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Author
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Topic: Color Dupes of PD Titles
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John Whittle
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 791
From: Northridge, CA USA
Registered: Jun 2003
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posted October 07, 2009 03:28 PM
When dealing with black and white, it's a pretty simple lab matter to make a composite dupe negative and use it for making release prints on black and white positive stock. If the origining release print is clean and complete and of normal contrast, an acceptable dupe can be made. There are trade offs from the original, mainly in sound quality.
But when it comes to color, it's a entirely different matter.
First there were two ways that color prints were made by the "dupers": positive and reversal. Reversal materials were limited to:
Anscochrome (sound prints had a silver suflide track of a yellowish appearance.)
Ektachrome of several stocks over the years with either a silver sulfide track (7388) or a positive silver track (7389).
Eastman Reversal Color print (commonly called Kodachrome print) of either 5269 or 7387. The early 5269 had a silver sulfide track but later prints were a postive silver track as were 7387. These prints look alot like a Technicolor release print both on the bench and on the screen. The big giveaway to the casual users is that the area in the sprocket area is black, not clear.
And then color positive from an internegative.
The first three methods produced varying results with rather poor sound quality on the silver suflide prints and even worse if the print isn't treated (applicated) on the sound track during processing and thus has a dye track (like Technicolor blue tracks or Cinecolor prints).
The big problem is that reversal prints are expensive, the Kodachrome 7387 and 5269 had to be processed by Kodak (there were a few independent labs like Viewmaster and Cinechrome in San Francisco but they were rare). The process was complicated and unless run in large quantities, very expensive.
Anscochrome and Ektachrome could be developed from kits or mixes but generally were softer focus and lower sound quality.
Color correction or lack thereof was common on labs working with old "J" Bell & Howell prints that generally only had a filter slot for color filters.
When we get into color positive, the "duper" had to take his original and make an internegative and then a color positive print. This system was originally designed for 16mm producers who shot Ektachrome Commercial and made an answer print on 7387 and then when on to 7271 internegative and a color positive release print. Also major features would take an interpositive and reduction print a 16mm dupe negative and then make color prints. These methods also required an optical sound negative recorded for the proper density for color positive prints. Alot of control and care is needed in running this process.
So what happens with a given title. Let's say we find a print of a cartoon that we know to be in the public domain. Hopefully it's in good condition and in best circumstances it would be a 35mm release print. First off the contrast was ideal for projection so any additional lab work will only increase the contrast and with the stocks and dyes involved, there will be problems with color accuracy.
So the first step is to make a 16mm internegative (not a dupe negative since we need the 7271 stock which is designed to see positive dyes without a dye mask) and then to take the print and put it up on a film photograph and re-record the sound track from the print to a 16mm A-wind negative sound track.
Now with these two elements, we can use them to make up a 16mm color positive print (or by extension we could use a CORP [continous optical reduction printer] to make regular or super8 prints from the 16mm negative. The regular 8 or super8 prints would have to be "sounded" or have the sound transfered onto the prints. We would make a 16mm master magnetic track just as we made the 16mm optical sound track negative.
Since we don't have access to the original materials, chances are we will find a 16mm tv print (from NTA or the like) that has started fading. There isn't too much you can do here unless you want to spend lots of money and do silver seps and try and adjust the color back that way, direct contact printing is pretty limited to a certain range or color correction and it's like putting filters on your projector lens.
So these are the ideas, but the "dupers" were in it to make money and often one guy would buy a print and use it for his master and thus another generation ensued. It gets worse and worse with some of the Bowery Boys titles that are floating around where it's been duped four or five times, the sound track is off center and it's been misprinted so many times that it's a distored mess.
There is this problem with printing sound on film. The picture negative should have a good grey scale and transfer it smoothly. The sound track (in the case of Area) is a high contrast image and should be black or white and nothing in between. To do this, on the original recording it's made to a density where when it's printed it will compensate for edge fill in. This is done with a cross-modulation test and carefully watched by both the sound company and the labroratory.
When the tracks start being duplicated on film, this all goes out the window and so you start getting muffled high freqencies and a lot of distortion. Few if any of the "dupers" made re-recorded sound track negatives. It just required more equipment, more expensive and more expertise.
So those are some of the pitfalls you find when you start looking at those dupes floating around from the 60s and 70s.
Today the cost of film makes this all but impossible. 16mm black and white 7302 rawstock is now .076345, Eastman color 3383 is .0524 per foot. There is no color reversal print stock, there is no black and white reversal print stock and there is no color internegative film in the current catalog.
So methods are more limited today even if you could get a permit to develop the product in your area (sewer restrictions, silver recovery, etc).
John
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John Whittle
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 791
From: Northridge, CA USA
Registered: Jun 2003
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posted October 09, 2009 04:07 PM
Continuous Optical Reduction Printers were made by Bell & Howell, Peterson and Hollywood Film Company. In the haydays of Super8, a 16mm negative would expose four rows of Super 8 images on 35mm stock and then the prints were developed, sounded and slit. There were even darkroom sound transfer machines. There were also two row machines which used 16mm stock that was perforated with three rows of Super8 perfs. One edge was discarded and both prints ran the same direction instead of up and back.
16mm prints were also produced on 35mm stock (which allowed the lab to use the same processing equipment with soft touch drive rollers) in either 35/32 which was up and down printing with the sound track in the middle and 35/16 which was up and up in sync with sound tracks in two position. The 35/32 was easier to develop with a single sound track applicator wheel where the the 35/16 required two wheels and wash station aiming was critical. As I recall, 35/16 was used by Metrocolor and Technicolor and CFI and DeLuxe used 35/32 along with Movielab, Pathe and most of the New York labs. With 35/32 you could use the single 16mm negative and A-wind negative sound track and just turn the rawstock and make another print on the reverse run. 35/16 produced two prints in a single pass. You could do the same with 35/32 if you made a special negative, but recording a sound track was tricky. There were sound recorders that produced the 35/16 track and there was a single sync point.
Most of the "duper" guys ran only single 16mm which is good because you need a good machine shop and technicians to keep a film slitter in spec.
John
[ October 09, 2009, 06:09 PM: Message edited by: John Whittle ]
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