"sound track film" and mystery film reels

[greta de groat]

I wasn't sure whether to put this in tech talk. And don't get excited, this is only from the early 70s and locally made.

But, one of our departments sent me for cataloging 3 small 16mm reels of film that they had lurking around. I have one small reel of what i think is what our library cataloging rules call a "sound track film"--something i've never actually seen. It's just clear film with a visible optical track. I'm assuming this is the sound element--and helpfully the can is lablled "optical track."

In another can i have 2 small reels on cores (not reel) and these are labelled A and B. I'm afraid to try to unwind any of these because i'm afraid the film will slip off the core. Also in the box are two sets of cards, one for reel A and one for Reel B. They appear to have footage counts on them, numbers in a column "red" with corresponding footage and occasional numbers in columns "in" and "out". There are also two strips of perforated paper tape, one of which has a paper stapled to it that says: Special trims
Red -- 13 Green -- 13 Blu -- 13
There is also a small film trim, about a foot, with no discernable image--it's black on one side and the other side looks like prints of fingerprints.

What have i got here? I know that i'm just going to have to have our preservation folks unwind the films on the core and see whats on it (at least there is a title on the cans), but i was wondering if the configuation of stuff that i have rings a bell among any of you used to handling this stuff. What am i likely to have here? Under what circumstances would you have a separate 16mm sound track? Is this likely to be something that was unfinished? Our preservation folks are generalists so they are unlikely to have seen this before either so any clues i can give them would be helpful.


thanks
greta

[martinola]

It sounds like you have original 16mm pre-print materials. These are probably either negatives or perhaps reversal positives. In either case they are probably camera originals. In order for splices to not show on a finished 16mm print, the cut original was prepared in A and B rolls.

If you mounted them on an editing bench with the rolls side by side in a sync block, you would see that the shots alternate from one roll to another. Shot one would be on roll A and all of the cement splice overlap would extend over opaque film. The second shot would be on the B roll and coincide where the opaque film was on roll A. Dissolves could be printed in with fading overlapping footage in the printer. These originals would be printed in multipule passes on a printer. The perforated tape you have was probably for color timing (exposure correction) of the original. A lot of work!

Regards,
Martin

[greta de groat]

Cool, thank you! I was thinking it was probably elements of something unfinished. So, it sounds like it's kind of roughly edited but still needed to have the pieces put together. I'm completely ignorant about 16mm films, was the soundtrack recorded onto a separate piece of film and then later cut up and printed onto the final version? Somehow without making pops all over the soundtrack. I'm aware that commercial films would have a track made of mixed elements but i never thought about what happens with a 16 mm track. Is film image and sound always recorded on separate elements and then only joined at the final stage?

I can pretty much guarantee that nobody is going to make prints of this film. My guess is that we will probably preserve the elements, and if we're lucky, digitize them. Dumb question--if this turns out to be negatives, can they be digitized and then the polarity reversed to get a positive image? I'm assuming this would be a fairly simple matter with black and white but i don't know about how color works--color negatives look so weird i was never sure how they were printed.

The filmmaker was someone who made films for the Medical School when he was a student, and my guess based on the title and department where it was found was that this was something being made for the Psychology or Anthropology Departments and not finished for whatever reason. It's possible it could be of local historical interest, so i'm hoping we can at least pull an image to examine.

Any other hints for working with this would be most welcome.

thanks
greta

[martinola]

I'm sorry, I think I threw a little too much jargon at you. What I meant by "cut" original, is really a completely spliced together set of picture rolls ready to run through a printing machine. Sound is generally on a separate roll to be printed onto a final composite print with both picture and sound track. There will probably be no splices on the optical track. It would likely be recorded from a final sound mix magnetic master (rather like magnetic tape but thicker with 16mm perforations).

If one wanted to do an electronic preservation of the film, one would scan each roll into data files and then combine them with something like Premier, Avid or Final Cut to produce a final video output. Of course, until the rolls are unrolled on an editing bench and examined, all we can do is make educated guesses.

Regards,
Martin

[martinola]

I'm aware that commercial films would have a track made of mixed elements but i never thought about what happens with a 16 mm track. Is film image and sound always recorded on separate elements and then only joined at the final stage?

Save for early TV news stuff, 16mm sound was usually recorded on a separate recorder - often on 1/4" tape and then transferred to 16mm magnetic stock for editing. The splices were usually at an angle to eliminate clicks. Making the optical track was usually the last stage in the process.

...if this turns out to be negatives, can they be digitized and then the polarity reversed to get a positive image? I'm assuming this would be a fairly simple matter with black and white but i don't know about how color works--color negatives look so weird i was never sure how they were printed.

Any decent transfer house should be able to handle negatives either in color or in B&W.

Good luck on this. I'm always curious about what people turn up.

Regards,
Martin

[greta de groat]

Thanks for the clarifications! Even though we don't know for sure what's on the reels, at least we have an idea of what we are likely to be looking at. I'll pass your info on to our preservation folks so that they'll have an idea of what might go into putting this together so they can decide how much time and money they'll want to invest in this. It's been an education for me, i've never seen anything but completed commercial films and really didn't have much of an idea on the details of how they got put together, so i'm grateful to Nitrateville that there was someplace to ask when i came up with something that looked out of the ordinary.

Much appreciated!
greta

[Bob Birchard]

Definitely original 16mm printing elements. The track is a track negative. The cards are the color timer's YCM timing notes, and the punch tapes are the timing numbers converted to data punch strips that would be run through a punch tape reader on an automated printing machine, and would trigger the color timing changes by corresponding footage, pasted on magnetic timing tabs, or timing notches.

[greta de groat]

Thanks! It's good to know that the paper is important, i'll pass that along to Preservation that those need to be kept as well. I had no idea that 16 mm production was so complicated.

greta

[martinola]

The printing machine punch tape will likely yield no actual help either in printing it photochemically or in electronic transfer. Back in the day, every time I had an element to pass on to a lab, they'd look at my punch tape and tell me that it was only for the lab that originally printed it and that they'd have to re-do all of the timing. While I realize that different labs had different equipment and calibration, I always thought that just maybe they were picking the more expensive route because it made them more money. In any case good luck on the project!

Regards,
Martin

[Bob Birchard]

The printing machine punch tape will likely yield no actual help either in printing it photochemically or in electronic transfer. Back in the day, every time I had an element to pass on to a lab, they'd look at my punch tape and tell me that it was only for the lab that originally printed it and that they'd have to re-do all of the timing. While I realize that different labs had different equipment and calibration, I always thought that just maybe they were picking the more expensive route because it made them more money. In any case good luck on the project!

Regards,
Martin

Yes, the labs would want to make a new first trial print at 45 cents a foot rather than rely on the timing of another lab and making a one-off release print at 5 cents a foot (back in the day prices, of course).