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Author
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Topic: Low fade print quality from major labels/studios vs individual label
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Winbert Hutahaean
Film God
Posts: 5468
From: Nouméa, New Caledonia
Registered: Jun 2003
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posted July 09, 2012 02:58 PM
Hi there,
I found every digest released by major labels even if the prints are on LPP or AGFA they are not as good as those prints released by individual labels.
The major labels I meant are such as; Ken film, Film Office, Universal 8, Walton Film, Mountain Films, MGM, etc
While the individual labels are: Derann, CHC, Red Fox, DCR, PM Film, etc.
Those low fade prints from major labels do not have deep black or strong skin colors plus the saturation is so weak, while prints from individual label are the opposite.
Is this related to the number of prints were struck?
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Winbert
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Hugh Thompson Scott
Film God
Posts: 3063
From: Gt. Clifton,Cumbria,England
Registered: Jan 2012
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posted July 09, 2012 03:26 PM
Can't agree on that one Winbert,bit of a sweeping statement
really.The colour on some of the Walton releases are exemplary,
cases in point being their features of "Witchfinder General",
"Hannie Caulder", "One Million Years B.C.","Curse of the Crimson
Altar" etc.The same with Mountain,I have some of their colour
features like "Invaders From Mars", "The Blood Demon" and
"Blackbeard the Pirate" and all have well saturated colour
PM FILMS releases like "Assault on Precinct 13" ,"The Water Babies""Golden Rendezvous" are very good but don;t compare
with some of the above,a bit like comparing lpp with IB Tech.
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Winbert Hutahaean
Film God
Posts: 5468
From: Nouméa, New Caledonia
Registered: Jun 2003
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posted July 10, 2012 11:11 AM
Hugh, i was thinking just like in other industry where an individual suite will be much better than the mass production ones. The same thing happen to shoes or furniture where lower number production will be near perfect than those made by big companies.
quote:
You often appear to want the very best at the lowest price.
Joe, what that is supposed to mean? it does not seem related to the topic at all!.
Is this a joke that I could not get it (since I am not an English speaker) or are you trying to insult me?
I am not nitpicking like you said. I have started this very topic since two years ago here:
Old prints (e.g. Ken Films, Marketing, U-8, UFA, etc) that have held color
And you can see some members have contributed their screen shots. Although generally the screen shots show they have good color, and I admit than in that post, but nothing can beat the quality made by individual companies as I said above.
If the problems are like you said:
quote:
preprint material used, lab used, and quality control both in the editing room and at the lab
then explore from that and no need to rise such statement that can offend other.
From the above old topic, we can see that those prints made from big companies will tend to be pale (except one SW "TESB"). Below some screen shots from Derann and Kempinski prints for comparison:
Wizard of Oz, the
Glen Miller Story, the
Gone with the Wind
Jason and the Argonauts
Meet me in St Louis
Abbys, the
Independence Day, the
West Side Story, the
ps: the above screen shots are originally taken from Super 8mm prints. I collected them from Ebay from a seller in Canada. None above prints are mine.
cheers,
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Winbert
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Osi Osgood
Film God
Posts: 10204
From: Mountian Home, ID.
Registered: Jul 2005
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posted July 10, 2012 12:52 PM
I agree with Luis on that one. I have seen the Kempski print of "Ben Hur", and I have the Derann print of the same, and the earlier Kempski print is much better.
However, I must congratulate Derann for keeping the print quality so good for so long. There are the occasional botched Derann prints, but I base this more upon the lab than Derann.
For instance, Fantasia 2000. Derann had a lovely pin sharp print to work with, but all the prints seem to have turned excessively blue, and I mean EXCESSIVELY! It's really un-watchable, quite frankly, (except for the "Rhapsody in Blue" sequence, haha!)
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"All these moments will be lost in time, just like ... tears, in the rain. "
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Hugh Thompson Scott
Film God
Posts: 3063
From: Gt. Clifton,Cumbria,England
Registered: Jan 2012
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posted July 10, 2012 12:54 PM
On the point that Luis makes,that part I can agree on,as I have
Kemski's Ben Hur feature (bought from Derann's ex library)
and I have had the reprint from Derann,which although had
good colour,the contrast was overdone on the print and shadow
detail was lost.I ended up keeping the ex library print and sold
on the new copy.My logic being that I can put up with a few
scratches at the benefit of far better print quality.Likewise with
the releases from Lone Wolf that had better print than Derann
when they took over.Companies like Walton,Film office etc
on the whole their product is beyond reproach,as they did
strive to obtain the best materials to work from.
Companies like MGM & Ken Films I would have thought were
far bigger outfits than Walton Films.
If I'm picking this up correctly,I think the point Winbert is
trying to make is that the S/8 films that someone like MGM
or Ken Films,were not up to the standard of some other
companies.It's like Joe said,it all depends on the negative you're
given to work from.I would agree that some of the MGMs were
not good,likewise with some of the Ken films.To complicate
things still further,some of the Ken films were done in the UK
and they weren't as good as their US counterparts.Some of the
best B/W prints I ever saw were Ken films 200's,the "Son of Kong" clip had far better definition than Mountain's feature
as did the 200' of "Mighty Joe Young" over the feature,which
tells me that Ken had access to better preprint than Mountain.
All in all it can get very complicated,with different film stock
used over the years,and improvements in the trade.The bottom
line for me is,if it's a title I really want,I don't care about acetate
if it's printed on sellotape, I don't mind.Film is Film,and as long
as I can show them,I won't be losing sleep over print fade in
twenty years time,I probably won't be here.Life is too short to
bother about trivialities.
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Winbert Hutahaean
Film God
Posts: 5468
From: Nouméa, New Caledonia
Registered: Jun 2003
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posted July 10, 2012 01:11 PM
Guys, as my post above, I would rather include Kempinski as the individual company ( = small number production) than the big ones. We can see that "Ben Hur" was released by Derann and Kempinski but at the same time also was released by a big company, MGM (both digest and three parter). This is suffice to say that apart from big comapny, there was a special rights given to the individual company to release this title for their segmented (niche) market.
Now we can see any prints from MGM for this title, although they are good, but nothing to compare the quality of the same prints from Derann or Kempinski.
quote:
If I'm picking this up correctly,I think the point Winbert is trying to make is that the S/8 films that someone like MGM or Ken Films,were not up to the standard of some other
companies.
Exactly Hugh.
So I need to see (screen shots is the best) if any from U8, Ken Films, MGM, Walton, Film Office etc pitns, that have nice saturation like the sample screen shots above.
cheers,
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Winbert
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Hugh Thompson Scott
Film God
Posts: 3063
From: Gt. Clifton,Cumbria,England
Registered: Jan 2012
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posted July 10, 2012 03:23 PM
I promise I will get a digital camera,even though it goes against the grain.Meanwhile,take the Star Wars films that were put out
in the late 70s early 80s and they were done by Ken Films,
compare them to the Marketing versions,and its a different film
altogether,now Marketing Film are no back street business, but
they got the best material to work from, and it shows.Likewise
with Piccolo Film when they released "Sinbad & the Eye of the
Tiger",their release puts the Columbia to shame in all depts.
It has has already been said that it depends on the labs used,note
the lovely print quality that Derann got from the Ranlk labs before they closed.
Consider the release of "Superman"(400' edition) and the
200' "Star Wars" these were very popular films and were
farmed out to various labs, and look at the results,some were
ptinted light,others soft focus some okay, now I'll bet they were
all given the same preprint material to work from,but some
were a lot better than others.Derann I wouldn't think of as a
large company,but they had a fair turnover of film,not all of
their stuff was top notch,more care could have been taken on
a lot of their earlier releases,as anyone who has copies of their
"The Giant Behemoth" and "The Woman Eater" will tell,washed
out print in some scenes.That isn't Derann to blame,that is the
labs.Now it's turnabout as the surviving labs strive to release
good quality prints,(I don't think we have any left in Britain), and
their main customers have gone over to the dark side, so they'll
be glad of any process work that comes their way and ensure it gets the due care and attention that it deserves.So I appreciate
the point Winbert's trying to make,but there are a lot of factors
involved that make it a difficult point to validate.
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Joe Balitzki
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 529
From: Charleston, SC, USA
Registered: Aug 2005
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posted July 10, 2012 07:08 PM
Lets not forget that some negatives were not top grade. Some were several generations away from the camera negative. Others were not timed correctly. CRIs (Color Reversal Internegative) which are no longer struck have proven to be notoriously unstable with the passage of time. In some instances, a foreign negative is better than a domestic one. While some negative issues could be corrected in printing, if a better negative was desired it may have been too expensive to justify having one made based on how many prints were going to be printed and sold. While some smaller companies released top quality prints, so did the larger ones. As always, its all about profit for the studios. The foolishness of not taking better care of the negatives is now evident due to restorations that are necessary for release in a digital format. A top quality negative can produce a lousy print if the company regardless of size doesn't care about quality control especially in the lab.
Here is a case in point from my past: When Marketing Film started selling in the U.S.A. out of a N.Y.C. office, I went there in person to purchase newly struck prints. I purchased two features and both were just printed by Technicolor at their N.Y.C. location. One title had just come in: "Grease". Well I came home and screened it that evening. One reel had the sound out of sync. I called and returned the next business day after leaving work early with the print. Before I got there, they checked the batch of prints that came in as they were ready to ship out prints of "Grease" that had been back-ordered. Every single print had the same defect which I brought to their attention. The executive secretary Gail Pizzaro, told her boss Jordan Deutsch and I was introduced to him. Both thanked me and I was told that they were having trouble getting orders filled with Technicolor. They had requested the return of some negatives and were having trouble getting them. All of the faulty reels were shipped to Germany to be re-recorded. And there were plenty because I was shown the storage room filled with boxed features. Because of the re-recording, that particular reel is different in volume from the rest of the feature. They were working with top quality pre-print materials, but Technicolor dropped the ball. I also saw one of their editors working on a future release but I have no idea what it was. They gave a damn about quality but even so, things happened. Those were the days!: Being able to walk into their office (though I made a appointment because I was driving from NJ to N.Y.C.) or walking into the N.Y.C. office of Columbia Pictures and talking to the department that filled mail orders and purchasing a few prints.
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Movie Lovers Do It in the Dark
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Adrian Winchester
Film God
Posts: 2941
From: Croydon, London, UK
Registered: Aug 2004
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posted July 10, 2012 08:35 PM
Lots of points here so I won't comment on some, but although Derann were not a production company, I think they qualify as a 'major' in terms of the 8mm world. They produced plenty of releases in the mass market mid to late 1970s era, but many of these were not quite as good quality as the "majors" mentioned. But even then, they were doing the sound recording for certain other companies. But when they became the world leader in Super 8, their sales lists from around the mid 1980s to the mid 1990s were astonishing. Even though I was receiving them at the time, I'm still amazed if I look back at them. I don't think companies such as Universal 8 or MGM generally had release schedules with the sheer volume of product that Derann issued for several years. Quality issues are linked to the labs used. E.g. the great Lone Wolf prints were done at Buck Labs, like the early prints of outstanding Derann prints sich as Predator. Rank Labs could also produce good results for Derann, but by the time Derann acquired the Lone Wolf negatives, they were probably less consistent or maybe it was the Film Labs North era. It can't help when there's only one lab in the country with no competition.
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Adrian Winchester
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Winbert Hutahaean
Film God
Posts: 5468
From: Nouméa, New Caledonia
Registered: Jun 2003
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posted July 10, 2012 10:51 PM
quote:
but although Derann were not a production company, I think they qualify as a 'major' in terms of the 8mm world. They produced plenty of releases in the mass market mid to late 1970s era, but many of these were not quite as good quality as the "majors" mentioned.
Adrian, what you just mentioned is exactly following my thesis. Indeed, Derann was a major company in 1970s, released thousands copies for each title. And as you said, there quality was not good.
But when Derann shrunk into a small company (due to the market was also shrinking) with only tens to hundreds copies for a title, Derann's quality was top notch (as screen shots above).
So maybe it is like making shoes or furniture?, when only small number of production was made, the quality control would be high.
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Winbert
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Adrian Winchester
Film God
Posts: 2941
From: Croydon, London, UK
Registered: Aug 2004
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posted July 11, 2012 01:01 AM
Winbert - you're right of course that the market shrank, but on the other hand Derek had the vision to make Derann the world leader in Super 8, making them a very big fish in a smaller sea. Although many of their releases in the 80s/90s would have sold less prints than some of their 1970s digests and abridged features, the sheer quantity of shorts and features (including lots of full length features) was so great that I'm confident that the actual footage they were selling was greater than in the 70s. In addition to their own releases, they re-released films (and I mean new prints, not old stock) from companies that included Kempski, Walton, Ken, Red Fox, Steel Valley, PM and DCR. So in reality they expanded in the 1980s, as seen via the increasing stock on their premises, the installation of their first floor 'cinema', the launch of their magazine and their taking over the organisation of the Blackpool convention. I'm sure there was no reduction in staff in their film department.
Regarding their improved prints in the 1980s, one important factor was that they were competing with video, so I'm sure they knew that people would not be satisfied with mediocre prints that didn't look better than videos, despite costing a lot more. That probably caused them to largely avoid using 16mm prints as masters, unless they were particularly good ones. Another factor was that the deals they made to release full length films from major distributors often meant that they were given access to high quality negatives that they would never have been able to use when editing films. Hence in the case of releases such as 'Who Dares Wins', the feature is of excellent quality due to the use of a Rank negative, whilst the 600' version isn't quite as good as it's edited from a 35mm print. I think it's also accepted that improvements to film stocks in the 1980s contributed to the better prints. I certainly see that in my 16mm collection, with colour prints from the second half of the 1980s and later having a sharpness and clarity not generally seen earlier.
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Adrian Winchester
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James N. Savage 3
Phenomenal Film Handler
Posts: 1375
From: Washington, DC
Registered: Jul 2003
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posted July 11, 2012 01:41 PM
Some of the VERY BEST quality prints I purchased around 1982, were the trailer reels put out by the very small super 8 company here in the U.S.- L.A. Films! (owned by Larry Arpin).
While the master material may have differed, due to natural wear on the negatives, the colors, sharpness, and smoothness of the prints was remarkable, and still is today! And great quality sound, to top it off.
Another very high-quality company at that time was Steel Valley Films in Pennsylvania.
It seemed that small companies like these were able to "tweek" little things that only an actuall film collector would catch. Much like the late Derrek Simmonds of Derann did during the 80's 90's era, and Phil Sheard and Steve Osborne do with their releases today.
James.
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