Tobis Portuguesa

Background

Tobis Portuguesa is a Portuguese film production and lab processing company. Established in June 3, 1932 as a Portuguese branch of the German studio Tobis Film, Tobis produced many of the major works in Portuguese cinema for three decades before collapsing in the early 1960s.

1st Logo (November 7, 1933)

Visuals: There is a square version of the shield of Portugal's coat of arms (a white rectangle with 5 blue escudetcheons arranged as a cross, each containing 5 silver bezants arranged as a quincunx, which is surrounded by a red border containing 7 golden castles). It then fades to a light grey background with a large dark grey square containing the text as follows:

TOBIS
PORTUGUESA

in white. The text is seen to have a shadow, along with the square.

Technique: Rostrum camera.

Audio: The opening theme.

Availability: Only seen on A Canção de Lisboa, Portugal's second sound full-length movie, but the first fully made domestically.

2nd Logo (1933-1970)

Visuals: On a black background, the white text "TOBIS" zooms in letter by letter and turns into red. Then the word "PORTUGUESA" in white wipes in below it. Finally, the word "APRESENTA" appears.

Trivia: Notice it's arranged in a similar way to the logo of the original German Tobis.

Technique: Cel animation and rostrum camera.

Audio: A drumroll, followed by a cymbal crash.

Availability: Seen of reissues of Tobis' early movies, such as Sonhar é Fácil and Ala-Arriba!.