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TEC4 NEWS
TELEVISION FILM POST PRODUCTION METHODS
Technological changes now taking place in the television industry will almost certainly have far-reaching effects on television program production on film. The availability of lightweight, portable electronic cameras and videotape recorders has made possible a rapid change-over from film to electronic news gathering (ENG). With the prospect of all-electronic television station operation in sight, broadcasters are now transferring film programs to videotape prior to on-air release. The immediate advantage is to eliminate manning of both videotape and telecine facilities. Taking the next obvious step, broadcasters are beginning to ask: “Why not produce all television programs on videotape so as to get rid of film and telecine altogether?”
But there is another quite interesting alternative for filmmakers in the midst of these developments. Until recently, broadcasters held an almost exclusive monopoly of film reproduction in the television system. Filmmakers and program producers had to give the broadcasters fully-timed and color-corrected prints, and the broadcasters then put the films through their telecine machines to generate video and audio signals for transmission to the public.
This divided responsiblity for the quality of the television pictures from film has been the cause of much dissatisfaction on both sides. But now that broadcasters are insisting that all television programs should be on video
Long time Supervisor of Technical Film Operations at the programming centre of the CBC, Mr. Ross is the author of two books, Television Film Engineering and Color Film for Color Television, has won the Agfa-Gevaert Gold Medal, awarded by the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers, and is presently chairman of the SMPTE Board of Editors.
36/Cinema Canada
tape, opportunities are opening up for filmmakers to take over the operation of telecine equipment and assume the responsibility for making the transfers to video tape. This offers the double benefit of giving broadcasters videotapes of film programs, and at the same time, enables filmmakers to gain direct access to the equipment used to reproduce their films in the television system.
The invention of videotape recording, hailed by broadcasters as a long-awaited release from the tensions and frustrations of direct on-air programming from television studios, had an unexpected outcome. Independent produc
tion companies acquired videotape re-,
corders to turn out commercials, and often complete television programs as well. Then motion picture laboratories began to acquire electronic facilities, at first mainly to produce what might be termed commercial quality helican scan videotapes for non-broadcast applications.
The possibilities for using film cameras to make the original recordings, instead of the much more complex, costly and inconvenient electronic picture-making equipment quickly became apparent, and some film laboratories have already installed telecine machines to transfer films to videotape. With these facilities it is no longer necessary to make fully timed and color corrected prints for television — a first trial print can be corrected electronically by appropriate adjustments of telecine camera controls. Going a step further, original camera films can be transferred to tape, avoiding altogether the costly and time-consuming printing stage, and effects such as fades, dissolves and supers can be put in electronically with still further savings in production costs. A recent issue of the Journal of the British Kinematograph, Sound and Television Society (BKSTS) had a news item about the expansion of facilities at Colour Film Services
by Rodger J. Ross
Ltd. in London; flying spot telecines have been installed to enable color negatives to be transferred to videotape.
Many different methods can _ be employed in producing programs on videotape, with film as the source. At one end of the scale, existing projection prints can be transferred to tape in a single uninterrupted run. The film is laced into a telecine projector and stopped on a convenient leader number — say 10, giving a run-up time of ten seconds to the start of the picture. A recording of the television color
bars is then made at the head end of the videotape, and the recorder is backed up to minus ten seconds. Then, on a cue signal, both machines are started, and the recorder is switched to the “record”mode at the end of the 10-sec. interval. As the film is running, a video operator at the telecine camera control console can make any necessary adjustments of video levels and color balance, while the output is viewed on a nearby color picture monitor.
At the other end of the scale, all of the original camera footage for a production can be transferred to tape, simply by splicing the material into one or more large rolls. Then a finished program can be assembled on videotape by electronic editing. While the transfer is being made, a procedure similar to conventional film timing has to be followed to compensate for sceneto-scene density and color variations in the originals.
These variations are likely to be quite extensive, giving the telecine video operator a difficult task in making the necessary adjustments of camera controls. Stopping and starting of the telecine projector when camera originals are being reproducéd should be avoided as far as possible so as not to damage the valuable originals. At the start of each scene the video operator needs a few seconds to alter the camera