More thoughts on the Sharpie marker and factory splices: I think if the splice jumps badly, then any missing emulsion or attempt to cover it up will be very visible. Jumpiness needs to be taken care of regardless. Also, it's probably much smarter to use the Sharpie marker to fill in missing emulsion where it is continuous with medium and dark areas and to cover the soundtrack. Where the missing emulsion is continuous with a light area of the image, it's probably best to leave it alone. This is a crude process, don't spend a lot of time on it. If it works for you, then fine, otherwise you'll want to cut the splice out. Note that Sharpie makes a fine point marker now. I like to have the fine point and the regular on hand.John Hope, as for finding a Sharpie marker in the UK, they are used in the States by photographers for marking negatives, prints, etc. because they are quite permanent on those materials. You could just see what your neighborhood photographer is using.
John Pytlak, thanks for the update on different forms of overlapping splices, and it was great to read the walk-thru of using the Metric splicer, in the Film-Tech "reviews" section by Joe Redifer.
I'm still having trouble with the idea of loosing a frame as seems to be necessary with an ultrasonic splicer. I could see there would be some situations where it would be worth it, but I wouldn't do it for reel change splices, especially because being a calendar house, I turn a print over every week. Art house films would suffer badly if they lost a frame at each splice at each theatre. In extreme cases, like Pacific Film Archives, they only show a film once and then it's off to another venue (or storage).
Do ultrasonic splices made in the booth loose their emulsion at the overlap area, like "factory" splices do, and if so, how long does it take? I have the impression that around a few weeks or months of screening, factory splices are missing the emulsion where the film overlaps.
Scott, thanks for turning me on to the term "bloop". I hadn't heard that before, but I get it. If there's a little gap at the soundtrack, I use my Sharpie on the outside of the splicing tape. The ink looks unchanged a week later at breakdown.
I know what you're saying about how smooth a tape splice can be. I've seen some run thru a projector like regular film. Mine aren't quite that good. Maybe we could get into that. Obviously the edges need to not have any overhang and the film needs to be butted well. I've heard some opinion in favor of staggering the tape by one sprocket hole from one side to the other. If this is helpful, does it matter which side is towards the head and which towards the tail? I also have the impression one type of projector may do better with one technique versus another. Can anyone share some trial and error or conventional wisdom on any of this?
It seems to me bulkiness may be the big issue. I've seen some jumpy lab splices, with trimmed edges, and it seemed that those were bulkier than the average lab splice.
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posted 09-18-2000 06:04 AM
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