British Kinematography (1952)

L50 Vol. 20, No. 5 PROBLEMS OF STORING FILM FOR ARCHIVE PURPOSES H. G. Brown (Associate)* Read to a joint meeting of the British Kinematograph Society and the British Film Academy on March 5, 1952. MY purpose is to present a picture of the task of storing film and to describe such solutions to the problems as have been devised. In doing so it must be explained that what is said refers to the experience of the National Film Library. There are other bodies concerned with film archives. Similar libraries exist in a number of other countries, and in this country the Imperial War Museum, and the War Office, are concerned with film preservation. Indeed, all Government Departments have a responsibility for keeping their films until the Master of the Rolls gives permission for their destruction or other disposal. The National Film Library's preservation work is carried out under the guidance of an expert Technical Committee consisting of Mr. Denis Wratten, Mr. S. A. Ashmore, Mr. A. Barclay, Mr. L. N. Duguid, Dr. G. B. Harrison, Mr. W. J. Malohey, Dr. H. J. Plenderleith and Mr. C. Winterman. Mr. Denis Wratten was also a member of a committee which was set up by the British Kinematograph Society, at the request of the British Film Institute, to advise the Institute on the technical matters connected with the establishment of a National Film Library. This Committee's report1 was published in 1934, and I shall have occasion to refer to this report several times for its recommendations are still the foundation of our practice. The storing of films in an archive or museum, may be regarded as a matter of protecting the films indefinitely from a number of hazards which threaten to destroy them. It is important to understand that when we say " indefinitely we are thinking in terms of at least hundreds of years. These hazards are : (1) Fire. (2) Physical wear and tear. (3) Damage by water. (4) The inherent chemical instability of nitrate film base. I propose to say something about each of these. Firstly about the conflicting claims of the need to provide access to the films and the necessity of avoiding' damage. It is useless to have a collection of films, however valuable and interesting, if it is never to be possible for anyone to see them. Indeed the real value of an archive may be measured by the amount of use which can be made of it, but whenever a film passes through any machine for viewing or printing, it suffers some degree of wear. The normal means of viewing films is, of course, to project them on the screen, but of all film handling equipment a projector imposes most strain and the greatest risk of accidental damage. Of almost every film in the Library, there is only one copy; and whether this copy is negative or positive, or whether it is in good or poor condition, being irreplaceable, its projection is a risk which we cannot afford to take, for eventually it would be worn out and the contained subject matter lost to subsequent would-be users. Cost precludes the making of a duplicate of every film which anyone desires to see. The best compromise available to us is that when viewing is necessary this is done on a continuous motion editing machine on which a postcard picture is seen. Viewing on this as compared with projection has three advantages in terms of protection of film from wear and risk of damage: ( 1 ) The film runs on a single continuously moving sprocket, which imposes less strain on perforations than the several sprockets and intermittent ♦National Film Library.