Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: chemical specs

This is topic chemical specs in forum Film Handlers' Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Philippe Laude (Member # 79) on 08-18-2000, 07:50 AM:

Hello, can somebody tell me all the chemical components and their respective percentage we can find in a modern print?
In this case, I think somebody is John Pytlak.

Thank you.

Philippe

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Posted by Philippe Laude (Member # 79) on 08-18-2000, 07:55 AM:

Oops, too fast! I have forgotten to mention my question is about both base and emulsion.

Phil

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 08-18-2000, 09:52 AM:

Philippe Laude said: "Hello, can somebody tell me all the chemical components and their respective percentage we can find in a modern print?"

Philippe: Is there any chance that you work for a certain Belgian film manufacturing company? Information like that is proprietary, of course. It's like asking Coca-Cola for their formula, or Brad for the secret ingredients in Film-Guard.

Health, Safety and Environment information about Kodak products (including Material Safety Data Sheets MSDS) can be found on Kodak's web site:
http://www.kodak.com/country/US/en/motion/about/environment/index.shtml

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John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Eastman Kodak Company
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7419
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: 716-477-5325 Fax: 716-722-7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com

Posted by John Walsh (Member # 168) on 08-18-2000, 10:55 AM:

Philippe; It looks like you will have to get up earlier in the morning to fool JP!

By the way, I have a question for you JP; When the sprocket holes are punched in release stock, what happens to the waste (the little square?) Are they thrown back in to the "vat" of base stock "goop" and recycled or anything?

I know this is a silly question, but I was showing a kid the booth equipment, and told him that something like 3000-4000 prints are made. He asked what happened to all the punched out pieces. After training people for 20 years or so, I usually have an answer to every question, but here I had to laugh and admit I had no idea. I thought they were just thrown away, but now I'm wondering....!

(Reminds me of that interview with Johnny Carson and Mel Brooks about "Silent Movie." Carson asks Mel what was the hardest part about making the movie, and Mel says; "Punching all those holes....")

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 08-18-2000, 11:59 AM:

John Walsh asked: "By the way, I have a question for you JP; When the sprocket holes are punched in release stock, what happens to the waste (the little square?) Are they thrown back in to the "vat" of base stock "goop" and recycled or anything?"

The perforation punchouts are collected from the perforators by a vacuum system. The silver is chemically recovered from the emulsion, and the polyester support is broken down into it's basic chemicals and recycled into new polyester support. BTW, Kodak's subsidiary FPC recycles billions of feet of worn prints scrapped by the distributors:
http://www.fpcfilm.com/US/en/motion/FPC/fsc/fsc_main.html

To impress your "newbies", show them the math for the number of perforations in 3000 prints of a 2 hour movie:

2x60x90 = 10,800 feet per print
10,800x3,000 = 32,400,000 feet of film for 3,000 prints
32,400,000x128 = 4,147,200,000 perforations
That's over 4 BILLION perforations, not including the leaders!

(Apologies to our friends who measure things the right way, in metres.)

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 08-18-2000, 01:18 PM:

In a previous post John Pytlak said........

("BTW, Kodak's subsidiary FPC recycles billions of feet of worn prints scrapped by the distributors").

How Sad indeed!
Mark

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 08-18-2000, 01:31 PM:

Mark Gulbrandsen sighed: "How Sad indeed!"

Please don't blame Kodak for old prints being destroyed rather than sold into the hands of loving collectors. The prints are the property of the distributors, and they are fearful of misuse or piracy. If worn prints aren't sent to FPC for recycling, they usually end up in landfills or incinerators.

Posted by Tim Reed (Member # 137) on 08-18-2000, 03:18 PM:

Interesting discussion, and since we're talking about punching holes... here's some questions I've often wondered about:

How many perfs are punched in one operation? How many operations per minute, and how many perforators are in operation at one time? Oh, and one final question, if I may:

How long before we get perforations in the shape of a Dolby logo?

Just curious.

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Better Projection Pays!

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 08-18-2000, 04:38 PM:

Tim Reed asked "How many perfs are punched in one operation? How many operations per minute, and how many perforators are in operation at one time?"

Looks like you and Philippe are thinking of manufacturing film. Sorry, that kind of information is proprietary.

Posted by Bill Enos (Member # 440) on 08-18-2000, 10:48 PM:

Sold off to loving collectors? B. S.! A motion picture print is an industrial product. Manufactured for a purpose and to be maintained and cared for properly till its' service life is over then disposed of properly.

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 08-19-2000, 01:55 AM:

Ok Bill. Then I guess I will have to sadly hope your favorite movie's negative suffers a flood or some other disaster so perhaps you will be able to see the light. Film collectors have saved many films from being lost forever. It's that passion and love for the movies which will help keep them preserved forever. Think the studios are really worried about film preservation? Sure the biggies like Raiders and Die Hard perhaps, but what about the smaller films that didn't make millions at the box office. Think about it.

Posted by John Walsh (Member # 168) on 08-19-2000, 07:14 AM:

I would have to agree (at least a little) with Bill. I mean, no one wants *any* film to be lost or even have only poor copies remain.

But the problem is twofold; the studios are worried about piracy, meaning they don't want to let anyone have prints and;

no one wants to pay for the storage costs, meaning the studios dont want the prints themselves.

I mean, how much are you going pay to keep, "Quintet" for example (the only film I ever ran that open and closed in less than a week.)

Posted by Tim Reed (Member # 137) on 08-19-2000, 09:39 AM:

quote:
Looks like you and Philippe are thinking of manufacturing film.

Only curious.

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Better Projection Pays!

Posted by Philippe Laude (Member # 79) on 08-21-2000, 12:07 AM:

No John, I'm not working for any belgian, nor foreign, film manufacturing company.I was just dreaming of recovering silver from a heap of used advertising prints.
I'll have to find another way to get rich!

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Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 08-21-2000, 06:57 AM:

Philippe:

The silver (mostly from the analog soundtrack area) is recovered when color prints are recycled properly. Of course, if they are put into landfills or incinerated without proper precipitation of the fly ash, the silver goes into the environment.

The film laboratories are very efficient in recovering most of the silver in the film, mostly from the fixer solution of the process. Very little goes down the drain.