50%. The film is too large to be moved using its sprockets, so they are instead used for registration, to aid in aligning the film. A feature film platter can cost to print. The camera negative is actually 65 mm film stock, but it runs horizontally and with 15 perforations per frame. The camera, like the projector, has a vacuum system; this makes the camera noisy, forbidding the recording of quiet scenes. The camera has enough film for three minutes of shooting. The large frame of the film also imposes optical limitations such as an extremely shallow depth of field when shooting with an open aperture.