Digital Restoration of Stencil Color

Daniela Currò, Ulrich Rüdel – Haghefilm Conservation BV 

Stencil colors are among the most stunning, but also the most problematic film colors to preserve. In this presentation, based on case studies presented at the 24^th/25^th editions of The Reel Thing, the sometimes drastic, sometimes subtle differences in preservation results using different analogue and digital workflows will be presented, along with the reasons - rooted in the physicochemical properties of the historic film and the nature of (dye) color.

Standards and Formats for Digital Archives

Heiko Sparenberg – Fraunhofer IIS

Providing an overview of the recently standardized JPEG 2000 archive profiles and their appropriate use during the digitization process, this presentation will also explain and discuss new concepts for film archiving.

Streamlining QC for Film and Film Sound Archiving

Jörg Houpert – Cube-Tec

This presentation is about quality control on large-scale film digitization and preservation projects. Archival applications such as generating master archive packages and the automatic sound enhancement of proxy copies will be described. Necessary steps to check the audiovisual data for defects that may have been introduced during the transfer process and the possibility of automated rule-based decisions will be shown.

Restoring the Silent Films of Alfred Hitchcock

Kieron Webb – BFI

The BFI National Archive is currently undertaking an ambitious plan to restore the nine surviving silent films of Alfred Hitchcock, which he directed in the 1920s. The aim is to make each title the subject of a digital intermediate restoration so that it is preserved and available in a variety of formats (film, data, DCP and HD master). The tint and tone colors of three films will be recreated in digital grading. This presentation will describe the project’s approach and the considerations made at each stage. From scanning to film recording and printing, work is closely and flexibly handled at both the Archive’s Conservation Centre and commercial partners. The overarching concern is to maintain the structure and texture of the original prints. 

NOSFERATU, 1921

Mark Rance – Watchmaker

A short insight into the restoration work of the world-famous movie NOSFERATU, shot in 1921. 

Restoration in 4k of New Zealand’s COUNTRY LADS

Nicholas Booth – Weta Digital

Archives New Zealand with Weta Digital and Park Road Post Production undertook a 4k digital intermediate restoration of this first film made by the New Zealand National Film Unit in 1941.

Large Scale Restoration and Remastering Projects – Challenges and Solutions

Thilo Gottschling – ARRI Film & TV

This presentation will show the workflow and project management of large restoration projects (as an example the 800-minutes restoration of the SISSI Trilogy) and large remastering projects for TV.

An XML-based Workflow Manager

Paul Collard – Deluxe 142 Ltd

An approach to metadata and workflow management for digitization projects using XML-generated content lists from archives.

Pragmatic Solutions for Problematic Sources

Silvester Stöger, Fumiko Tsuneishi – Austrian Film Archive 

When dealing with early nitrate material a lot of difficulties can occur, not just because of the physical defects, but also due to the technical standard of the time, which is quite different from today. This presentation shows some of the problems as well as current solutions.

The Future of Film Archives: Experiences from Scientific – Industrial Cooperations 

Dr. Peter Fornaro – Uni Basel
William Hungerbühler – sondor Willy Hungerbühler AG

To show analogue archival motion pictures in the future, it will be necessary to scan the material, following standards of preservation recommendations. Furthermore, a move towards the digital domain is inevitable because of striking advantages such as accessibility, dissemination and reproduction of digital objects. However, the conversion to a digital replica is not so much limited by technical means today but by economic constraints and open questions about the sustainability of digital objects in general. The experiences and results of the Swiss-funded AFRESA project, geared toward designing a cost-effective, integrated archival workflow, will be presented. Steps to be taken and questions to be considered by archives not just wanting to “go digital” but considering digital responsibility and sustainability will be shown.

Stability of the Silver Image

Ben Bradley – Fujifilm

This presentation will put forward the results of a study into the stability of silver images for long term preservation. The density of a silver image was found to increase during the aging test, due to the developed silver changing form. It was discovered that stability of the form of developed silver depends mainly on the size and shape of the developed silver before aging. The life expectancy of a silver image on appropriately designed black-and-white film was estimated to be more than 1000 years by the Arrhenius method.

Cost-Effective Restoration of Archive Material at Short Notice

Stefan Geradts – Snell

An ever-increasing number of TV channels and distribution platforms demand more program material than can be provided under current production budgets. Solutions for quick access to existing content are therefore required. 

Synchro Tinting

Roman Sorger – Synchro Film

This talk presents a new analogue process, invented by Synchro Film, Video & Audio in Vienna, to color black-and-white films without splices.

The Power of 16mm – Addressing European Television Archive Challenges

Mr. Patrick von Sychowski – Reliance MediaWorks

Beyond feature film archives lies an even larger and mainly unaddressed collection of hundreds of thousands of hours of television footage on tape and 16 mm film. Today‘s challenge is not only to preserve this important audio-visual legacy, but to make it available in high definition formats. This session will look at the challenges and some of the solutions used in working on some of the greatest European television classics.