Case Study Progress

Since intersession, I have decided on a film collection to pull films from for case studies, the John Allen Collection. A former student from 2000 inspected a group of films from this collection which I am now using for my case studies.

The films are silent nitrate prints and from the early 20th century. The films I am inspecting are at varying levels of decay. These films are held at the Louis B. Mayer Conservation Center owned by the George Eastman Museum. I have been visiting the conservation center to inspect the films, Collection Manager, Deborah Stoiber, has been there to assist and instruct me.

As of today, I have inspected the film Garden of Allah and found that since the films have been put into the nitrate vaults the amount of decay has slowed considerably since they were last inspected in 2000. I have plans to inspect 5 titles total and compare them to each other. In the end, I hope to be able to conclude the storage conditions have slowed the rate of decomposition for all of the titles.


I am continuing to add information on current preservation practices and am deciding whether or not to add in the costs associated with preservation. 

Oh how things have changed

From the start, I had a general idea of what the subject of my thesis would be but was unsure how to narrow down the subject to a relevant topic. I first started with digital restoration but that topic ended up being too broad and complicated with technical terms. With a little help from the Eastman Museum, I changed my topic from digital restoration to the topic of a selection of films to be preserved (what has and had not been preserved) along with how this influences the film canon. Revising my literature review before submitting the complete proposal will most likely evolve my topic a bit more and help me come up with a title for my thesis. Meeting with my primary and secondary will further change my topic with the feedback they give me on how to change and expand on information. I hope to get their thoughts on what films to use as case studies as to what is reasonable to study in a short time. Research on my case studies will produce results that are bound to change the direction of my thesis but that won't occur until after January break.

Film Preservation: what has and has not been preserved

Since last class, my topic has changed from focusing on digital restoration to a focus on what films have been preserved and what has not, along with how this influences the film canon. 

Throughout my research, I have discovered which archives ended up with the silent films from 1912-1929. The major archives these films are housed include the Library of Congress, Museum of Modern Art, George Eastman House, and UCLA Film & Television Archive. There are a number of films that are lost or incomplete. Many lost films are ones that have decayed over time, have been misplaced, or are in private collections. Much of the focus during the 30’s-50’s was to save the most important films which caused less important films to decay and become lost. There is now a need to create a program to repatriate U.S. feature films from foreign archives due to the fact that many silent films only survive in foreign-release versions. I have also learned the basics of film preservation and how to identify films that do not have titles or unknown dates. 

I still need to gather information on specific case studies of films from the George Eastman Museum and assess their state of preservation. Of the surviving silent films, which ones or have all been digitally restored? Regarding the Library of Congress film registry, I want to do more research as to what is happening with the films not yet on the registry and what happens to the films once they do get put on the registry. Lastly, research into the preservation status of the films that do remain. 

Digital Film Restoration

The focus of my senior thesis is on digital film restoration. Digital restoration is a complex process done through a computer program that requires training to master. A film technician works on the film and the restorer is present to supervise the work to keep the film looking as close to the original as possible. From the sources I have found, digital restoration is expensive and I am curious to find out what makes it expensive. What type of training and work goes into digital restoration and who’s involved. I am going to explore and possibly email interview several archives that practice digital restoration and discover what types of technology and methods they use. Find out which of the archives are more technologically advanced. I will focus on a few select archives in the U.S. such as IPI, George Eastman Museum, NYU, and UCLA. Case studies are going to be a big part of my thesis, I’m going to use films that have already been digitally restored and ones that are in need of being digitally restored. I want to be able to answer the question of what qualifies a film to be digitally restored or traditionally restored?

Close Readings

Ever since high school, I have been told to always use academic sources for any paper but never taught until college how to properly close read an academic source. Most times I’m skimming readings and only retaining most of the information. While reading the two sources I found, I was focusing on finding arguments and evidence that pertained to my thesis topic and looking past the fluff in the sources. I have learned that academic sources are structured in an organized way with sub-topics. Finding important information is easier with academic sources than a website. 

From research methods, I have learned how to recognize citation formats and what type of formats are best suited for certain types of papers. I have also formed the habit of looking over the citations to see where the author found their information and possibly visit some of their sources. The two academic sources I found were both on the topic of digital film restoration and both used interviews as their main source of information. I found that a lot of quality information came from the interviews since it is straight from the source and not another academic article. One source interviewed multiple archives in Europe to compare restoration techniques. The other source interviewed a restoration technician on his background in film. I ended up getting better information from the source that interviewed the technician. His stories were more personable and interesting, he told details about movie studios that aren't normally mentioned such as how they used to store their films; in a storage room with a hole in the roof and no temperature and humidity control. I find that interviews have less dry information than other types of research methodologies. 

TURCI, ARIANNA. "The use of Digital Restoration within European Film Archives: A Case Study." The Moving Image: The Journal of the Association of Moving Image Archivists 6, no. 1 (2006): 111-124.

Belton, John. "Getting it Right: Robert Harris on Colour Restoration." Film History: An International Journal 12.4 (2000): 393-409. ProQuest. Web. 10 Oct. 2017.

Nice To Meet...Me...

Hi everyone, my name is Lauren Hubbs, I am a fourth year in the Museum Studies program. Before I found this program I was majoring in Motion Picture Science where I quickly learned I was not cut out for coding. My interests lie with film, film preservation and film archiving; and Museum Studies was the perfect place to start to learn all the basics with museums and archiving. 

I didn't start falling in love with Rochester until my third year and I'm glad I fell in love because my plans for graduate school have me staying in Rochester. The Selznick School of Film Preservation is where I want to be after this year. Fingers crossed. 

This summer, 2017, I worked at the Visual Studies Workshop (VSW) in their film archive inspecting magnetic tape, digitizing tapes, and cataloging film. I also was beyond thrilled to get an internship at the George Eastman Museum working in the Moving Image Department working directly with the Collections Manager, Deborah Stoiber, and a couple of students from the graduate program. I did hands-on work with film, doing inspection and inspection reports, creating catalogue records, film labels, and viewing films on a Steenbeck flatbed. Overall, one of the best and most unforgettable summers I've ever had. I'm hoping my work at VSW and the Eastman Museum will help me produce a thesis idea...soon.

Below is a picture I took from a portion of the film "Garden of Allah", which you can tell is in rough shape. This is a film blister caused by a projector light. This is a rare shape for a film blister to look like a smiley face :) 

Wishing you all the best this semester!

Lauren