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This topic comprises 5 pages: 1 2 3 4 5
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Author
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Topic: Film is nitrate... now what?
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Thomas Pitt
Master Film Handler
Posts: 266
From: Leeds, West Yorkshire, UK
Registered: May 2007
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posted 07-15-2007 12:09 PM
I found this information in an obscure place of the National Media Museum's (formerly the Museum of Photography, Film and Television) relating to nitrate.
quote:
Nitrate movie film was made mostly in the professional 35mm gauge, though in the 1890s and the early years of the 20th century some amateur film stocks, such as 17.5mm, were cut down from 35mm film.
8mm, Super 8, 9.5mm and 16mm movie film was always manufactured with a safety (non-flammable) base, as were the earlier Edison 22mm and Pathé 28mm films. 35mm safety movie film was made from 1908 onwards but was not widely used by the cinema industry until the mid-1950s.
Nitrate film is often difficult to identify. 35mm movie film is usually found in metal cans, about 1-11?2in (2.5-4cm) deep and varying in diameter from two to fourteen
inches (5-35cm). The film may be wound on a wooden or plastic bobbin but often there is no bobbin at all.
Unroll a few strands of the film to look at the pictures. If the frames stretch from one side of the sprocket holes to the other, it is silent film and almost certainly nitrate. If the picture is yellowish and slightly faded and the film gives off a pungent smell it is nitrate in the first stage of decomposition.
The manufacturer's name is sometimes printed along the film edge together with other identifying marks. A star identifies the film as nitrate. Sound nitrate film (this has smaller-sized frames and a strip of sound track running the length of the film between the frames and one set of sprocket holes) often has 'nitrate film' printed along the edge and/or horizontal dashes between every fourth sprocket hole. Safety film has vertical dashes every fourth sprocket hole or the letter S followed by a
number.
Nitrate negative may be printed on safety film so the film edge may show both 'nitrate' and 'safety' markings. If in doubt, test.
Testing
One way of testing if a film is on nitrate base is to apply a small drop of film cement (Amyl Acetate or Ethyl Acetate) to the base side. If it is nitrate, the base will immediately become quite 'tacky'; safety film will not, though there might be a white deposit left.
The laboratory method is to put the piece of film into a tube of trichloroethylene. Nitrate film sinks, safety floats.
From your photos, it seems that the film is almost certainly nitrate and should really be stored very carefully. It might be worth finding a company that will copy the nitrate film onto safety for you, so it can be projected without worries. Best to do this soon, before the film starts to decompose!
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Leo Enticknap
Film God
Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 07-15-2007 12:35 PM
quote: NMM page
Nitrate movie film was made mostly in the professional 35mm gauge, though in the 1890s and the early years of the 20th century...
A potentially misleading statement, given the scope for interpretation of 'early years'. Far better to state that industrial-scale manufacture of cellulose nitrate film base was discontinued in February 1950 (in the west - production is rumoured to have continued into the '60s in the Soviet Union and China).
quote: NMM page
If the frames stretch from one side of the sprocket holes to the other, it is silent film and almost certainly nitrate.
Not true. It could be - and, given the volume of film in circulation overall, probably will be - an acetate or polyester reprint from material originated on nitrate.
As for testing, I know it's politically incorrect, but about the only definitive and feasible test which someone without access to special equipment or chemicals can do is the obvious one. Chop a frame or two off the spacing at the head or tail (making sure that the spacing isn't of a different stock to the actual picture footage, of course), and, having removed the rest of the reel to a safe distance, put a match to it.
quote: Thomas Pitt
From your photos, it seems that the film is almost certainly nitrate and should really be stored very carefully. It might be worth finding a company that will copy the nitrate film onto safety for you, so it can be projected without worries. Best to do this soon, before the film starts to decompose!
I think the original poster is a private film collector, for whom the £2k (approx.) bill for having a new interneg, track neg and print made might prove a little daunting! In any case, the content of his film (North Sea) is fully preserved from the camera negatives.
Incidentally, research since the early '90s has established that nitrate film stored in the appropriate temperature and humidity conditions and which hasn't got to stage 2 (on the FIAF scale) decomposition will last for centuries. As a result, archives have been shifting their policies somewhat from a 'nitrate won't wait' approach to copying as much as possible as quickly as possible, to a 'passive conservation' strategy of trying to keep originals in good condition until access to the content is needed.
I wrote this 'Could it be nitrate?' paragraph for the website of my last workplace, trying to keep the bullet points as straightforward as possible but without oversimplifying. It was more difficult than I thought.
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Frank Angel
Film God
Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 07-15-2007 05:04 PM
I am not sure about the regulations against using nitrate film, at least in NYC. In fact, the Bureau of Gas and Electricity licensed the projectionists and wrote much of the regs for booth operation, down to the amount of film that could be carried from the projector to the rewind room (no more than 2000ft) and the reel had to be put into a can -- it couldn't just be carried on the unprotected reel(!); you couldn't pull more than 3ft of film from the top magazine to thread, etc.
The Bureau was removed from regulating, inspecting and licensing projectionists sometime in the early 80s. The question is, without this regulatory agency, were any of these regs actually rewritten (like when many multiplexes builds precluded the regulation that required a licensed projectionist to be in the booth AT ALL TIMES) or were they just ignored? Is there a new regulation that flat outright prohibits running nitrate film in previously nitrate-safe booths? I tend to think not, given how shoddy the safety regulation has been with regard to theatres.
The new department that handles booth licensing is nothing more than a money generating machine for the city -- they have nothing to do with safety regulations. The 3 hour written test and oral test that was required to get a projectionist license, which mainly focused on knowledge of safety procedures has been totally decimated. Plus, up until the late 70s we had an inspection card in the booth and had inspectors come up and look at the booth maybe once every two years. Since the Bureau was closed down, I have never EVER had an inspector come into any of the booths that I work in this city.
But, I digress. My point being, if a nitrate print came in today, I know of no regulation that says my nitrate-safe booth has become uncertified by any active change in existing regulations. My booth is still a fire-proof box with double 1 foot poured concrete walls and steel fireproof doors, sitting inside the bigger theatre box. A fire breaks out in that booth and it stays in that box.
When projectionists needed to be trained in fire and saftey regulations and codes before they could be licensed, the assumption was that there was a licensed projectionist in the booth at all times and he/she was supposed to know when a violation existed in a booth. Has the regulation that a licensed projectionist must be in the booth at all time been recinded? Not to my knowledge, but that reg is routinely ignored. So what? In fact, he's supposed to report violations; that was the whole purpose of licensing projectionists -- they were supposed to be the trained eyes and ears for the city against safety violations -- not reporting a violation to the bureau and still running shows could cost him his license; it was a great incentive to keep booths safe. That's all over now. In fact, the City Council has been pressured by the chains to totally eliminate the license altogether so they can put their pimply minimum wagers in the booth (at show start times). They didn't their way on that -- the license is still issued, but I am told they got around the fact that they couldn't eliminate the license by getting the testing down to a ten question sheet of paper that a grade school kid could pass in ten minutes. Projectionist as knowledgeable safety monitor in the booth? It's a joke.
So is that popcorn machine operator going to even know when he's got a nitrate print in his hands or even what to do about it? The city doesn't seem to care. If I run a nitrate film, who is going to know except me? Even if there WERE a proactive decertification of all booths for nitrate, what's going to prevent me from running it? There are no inspectors; who is going to care?
As for 6000ft reels, Stephen, I am not sure if these were ruled out for nitrate; they do have the same fire traps as their 2000ft baby brothers, so I assume they were allowed. If not, we still have the 2000ft mags and could replace them in a few minutes. In theory I would imagine that just from a safety standpoint, the issue would really be not so much the actual size of the magazine, but the amount of nitrate film that is loaded into it. If you are not running more than 2000ft reels and the 6000ft mags were properly fire-trapped, then they really wouldn't present any more of a safety issue than 2000ft mags, as long as you had enough brains to limit the amount of film you put in them -- again, relying here on a licensed, knowledgeable projectionist.
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