8mm Forum: Prints from Commercial 16mm Negatives

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Posted by Stewart McSporran (Member # 128) on June 28, 2009, 11:08 AM:

There are some 16mm negatives on sale on E-Bay US that I'd be interested in. However this raises two questions:

1. Where in the UK could I get a positive print made; and what sort of price (B&W) are we talking for about 200 feet?

2. Copyright. One is a Betty Boop singalong and the other is a Mae West singalong. Given their age they're possibly out of copyright, but one never knows. Would this be an issue in trying to have a print run off?

thanks
Stewart

Posted by Colin Auty (Member # 231) on June 28, 2009, 01:36 PM:

Hi Stewart,
East Anglian Film Archive do small guage film printing as well as
film to video transfers.Their website is www.eafa.org.uk , and e-mail address eafa@uea.ac.uk.

As far as the copyright issue, the British Film Institute have a list of public domain films on their web site.

Colin

Posted by Joe McAllister (Member # 825) on June 28, 2009, 03:31 PM:

There are still a few labs that could make a print but the question I would ask is how good is the neg. If the titles are public domain its likely that these are dupe negs which may produce soot and whitewash results with low hissy sound.
Even with properly sourced material to get good quality prints from a combined sound and picture neg is difficult and may take several attempts.
Even if you go the telecine route negative soundtracks produce poor results on transfer.
The phrase "pig in a poke" comes to mind.

Posted by Stewart McSporran (Member # 128) on June 28, 2009, 03:56 PM:

Thanks for the info guys. The negs are currently at $10 and I'm quite prepared to risk that sort of money.

Colin, I've just spent half an hour trawling the BFI website and can't find the list you mention. Do you have a link to it?

Posted by John Whittle (Member # 22) on June 28, 2009, 04:21 PM:

The problem with buying negatives is you can't tell the quality until you make a print. Black and white print stock is an endangered species if not extinct. In practice subjects generally had two negatives, action and track. This was necessary because the photographic qualities necessary for picture are vastly different than for sound recording. Also sound records should be original from a sound recorder and not a dupe.

When you get a negative from a PD source, it's unknow what the "original" was. Another 16mm dupe? A 35mm release print? and what condition was the original--well used or pristine?

Then who and how was the sound made? If just a print from the original, you're going to have problems since the edge effect will kill any high frequency and since many of these dupes were made by collectors with bathtubs, the control of density and gamma are poor at best.

But if you get a decent negative, be prepared to pay over $1 per foot for a single first trial print. Perhaps you can find a lab which would make a one-light workprint of the negative and you'll likely have to settle for color stock which takes a very heavy filter pack when printed from a black and white dupe.

Telecine would give you a chance to correct many problems, but you can't put back things that aren't in the negative to begin with. Cost is again a factor and a telecine suite with a colorist can cost several hundred dollars an hour. Of course there is the drop it off drug store transfer as well which is much cheaper but the results are consistent with the price.

The titles are likely PD, but be prepared to prove it to a lab so that they won't be considered liable for infringement. If the negatives are indeed PD, they should have the original Paramount opening for the Betty Boop title, if it's NTA then it's been made from a tv print from the 1950s. Not all Betty Boop titles are PD, by the way and anything that was in copyright in 1976 is still protected today. In the US the term was 28/28 so that would put anything prior to 1920 in PD without protection, otherwise it would have to have missed a renewal filing. Laws and terms are different in the UK. One L&H title which was PD in the US was under copyright in the UK by Roehauer (sp?) so a full search needs to be done depending on where you are.

John

Posted by Colin Auty (Member # 231) on June 29, 2009, 02:24 PM:

Hi Stewart

try this link http://ftvdb.bfi.org.uk/sift/organisation/85121

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