The Birth Of 16mm

[Maurice Leakey]

Around 1912 Eastman Kodak wanted an economic motion picture system for the amateur which would use reversal acetate (safety) stock. This would obviate the need of using a negative film and the acetate stock would ensure safety in the home.

The first World War interrupted work on the project, but in 1919 George Eastman gave permission for a full-scale development programme. One important question was what would be the image size. Many experiments were made using different sizes, eventually a picture area of 10mm by 7mm proved that a screen 9ft by 6ft would be adequate for most amateur usage.

Adding 3mm on each side for perforations gave an eventual width of 16mm. The final work led to the film's introduction in 1923.

The gauge has never looked back !!


Maurice

[Dominique De Bast]

Interesting. I read somewhere that a 16 mm width had been choosen instead of a 17,5 one to prevent amateurs to use professionnal stock as it was not safe at that time and could burn easily. I didn't know about experiments.

[Maurice Leakey]

Many early experimenters did indeed split 35mm to use it as 17.5mm. But their different ideas did not last long.

However, with the introduction of safety film, Pathe in France, introduced 17.5mm around 1926. It was called Pathe Rural as it was designed as a cheaper form of film to be used mainly in the rural districts which were not large enough to support a 35mm cinema.


Maurice

[Dominique De Bast]

Yes, the Pathé Rural ended during the WW Il when the nazis, who wanted to control the informations, forced the Frenchs to convert their 17,5 equipment to 16 mm. 16 mm had already won several battles before that. It seemed that the French gauge was critizided even in France because it was a kind of monopole of Pathé (who claimed the superiority of the quality of 17,5 vs 16 mm). 17,5 mm got a sound version before 16 mm.

[Maurice Leakey]

I started collecting the magazine "Amateur Cine World" in Spring 1946. The magazine carried a few firms who advertised their conversion of 17.5mm sound projectors to 16mm. Obviously, they must have had quite a few owners taking up this conversion.

Maurice

[Dominique De Bast]

That ment for the owners of 17.5 projectors to sacrifice their films

[Maurice Leakey]

Dominque

True.
But I understand that Pathe never sold their 17.5mm films as they were only available for hire. So projector owners probably welcomed the gauge change offer.
When Pathe introduced 9.5mm they were offered for sale or hire, but in considerably abridged versions. I understand that the 17.5mm releases were full length and never edited.


Maurice

[Tom Photiou]

Maurice, as i said before elsewhere, your knowledge in the cine world is second to none, a wealth of experience both professionally and in the collecting world, i do hope many more people give you the credit you deserve. The knowledge you have is so few and far between and i hope that everyone reading your posts can also learn from them and keep the knowledge going for everyone who loves reel film and especially, projectors.

[Maurice Leakey]

Thank you, Tom, your comments are much appreciated.
I always try to be helpful in my posts, and I do have a long varied memory.

Maurice

[Dominique De Bast]

Maurice is certainly a cornerstone of this forum ! I learnt many things from his posts.

[Charlie Peich]

Eastman Kodak presented 2 papers to 'The Society of Motion Picture Engineers' on the new 16mm 'sub standard' film.

Both were written by C.E.K. Mees of Eastman Kodak. The papers were published in the May 1923 journal of the S.M.P.E.


This link is to the paper about the 16mm film........

https://archive.org/details/transact...e/252/mode/2up

The 2nd link is to the Cine Kodak Model A camera and the Kodascope projector.

https://archive.org/details/transact...e/246/mode/2up


Interesting History!