Principles of cinematography : a handbook of motion picture technology (1953)

CHAPTER 5 PRINTING MOTION PICTURE FILM General Consideration The Positive copy from original negative films may be made in two ways, firstly by taking a straight print directly from the negative material which actually passed through the camera or, secondly, by preparing from the original camera film a 'duplicate negative* from which the many copies required for general cinema 'release* may be taken. The second method is now almost universally used in studio production since it offers many advantages over the straightforward copying method. Although it is now very unusual for a cameraman to produce a negative which is very badly exposed, it is an impossibility to produce a whole series of shots and to expect all to be printed with equal success without adjusting the intensity of the printing light. It is also impossible to include in the original negative all the transition effects, such as 'lap dissolves' and 'wipes', which occur between scenes in the final prints. Although cameras are fitted with means for producing many of these effects it is obviously impractical to use them for normal story production. As was mentioned when descriptions of the camera mechanism were given (Chapter 2), film productions are not shot in sequence, and the final arrangement of the negative consists of a series of individual strips of film, each containing one scene, and all joined together in their correct sequence. For these reasons it will be obvious that the original joined negative would not stand up to the strain imposed by making a large number of copies and, for other reasons of convenience and as a measure to safeguard the original film, it is necessary to produce duplicate negatives from which the copies may be made. A further consideration is that an original negative represents a very considerable amount of capital and, in consequence, all originals are insured. If the producers are able to guarantee that these original 141