TINTING - A Challenge
Evaluation
It has become canonical to claim that early films were black and white
and that tinting and toning were a rare exception to the rule.
The evidence, rather, is that almost ALL films were tinted and toned
(if only sepia toning) up until about 1927, so I'd like to revise the
foundation of this argument by a challenge.
Let's switch the burden of proof:
The assertion now is:
ALMOST ALL EARLY FILMS WERE TINTED OR TONED.
Only a CHOSEN FEW FILMS were in BLACK AND WHITE or had SPECIAL BLACK
AND WHITE SEQUENCES (cf. DeMille's The Cheat or Ben Hur).
Can anyone prove that this is not true?
My belief is that the erroneous notion of "universal black and white"
comes from a generation of critics and historians raised on improperly
preserved films (eg. TInted/toned films were preserved as less
expensive black and white negatives assuming that the tinting and
toning would simply be reproduced later) and able to view only 16mm
prints of silent films in black and white and with no sound tracks.
(What human being with all faculties intact can endure, for example,
Intolerance, with no music???) These 16mm prints were what many
scholars in NYC relied upon to learn about "history." Even the
prestigious archives like MoMA of The Anthology Film Archive showed
only black and white prints of many important films because of the
extreme costs of either duplicating the existing nitrate tinted/toned
versions or the modern near-impossibility of reproducing the early
processes.
This falsehood has been repeated now for nearly a generation by
"scholars" (especially followers of Bazin) who have some sort of
(well, let me call it "strange") prejudice about the "purity" of
"silence" and "black and white" which overshadows actual "scholarship"
and real history to the point where the defense of the reality of
"universal tinting and toning" has degenerated to a well-informed and
vocal few standing up to the tyranny of a misinformed mass who simply
don't know or, for various subjective reasons, like black and white
better.
It's about time to see historical film the way it was meant to be seen
and not the way that some "clique" of academics and other tyrants have
been getting away with for far too long.
Mr. Moose
wrote:
>It's about time to see historical film the way it was meant to be seen
>and not the way that some "clique" of academics and other tyrants have
>been getting away with for far too long.
I'm playing devils advocate here, but -
If academics are the only ones watching some of these films, or are
even the majorit of folks watching these films, then wouldn't they
have the position and authority to decide how they are watched?
Just being devil's advocate - feel free to attack this idea, just not
me. :)
Mark
Bob Birchard
> It has become canonical to claim that early films were black and white
> and that tinting and toning were a rare exception to the rule.
>
> The evidence, rather, is that almost ALL films were tinted and toned
> (if only sepia toning) up until about 1927, so I'd like to revise the
> foundation of this argument by a challenge.
Actually the evidence does not suggest this at all. David Pierce has
done a study of tinting, and it has been awhile since I've reviewed his
spread sheet on the subject, but in general the conclusion breaks down
this way.
The use of tinting and toning declined rapidly from the early 1920's
on. It was more likely for independents to use elaborate tinting than it
was for major studios. Some studios (like Fox) were more likely to use
tinting and toning than others (like M-G-M--which did very little tinting
or toning in the years 1924-1930).
> Let's switch the burden of proof:
>
> The assertion now is:
>
> ALMOST ALL EARLY FILMS WERE TINTED OR TONED.
>
> Only a CHOSEN FEW FILMS were in BLACK AND WHITE or had SPECIAL BLACK
> AND WHITE SEQUENCES (cf. DeMille's The Cheat or Ben Hur).
I have, but have not yet looked at, David Shepard's DVD of "The
Cheat." David can confirm this, but I am virtually certain he took his
tinting scheme from the surviving record of the tints in DeMille's own
script.
> Can anyone prove that this is not true?
>
> My belief is that the erroneous notion of "universal black and white"
> comes from a generation of critics and historians raised on improperly
> preserved films (eg. TInted/toned films were preserved as less
> expensive black and white negatives assuming that the tinting and
> toning would simply be reproduced later) and able to view only 16mm
> prints of silent films in black and white and with no sound tracks.
> (What human being with all faculties intact can endure, for example,
> Intolerance, with no music???) These 16mm prints were what many
> scholars in NYC relied upon to learn about "history." Even the
> prestigious archives like MoMA of The Anthology Film Archive showed
> only black and white prints of many important films because of the
> extreme costs of either duplicating the existing nitrate tinted/toned
> versions or the modern near-impossibility of reproducing the early
> processes.
It is certainly true that for many years it was impossible to see
properly tinted and/or toned prints of silents, but I have seen original
studio nitrate prints of a lot of Paramounts and a few other silents (like
"Mark of Zorro"--which was B&W). There were some very elaborate tints,
tones and even Handschiegal color in some of the Paramounts (especially
the DeMille's) but there were quite a number that were B&W or had only a
few tints--like blue for night.
One reason the earliest films were often elaborately tinted is that
film came in rolls that were no more than 200 feet long. It was a
necessity to have several small rolls to make up a fell reel, and so it
was not much more work to tint the films since the release prints had to
be assembled anyway.
By the late Teens it was more common to have all the scenes from a
full 1,000 foot reel assembled on a single roll, with the sections to be
color tinted and/or toned to be segregated, i.e. all the blue scenes would
be lumped together with numbered tabs to indicate final location, then all
the red scenes, green, amber, etc. The full reel was printed, pulled
apart, tinted, and then assembled in proper order. Some pictures on which
I've handled negatives (or prints before they were broken down) with this
sort of arrangement are "Down Home" (1920) and "Behind the Door" (1919),
both of which had fairly elaborate tinting schemes, and "Johanna Enlists"
(1917) which had only a few scenes with blue night tints suggested in what
was otherwise a B&W film. When I supervised the video transfer of "My
Best Girl" (1927) for laser disk several years back we added tints at the
request of Matty Kemp of the Pickford library because he wanted to compete
with other tinted silents that were coming out at the time, but originally
the film had no tints.
> This falsehood has been repeated now for nearly a generation by
> "scholars" (especially followers of Bazin) who have some sort of
> (well, let me call it "strange") prejudice about the "purity" of
> "silence" and "black and white" which overshadows actual "scholarship"
> and real history to the point where the defense of the reality of
> "universal tinting and toning" has degenerated to a well-informed and
> vocal few standing up to the tyranny of a misinformed mass who simply
> don't know or, for various subjective reasons, like black and white
> better.
Well, as I have said before, Bazin was an idiot. I've never
understood his influence as a critic. I've always felt that the "purity
of silence" approach was a "make do" for the fact that there was no way to
see these films with any sort of music for many years after the arrival of
sound. It also cut into the argument for "pure cinema" if one contended
that sound (i.e. music) was a necessary component for the presentation of
silent pictures. But, as i said, Bazin was an idiot.
> It's about time to see historical film the way it was meant to be seen
> and not the way that some "clique" of academics and other tyrants have
> been getting away with for far too long.
Things are much different today than they were even a few years ago.
There are a number of DVD and Video releases that duplicate or recreate
the original color schemes of some silents, so it is finally possible to
see how the filmmakers intended the color schemes for their films.
--
Bob Birchard
bbir...@earthlink.net
http://www.mdle.com/ClassicFilms/Guest/birchard.htm
Eric Grayson
Let me add a few things:
a) There are a lot of silent films that went out with an overall sepia-ish
tint. This seems to have been rather common. Many Universal films of this
era are done this way. These are still effectively black-and-white films,
since the tint never changes.
b) It is often possible to detect a 16mm print that has been made from
tinted nitrate, since the tinting changes the timing of the dupe print,
especially the red tints. A trained guy should be able to spot this pretty
easily.
c) I don't go along with the purity of silence idea any more than I go
along with Roger Ebert's idea that 48 flickers per second is hypnotic to a
person. I like silent films; I can watch them with no accompaniment when
necessary, and I like projected films over video. Those theories are
goofy, however.
Eric
Andrew Henderson
however, a title card announced something like 'When the dawn came up it
was the reddest imaginable', or something to that effect. A big climax to
the film. Clearly that dawn sequence at least should have been tinted!! It
wasn't. It looked ridiculous and semi-spoiled the effect intended!!!
FLEXARET2
Since the vast amount of silent 35mm nitrate prints are gone forever
we can only judge the percentage of tinted/toned prints from our
own experiences.
I have examined/screened a large number of nitrate silent prints over
the years and here is my experience.
Of the prints I have examined/seen - at least 65% or more were just regular
black and white prints. Then of the balance it was most common
to see a print made completely on yellow tinted stock - that one color
throughout. Next it was common to see the print completely on
amber tinted stock.
Then the least common were prints which were printed on a variety of
color stocks - black and white, amber, blue - all spliced together at the
original labs in what was called "positive assembly". The least common I have
seen were prints which had tinting and toning in the same scene-
ie. emulsion one color base another color. So in a night campfire scene
the background would be dark blue and the campfire an amber/salmon color. Even
less common were the prints I have seen with cut in sequences which were hand
colored.
As labor was cheap in those days the added cost of tinted, toned and
hand-colored prints was not as great as one would think. However
I can only comment on the prints I have examined and most were old nitrate
plain black and white.
- Sam Sherman
Mr. Moose
<snip>
>As labor was cheap in those days the added cost of tinted, toned and
>hand-colored prints was not as great as one would think. However
>I can only comment on the prints I have examined and most were old nitrate
>plain black and white.
>
>- Sam Sherman
Did tinting cause nitrate to decompose earlier?
Mark
Eric Grayson
I don't think it did. I think the big marker for decomposition is initial
lab work, followed by long-term storage.
I've seen a fair amount of tinted nitrate from 1920 or so that's perfectly
fine and projectable. (And my beautiful print of From Russia With Love is
complete junk today!!!)
Eric
Phil Posner
in 1904, and Mom born in 1912 both said when I asked them a number of
years back that all the silents they saw when they were young were in
black and white and not tinted or toned.
On 15 Jul 2002 00:26:58 GMT, flex...@aol.com (FLEXARET2) wrote:
ChaneyFan
black and white prints.
This is similar to my experience. I've seen a reasonable number of silent
nitrate prints and my general observation is that pre-1926 a significant number
were tinted, maybe half, and post-1925, the cheap independent pictures were
frequently tinted. But big studio pictures were rarely tinted after about
1925. At 1928 and beyond this may be due to adding tracks to pictures, but it
started to wind down even before then. And as others have noted, most tinted
films were a single color, with maybe a couple inserts of another color. It
was quite rare (and quite beautiful!) to find a film with many color changes
throughout.
As a quick check of one studio, I have cutting continuities on all but two of
the Lon Chaney MGM pictures. They actually have a column on the continuity to
indicate if each scene is b/w or color. Here's the story, in chronological
order. The pattern is obvious:
HE WHO GETS SLAPPED (1924) was about a third b/w and two thirds light amber,
with three scenes toned blue on light amber.
THE MONSTER (1925...but technically not an MGM picture...it was a Roland West
Production, only released by MGM) was tinted throughout in orange, yellow,
blue, green, amber, and pink.
THE UNHOLY THREE (1925) is light amber for most of the picture, but for night
scenes they indicate "NA" which may mean they did night shots in b/w, which
seems a bit odd. Or maybe this is "Night amber" to distinguish it from "Light
amber" abbreviated as L.A.
THE TOWER OF LIES (1925) is mostly light amber throughout, with some sections
of b/w, and a couple short scenes in blue.
THE ROAD TO MANDALAY (1926) b/w only
MR. WU (March, 1927) here's the transition point...the entire film is b/w
except for one 32' scene (about 20 sec) in lavender.
THE UNKNOWN (June, 1927), MOCKERY (August, 1927), LONDON AFTER MIDNIGHT
(December, 1927), THE BIG CITY (1928), LAUGH CLOWN LAUGH (1928), WHILE THE CITY
SLEEPS (1928), WEST OF ZANZIBAR (1928), WHERE EAST IS EAST (1929), and THUNDER
(1929) are entirely b/w.
My impression is that Paramount and Fox were similar. I think Universal
probably had less tinted film...maybe Uncle Carl was too cheap!
So it's certainly silly to postulate that "all but a few silent films were
tinted." I think the facts support that >50% in the teens were tinted, and the
practice began to wind down in the 20s, possibly as b/w film stocks improved.
By the mid-20s, few silents were tinted. This of course if for American
films...I have no idea what the practice was in other countries.
David Pierce and David Shepard are certainly the experts on this. Also, I know
Rob McKay has seen ten times as many nitrates as I have. All of them should
weigh in with their experiences.
===============================
Jon Mirsalis
e-mail: Chan...@aol.com
Lon Chaney Home Page: http://members.aol.com/ChaneyFan
Jon's Film Sites: http://members.aol.com/ChaneyFan/jonfilm.htm
Eric Grayson
>THE ROAD TO MANDALAY (1926) b/w only
I have one frame used in a slide that was from a release print of Road to
Mandalay and it is clearly tinted green.
Eric
Evaluation
wrote:
Thanks for yours...
>Let me add a few things:
>
>a) There are a lot of silent films that went out with an overall sepia-ish
>tint. This seems to have been rather common. Many Universal films of this
>era are done this way. These are still effectively black-and-white films,
>since the tint never changes.
>
With all due respect, that's rather like saying that apples and
bananas are identical because they are both fruits.
BLACK and WHITE is NOT sepia.
SEPIA is sepia.
True SEPIA is a toning process, although tinted base was often used
instead of true toning.
Part of my point is that the AESTHETIC of TRUE black and white is
quite different from that of a tinted film: the lighting must be
different and by extention so must compositions.
I'm ignoring, for the moment, the problems with panchromatic and
orthochromatic films as they effect a black and white image.
>b) It is often possible to detect a 16mm print that has been made from
>tinted nitrate, since the tinting changes the timing of the dupe print,
>especially the red tints. A trained guy should be able to spot this pretty
>easily.
>
One can also spot the splices where the tinted/toned sections were
joined together.
Glamour Studios
Evaluation wrote:
> "Eric Grayson" <wolf...@indy.net>
> wrote:
>
> >a) There are a lot of silent films that went out with an overall sepia-ish
> >tint. This seems to have been rather common. Many Universal films of this
> >era are done this way. These are still effectively black-and-white films,
> >since the tint never changes.
> With all due respect, that's rather like saying that apples and
> bananas are identical because they are both fruits.
>
> BLACK and WHITE is NOT sepia.
>
> SEPIA is sepia.
>
> True SEPIA is a toning process, although tinted base was often used
> instead of true toning.
>
> Part of my point is that the AESTHETIC of TRUE black and white is
> quite different from that of a tinted film: the lighting must be
> different and by extention so must compositions.
The most obvious example of this is the opening/closing scenes of Wizard of
Oz...when they were finally restored some years ago, the change in the impact of
those scenes was remarkable, at least to me. Sepia changed those cold, stark
grey Kansas scenes of my youthful memory into warm, wholesome folksy ones.
I agree that black and white is NOT the same as monochrome.
Archie Waugh
Early Film
>Part of my point is that the AESTHETIC of TRUE black and white is
>quite different from that of a tinted film: the lighting must be
>different and by extention so must compositions.
Hold it a minute! With the possible exception of untinted day-for-night, the
lighting and composition make absolutely no difference whether or not a film
can be tinted. To make a film suitable for tinting all one has to is to crank
up the contrast of the print a bit to compensate for apparent contrast loss due
to the color dye. And of course, to fix the print in a non-hardening fixer
to make the dye tint take better.
In my opinion, tinting was the first copy guard. The first tint used, pale
amber, was the color of the safelight used for the print stock of the era. It
was soon learned that rinsing the source print in Sodium Hypochlorite, or
Clorox ®, defeated the copy guard. I would estimate that half of the pre-1915
films had tinted scenes. I would estimate that 80% of the films 1922-1924,
after the release of pre-tinted film stock, were tinted, but the novelty soon
wore off and major productions from major studios soon quit using it.
Even during the time of heaviest usage, many tinted films only had either a few
night scenes blue, or were all amber.
One of the annoying things in a tinted film is how do you dissolve from one
tint to another. Usually they just cut in the middle of the dissolve, which
was rather jarring. I know of at least two films, "Behind the Door" and "Irish
Destiny" that hand dipped dissolves to allow the color to change with the
dissolve. There were probably more films done this wasy. Many films had one
or two tint and toned shots in first run prints, that were dropped on the
general release. This is just like today, where the big cities where the
reviewers are get beautiful prints, but in the boondocks they get the lab
mistakes.
On the few times where I have had the chance to inspect two different tinted
nitrate prints of the same film, I have never found the tinting to be the same
in both prints, which always leaves open the question of which is correct!
To take this one step further, DeMille's personal nitrate print (at Eastman
House) of THE CHEAT shows a tint change at a point where an older release print
(at Library of Congress) has no tint change and no splice in either the older
print of the negative that it was printed from at that point. In other words,
there was never a tint change there as tint changes require a splice in the
negative! My guess is that DeMille "improved" his personal print at a later
date. In addition, one of the prints used straw tint for several scenes where
the other used B&W for the same scenes.
Earl.
FLEXARET2
Tinting for the emulsion or base was generally on the surface and
the composition/deterioration of nitrate film most likely due to other causes.
I never found a correlation between tinting and good or bad condition
of nitrate film.
- Sam Sherman
FLEXARET2
I was never aware that silent films were tinted the color "sepia" -
at least I never saw one - but I saw many other tints.
In the sound era (40s-50s) various films were distributed in the
US in "glowing Sepia" to foll audiences into thinking they were seeing
some kind of color film. Columbia used it on Gene Autry westerns
after he had made 2 in Cinecolor and the color idea was dropped.
A sepia bath was used in processing to color the prints, as opposed to
tinted stock which generally came from Kodak-Agfa-Dupont already
colored by the manufacturer.
While film using the Sepia bath did exhibit some form of color - it was
pale and "cold" for a supposed warm/brownish color. It never had the
warmth that silent tinted prints had.
I have seen films originally in theatres on Sepia prints and I never liked it,
but have preferred black and white print.
- Sam Sherman
Bob Birchard
> One of the annoying things in a tinted film is how do you dissolve from one
> tint to another. Usually they just cut in the middle of the dissolve, which
> was rather jarring. I know of at least two films, "Behind the Door" and "Irish
> Destiny" that hand dipped dissolves to allow the color to change with the
> dissolve. There were probably more films done this wasy.
There was a rather remarkable use of this technique in either a sunrise or
sunset sequence in "The Years of the Locust" (1916) which we ran at Cinecon a few
years back.
> Many films had one
> or two tint and toned shots in first run prints, that were dropped on the
> general release. This is just like today, where the big cities where the
> reviewers are get beautiful prints, but in the boondocks they get the lab
> mistakes.
On the few times where I have had the chance to inspect two different tinted
nitrate prints of the same film, I have never found the tinting to be the same
in both prints, which always leaves open the question of which is correct!
Yes. The print of "The Affairs of Anatol" that was found in the old Bosworth
Studio vaults in the 1970's (Bosworth was a satellite of Paramount), was
elaborately tinted and stencil colored. The print that DeMille had in his personal
collection was straw colored (yellow) only.
>
> To take this one step further, DeMille's personal nitrate print (at Eastman
> House) of THE CHEAT shows a tint change at a point where an older release print
> (at Library of Congress) has no tint change and no splice in either the older
> print of the negative that it was printed from at that point. In other words,
> there was never a tint change there as tint changes require a splice in the
> negative! My guess is that DeMille "improved" his personal print at a later
> date. In addition, one of the prints used straw tint for several scenes where
> the other used B&W for the same scenes.
I seriously doubt that DeMille "improved" his print. There is little evidence
that he ever looked at his personal prints after he acquired them in 1925. It is
more likely that the copy DeMille had was the studio work print for the reissue
version and that it contained tinting tests that were not incorporated into the
release print.
William Hooper
> along with Roger Ebert's idea that 48 flickers per second is hypnotic to a
> person.
I'll pass on the "purity of silence" bit, too; but there may be
something in the 24/48/72 flickers per second theory. I have a friend
whose autistic son is completely oblivious to the TV, but is
attracted, watchful & attentive to whatever's onscreen when 16mm
movies are run in their home.
ChaneyFan
Mandalay and it is clearly tinted green.
Someone could have hand tinted it for the slide, but the cutting continuity
clearly states that every shot is b/w.
Early Film
> I seriously doubt that DeMille "improved" his print. There
> is little evidence that he ever looked at his personal prints
> after he acquired them in 1925. It is more likely that the copy
> DeMille had was the studio work print for the reissue
> version and that it contained tinting tests that were not incorporated
> into the release print.
>
Both of the surviving nitrate prints are of the reissue version with reissue
titles and DeMille's print is the newer by several years, per Eastman's stock
manufacture codes.
GEH has a script of the original titles and someday they hope to recreate them.
Another guess is that the Lab making the DeMille print put a little extra
effort into getting the print correct for the boss. This tint change was
where a light was turned on behind a screen, and the version in the personal
print had a color change here, while the older print did not change color until
the next shot.
Earl.
Evaluation
Interesting information in the "snipped" part of the post.
However, Lighting and Composition can make EVERY difference with
tinting.
Ironically, you've cited the very film which provides the most
conclusive evidence of this.
There are existing rushes and stills showing slates from "The Cheat"
which have the specific tint or tone listed.
Clearly, they did numerous tests at various apertures and possibly
with different filters to provide a shot which appeared most pleasing
with a particular tint or tone.
Unfortunatley, you make an understandable and common mistake by
conflating tinting and toning. Obviously, they're not the same thing,
and a given piece of film will look dramatically different depending
upon which of the two processes is used, the density of the print, the
specific exposure given the negative and -- to try to make this as
clear as possible briefly and without visual examples -- a composition
with numerous dark areas adjoining one another will not appear as
clear to the audiience in terms of content either on a tinted base or
when toned as a composition where the important elements are
surrounded by enough space for the object of attention to stand out
against the background.
Further, films intended for tinting or toning often used a style of
lighting that was re-invented for Technicolor: a flat, relative bright
light that leaves almost no shadows on the faces of the major players
and that fills almost all of the background areas relatively equally.
The purpose, of course, is to leave details clear even when they're
toned. (This ignores for simplicity issues of film speed and so on).
One only has to look at the style of true black and white films
starting, roughly, in the late 1920's where the style of black and
white photography begins to alter toward what might be called
chiarascuro. It's extraordinarily clear by the time that James Wong
Howe and Greg Toland start to hit their stride; REAL black and white
cinematography has much more complex lighting especially on faces.
Look at the most famous Val Lewton produced films. Look at the work of
Jacques Tourneur's famous cameraman (whose name escapes me at the
moment). Look at Citizen Kane and compare it to, say, Broken Blossoms
in terms of composition, light style, figure lighting, blocking and so
on.
>Evaluation states:
>
>>Part of my point is that the AESTHETIC of TRUE black and white is
>>quite different from that of a tinted film: the lighting must be
>>different and by extention so must compositions.
>
>Hold it a minute! With the possible exception of untinted day-for-night, the
>lighting and composition make absolutely no difference whether or not a film
>can be tinted. To make a film suitable for tinting all one has to is to crank
>up the contrast of the print a bit to compensate for apparent contrast loss due
>to the color dye. And of course, to fix the print in a non-hardening fixer
>to make the dye tint take better.
>
SNIPPED
Evaluation
Mr. Sherman's interesting note which conflates "tinting" with "toning"
is an excellent example of what I'm maintaining steadfastly is a
confusion of "personal taste" with "historical facts."
While there's nothing at all to be criticized for preferring so-called
black and white silent films over the authentic versions, that's just
an opinion. One may not like the current President, but he is, indeed,
a fact and so was tinting and toning.
If authentic prints were made more widely available the notion that
they were uncommon and, worse, inauthentic, would vanish in moments.
MANY cowboy movies were released either sepia toned or on a sepia
color tinted base because aesthetically it matched a romantic notion
of the prairies of the "golden West." One may reasonably question
the wisdom of this, but substitution for color was clealry not the
only consideration.
Evaluation
of the discusision and the below list is focussed on films
made/released in the United States.
One has only to look at Kevin Brownlow's "Cinema Europe" (or whichever
title it currently holds) to see the evidence for extraordinary and
common tinting and especially toniing/tinting combinations on European
film.
So far, the contention that up until about 1927-28 virtually all
silent films were tinted or toned has not been successfully refuted.
The fact that some films have only ONE color doesn't change the
assertion. Color is NOT black and white: as someone said "monochrome"
is not the same as black and white which is a specific aesthetic.
A secondary factor that has not been so far mentioned is that there
were several release tracks in those days: first run, second run,
third run. It's clear that in come cases second or third run or
small town theatres in first run were given inferior prints: in this
case an "inferior print" would be a non-tinted/toned print. Clearly,
expense WAS a factor in tinting/toning and the aforementioned "Uncle
Carl" was as cheap as anyone when it came to exhibiting in Podunk,
Illinois, but not in a major city.
The assertion here is that for all intents and purposes the first run
of almost every silent film up through the transition period which is
clearly evidenced in the material below was tinted or toned in some
way. Including second and third run prints, re-release prints, and
modern prints struck from black and white separation negatives doesn't
count.
Bob Birchard
> The assertion here is that for all intents and purposes the first run
> of almost every silent film up through the transition period which is
> clearly evidenced in the material below was tinted or toned in some
> way. Including second and third run prints, re-release prints, and
> modern prints struck from black and white separation negatives doesn't
> count.
You don't seem to be willing to accept the evidence, but I'd hazard that
probably only 50%-60% of silents were tinted at the peak of tinting--not anything
like "almost every silent film up through the transition period."
Bob Birchard
> MANY cowboy movies were released either sepia toned or on a sepia
> color tinted base because aesthetically it matched a romantic notion
> of the prairies of the "golden West." One may reasonably question
> the wisdom of this, but substitution for color was clealry not the
> only consideration.
As mentioned before, there is ample evidence that tinting and toning was more
prevalent in low budget independent films (as most non-Tom Mix/BuckJones/Hoot
Gibson/Fred Thomson Westerns were) than in major studio product. The real reason
for this, is that many of these pictures were financed (or partially financed) by
film laboratories like Rothaker-Aller, CFI, and the like, and the labs could add
value to their investment by tinting and toning--and thereby being able to charge
more for release prints.
Bob Birchard
I haven't checked the edge codes. I do know that DeMille did not have any
personal prints until he arranged to obtain them as he left the studio in 1925.
Everything points to the studio simply supplying DeMille with the studio print (or
a studio print), and there is little to suggest that prints were made up specially
for him. For example, prints of "The Man From Home," "The Captive," and a fragment
of "The Devil Stone" turned up in the Bosworth Studio in the late 1960's or early
1970's, and my guess is that if Paramount had known where the prints were they
would have been given to DeMille, because he did not have prints of them in his
personal collection.
Bob Birchard
> On 16 Jul 2002 00:22:50 GMT, earl...@aol.comedy (Early Film) wrote:
>
> Interesting information in the "snipped" part of the post.
>
> However, Lighting and Composition can make EVERY difference with
> tinting.
>
> Ironically, you've cited the very film which provides the most
> conclusive evidence of this.
>
> There are existing rushes and stills showing slates from "The Cheat"
> which have the specific tint or tone listed.
DeMille's scripts had fairly meticulous tinting lists in them. breaking down
the scene numbers by color--this is why the information would be on the slate. i
presume others did this, too. I know Irvin Willat did.
But by 1924 Willat was using other techniques to suggest night, rather than
tinting the film. In "North of 36" he and cameraman Al Gilks used a single element
lens for night scenes that gave the picture a soft diffused look that suggested
night without requiring tinting.
> Clearly, they did numerous tests at various apertures and possibly
> with different filters to provide a shot which appeared most pleasing
> with a particular tint or tone.
Not really. The tints and tones were largely suggested in the scripts and
usually for specific reason, i.e. blue for night, amber for night interior, Straw
(or yellow) for day exteriors, red for fire, etc.
> Unfortunatley, you make an understandable and common mistake by
> conflating tinting and toning. Obviously, they're not the same thing,
> and a given piece of film will look dramatically different depending
> upon which of the two processes is used, the density of the print, the
> specific exposure given the negative and -- to try to make this as
> clear as possible briefly and without visual examples -- a composition
> with numerous dark areas adjoining one another will not appear as
> clear to the audiience in terms of content either on a tinted base or
> when toned as a composition where the important elements are
> surrounded by enough space for the object of attention to stand out
> against the background.
DeMille certainly did not go for a flatter lighting style until the very late
Teens. The Cheat is all very high contrast photography with black blacks and white
whites.
> Further, films intended for tinting or toning often used a style of
> lighting that was re-invented for Technicolor: a flat, relative bright
> light that leaves almost no shadows on the faces of the major players
> and that fills almost all of the background areas relatively equally.
> The purpose, of course, is to leave details clear even when they're
> toned. (This ignores for simplicity issues of film speed and so on).
DeMille, however was an exception is the use of controlled lighting. Most
films from the Teens were shot in sunlight or in glass studios under diffusers that
effectively flattened the light. It was not a function of shooting this way for
tinting--this was simply the way they shot and tinting was an after thought.
> One only has to look at the style of true black and white films
> starting, roughly, in the late 1920's where the style of black and
> white photography begins to alter toward what might be called
> chiarascuro. It's extraordinarily clear by the time that James Wong
> Howe and Greg Toland start to hit their stride; REAL black and white
> cinematography has much more complex lighting especially on faces.
This is almost entirely due to the change in lighting made necessary by the
coming of sound. In the silent era it was common to use Mercury Vapor and Carbon
Arcs--which produced relatively broad, flat lighting. These lights made too much
noise, so cinematographers were forced to use incandescent lamps. Still, anyone
whose seen original prints of pictures photographed by L. Guy Wilky, Arthur Edeson,
John Seitz, or Charles Rosher is immediately aware of how chiarascuro was not unique
to the sound era.
> Look at the most famous Val Lewton produced films. Look at the work of
> Jacques Tourneur's famous cameraman (whose name escapes me at the
> moment). Look at Citizen Kane and compare it to, say, Broken Blossoms
> in terms of composition, light style, figure lighting, blocking and so
> on.
This is a poor comparison. By the time of Broken Blossoms, Griffith was
favoring performance over technique. Also, for all his fame, Billy Bitzer can not
be considered one of the really great cinematographers. Better to compare John
Seitz and "Scaramouche" or Arthur Edeson and "Douglas Fairbanks in Robin Hood" or
Gilbert Warrenton and "The Man Who Laughs" or anything by Ernest Palmer with these
later films you mention.
ChaneyFan
that
probably only 50%-60% of silents were tinted at the peak of tinting--not
anything
like "almost every silent film up through the transition period."
I agree. Unless as...@somewhere.com is a screen name for Bob Gitt or Kevin
Brownlow, I would have to go with the opinions of Bob Birchard, Sam Sherman and
Earlyfilm, who I would guess have seen 50 times the silent nitrate that the
rest of us have.
Certainly a lot of silents were tinted. But the orriginal statement of "most
silent films were tinted" which has now been revised to "most pre-1927 silents
were tinted" is simply not true. This is kind of like Tom Moran's "VHS is
Dead." It's a provocative statement, but the facts speak otherwise.
I'm still waiting for David Pierce to comment on this as he has studied silent
film tinting extensively and can probably quote real percentages. (David told
me he's at the lab until 10 pm every night lately, so he probably hasn't had
time to read this group!)
Evaluation
Perhaps what this discussion has come down to know is the semantic
difference between "almost every silent" and "probably only 50-60%."
This is, from my point of view, a far cry from where most such
conversations start: eg. MOST silent films were black and white.
The purpose here is to increase awareness of tinting and toning as the
authentic release version of (and I'll still assert) a majority of
sileent films up to the late twenties (before the transition to sound
and a deliberate transition to true black and white aesthetics).
If you're saying that 50-60% is not a majority of films and that it is
insignificant, then we're in great disagreement.
If you're saying that your asserted 50-60% IS a majority of films then
our positions are pretty close together.
Nonetheless, the base assertion here is for folks to prove that films
were NOT tinted, not to prove that they were.
I'll maintain that they WERE TINTED in all the major first run
situations from the very beginning. I'm trying to lay my hands on the
description of the first projection of Edison films in NYC. My
recollection is that the reviews in, as I recall, the NY Times or
another major paper of the day, describes the TINTING of " The Kiss."
Perhaps someone has this at hand and can supply it more readily than I
seem to be able to.
By the way, where DOES this 50-60% figure come from? It's been bandied
about and I'm not dismissing it out of hand, just asking for a source.
(My own experience, of course, is that ALL of the hundreds of silent
nitrate films that I examined years ago were tinted and/or toned, so
based on that first hand sample, I'd have to assert that 100% of
silent films were tinted or toned or a combination of both).
Also by the way, no one has mentioned the services of Pathe
Laboratories in Paris which published an entire catalog in the late
teens or early 20's listing virtually dozens of different shades of
tinting, toning and combination printing. Kevin Brownlow is in
possession of a copy of this catalog which has been produced in color
in an otherwise peripheral book by one Paulo Cherchi-Usai the name of
which also escapes me at the moment. (Can't find my copy: guess it's
really peripheral).
Evaluation
Quote
The evidence, rather, is that almost ALL films were tinted and toned
(if only sepia toning) up until about 1927
END QUOTE
If you want to disagree with the statement and assert the authority of
three people against it, at least be decent enough to quote the
original assertion accurately and not accuse the writer of altering
the assertion to fit the purported contrary evidence (which is rather
ambivalent).
The difference between "almost all films" and 50-60% of the films may
be a fine semantic one and some thoughts on that are posted elsewhere.
Regardless, there is a vocal group of folks who would like us to
believe that just because THEY LIKE black and white prints of silent
films that the majority of silent films were black and white,
especially the ones that they happen to like seeing in black and white
because, well, because that's the way they like to see them and the
heck with anyone who says they were tinted and toned!
How, for example, would we feel about releasing say... "Rules of the
Game" as a silent movie with no subtitles?. Or a pan and scan version
of "Lawrence of Arabia" in a 16mm black and white reduction print and
claiming that it was David Lean's authentic version?
One can only expect a chorus of "poo poo" it's not the same!
Nonetheless, it seems like it's time to start showing these films the
way they were meant to be and no excuses about it.
One might have aesthetic questions about Griffiths strange notions of
shining colored lights on the screen during the projection of his
movies, but, gee, that WAS the way he wanted them shown. We all
wander around in modern art museums oohing and aahing at Andy Warhol's
soup cans and acting very high and mighty about how wonderful his silk
screen inks are, and yet a great many folks hereabouts are quite
satisfied to look at third rate, non-tinted prints of great silent
motion pictures and not bat an eyelash at how badly they are
presented.
Come on folks and archivists: get your act together and tint and tone
those release prints! and do it right!
When argument from authority comes down to one's public name and
arraying a number of other public names against it/them, then surely
the issue is not being considered on the basis of the ideas being
presented.
Thank you.
Bob Birchard
> Thanks for yours.
>
> Perhaps what this discussion has come down to know is the semantic
> difference between "almost every silent" and "probably only 50-60%."
You are on the verge of becoming a troll on this subject, but I will attempt to make
myself perfectly clear:
> This is, from my point of view, a far cry from where most such
> conversations start: eg. MOST silent films were black and white.
It is NOT PROVEN that "most such conversations start: e.g.. MOST silent films
were black and white." This is a position you are positing so that you can set up an
argument that doesn't exist in the real world.
> The purpose here is to increase awareness of tinting and toning as the
> authentic release version of (and I'll still assert) a majority of
> sileent films up to the late twenties (before the transition to sound
> and a deliberate transition to true black and white aesthetics).
Now you are saying "a majority of silent films up to the late twenties" were
tinted, and I'm not sure that anyone necessarily disagrees with this. But earlier you
stated that "almost ALL films were tinted and toned (if only sepia toning) up until
about 1927." Now, if you want to play definitions, then I would suggest that the term
"almost all" suggests a number that would be in excess of 90%, and the evidence
(surviving original prints and negatives, anecdotal, reviews, cutting continuities,
etc.) just does not support this. My guestimate of 50%-60% (based on my own
observations of original nitrate prints as well as some scripts, cutting continuities,
interviews and reviewing David Pierce's research on the subject) offers my educated
opinion that something hovering around half of silent films were tinted. I wish David
Pierce would chime in here, I know he's quite busy and probably doesn't want to be
bothered, but his extensive research on the subject clearly suggests that tinting and
toning were far less prevalent than had earlier been assumed--at least among the major
studios. Understand, I am not commenting on European product as I have no extensive
first hand knowledge of European practices.
This said, I would also suggest that there were several different reasons for
tinting/toning, and not all of them were aesthetic. As others have pointed out sepia
toning (or red tinting for titles in the early days) was done in part because of
silver recovery in the toning process and it also made the films harder to dupe.
Directors like Griffith and DeMille used tinting/toning for dramatic effect, but I'd
bet the majority of blue nite tints were for the purely practical reason of attempting
to cover up unconvincing day for night photography--which is an aesthetic application
in only a rather back handed way.
But what I don't buy is your premise that there is (or has been) no historical
awareness of tinting and toning. Until about 30 years ago it was virtually impossible
to duplicate the tints and tones in copying films. But in recent years, virtually
every archive restoration and many video and DVD releases have attempted to duplicate
or recreate the original color effects. Killiam Shows started doing this in the
1970's with many of their releases.
> If you're saying that 50-60% is not a majority of films and that it is
> insignificant, then we're in great disagreement.
>
> If you're saying that your asserted 50-60% IS a majority of films then
> our positions are pretty close together.
I am not saying that 50%-60% is NOT a majority of films. What I am saying is
that 50%-60% in no way represents a figure that could be construed as being "almost
ALL films"
> Nonetheless, the base assertion here is for folks to prove that films
> were NOT tinted, not to prove that they were.
I think we've proven that significant numbers of films were not tinted or
toned. You simply seem unwilling to accept the evidence.
> I'll maintain that they WERE TINTED in all the major first run
> situations from the very beginning. I'm trying to lay my hands on the
> description of the first projection of Edison films in NYC. My
> recollection is that the reviews in, as I recall, the NY Times or
> another major paper of the day, describes the TINTING of " The Kiss."
So what? No one is arguing that films were not tinted. I can tell you that I
have looked at original release nitrate prints as diverse as "Love in Gloucester Port"
(Vitagraph, 1911) and some George Ovey Cub Comedies ca. 1916 and there wasn't a tint
to be seen in these. What I assert with certain knowledge is that tinted/toned and
non-tinted/toned both existed in the period you designate.
> Perhaps someone has this at hand and can supply it more readily than I
> seem to be able to.
>
> By the way, where DOES this 50-60% figure come from? It's been bandied
> about and I'm not dismissing it out of hand, just asking for a source.
>
> (My own experience, of course, is that ALL of the hundreds of silent
> nitrate films that I examined years ago were tinted and/or toned, so
> based on that first hand sample, I'd have to assert that 100% of
> silent films were tinted or toned or a combination of both).
>
> Also by the way, no one has mentioned the services of Pathe
> Laboratories in Paris which published an entire catalog in the late
> teens or early 20's listing virtually dozens of different shades of
> tinting, toning and combination printing. Kevin Brownlow is in
> possession of a copy of this catalog which has been produced in color
> in an otherwise peripheral book by one Paulo Cherchi-Usai the name of
> which also escapes me at the moment. (Can't find my copy: guess it's
> really peripheral).
I have a book published by Eastman Kodak in the 1920's (there were several
different editions over a period of years) which includes several dozen nitrate frames
with various examples of tinting, toning, tinting with toning and pre-tinted release
print stocks. Again, so what? We all agree that many films were tinted and toned, but
just because they could be doesn't mean that all were.
Bruce Calvert
<j6ccjusaueldej94l...@4ax.com>, Evaluation stated...
>Also by the way, no one has mentioned the services of Pathe
>Laboratories in Paris which published an entire catalog in the late
>teens or early 20's listing virtually dozens of different shades of
>tinting, toning and combination printing. Kevin Brownlow is in
>possession of a copy of this catalog which has been produced in color
>in an otherwise peripheral book by one Paulo Cherchi-Usai the name of
>which also escapes me at the moment. (Can't find my copy: guess it's
>really peripheral).
Paulo's book is called SILENT CINEMA: AN INTRODUCTION. An earlier version was
called BURNING PASSIONS. This is not a "peripheral" book; it is a great book.
He goes into great detail about the different color processes that were used in
the silent era.
Bruce Calvert
(remove the xspam to reply)
Visit the Silent Film Still Archive
http://home.attbi.com/~silentfilm
Evaluation
Let's get the insults out of the way first: this is a legitimate
question based upon countless posts and real-world film releases that
are simply incorrect.
If it annoys you, the solution is not to call me names, but to either
answer clearly or to ignore the whole thing.
Certainly,, you as an individual are well-informed on the subject, but
-- unless solipsism is more true than the evidence presents -- there
are others in the world who don't share your knowledge.
Let's simply skip the 1/2 full, 1/2 empty argument here: is a majority
the same as 50/60%? We could go on with that forever and I'm not sure
that it's really important to determine who is winning.
However, if this knowledge is SO pervasive and SO universal, why, for
example did KINO release "The Cheat" in black and white on DVD? Why is
the current (excellent) reconstruction of "Metropolis" in black and
white when there are fully tinted original prints in existance?
Why does the George Eastman house persist in circulating black and
white prints of so many classics (Caligari, for example) when the
authentic versions are uncontestably elatborately tinted? (If you
answer money, money, money, you may be correct, but that doesn't
justify the blatant historical and ethical responsibllity to get it
right).
This group is rife with "learned" discussions of aesthetics of early
films based upon the viewing of non-tinted prints and a habitual
preference for "black and white" that comes from lack of exposure to
the real thing.
Your information about the economics of producing authentic and
correct prints is absolutely correct and it was mentioned very early
on in this discussion.
Unfortunatley, if you take this as a personal discussion, you'll be
missing the point.
The point is to raise the level of discussion about silent film to
include tinting and toning as equally important to missing sequences
and authentic musical scores.
Just think, for a moment, how low the awareness of proper musical
accompaniment was, say, 20 or so years ago. Now, it's almost de rigeur
to have some kind of music (not always the best, but better than
nothing.)
It's about time to be fussy and adament about proper tinting and
toning and the actual evolution of a conscious black and white
aesthetic as contrasted with a "default aesthetic" based upon the
chemical state of black and white motion picture film.
One might extend the argument (though I won't at the moment) to the
dramatic aesthetic difference between low ASA, high silver black and
white prints on nitrate stock and the modern high ASA, low-silver
prints on Safety stock. The aesthetics are NOT the same. The look of
hte film is NOT the same and the response of the audience and of the
filmmakers cannot by definition be the same. One only needs to have
heard the literal gasps of the audience at a recent MoMA screening of
an original nitrate print of Casablanca step-printed off of the
original negative to see how true this is.
Hence, a non-tinted print of a film that was INTENDED to be tinted or
toned in one way or another is simply WRONG.
You personally may recognize this, but there are countless people
including professionals who don't.
Harlett O'Dowd
> >>>Of the prints I have examined/seen - at least 65% or more were just regular
> black and white prints.
>
> This is similar to my experience. I've seen a reasonable number of silent
> nitrate prints and my general observation is that pre-1926 a significant number
> were tinted, maybe half, and post-1925, the cheap independent pictures were
> frequently tinted. But big studio pictures were rarely tinted after about
> 1925. At 1928 and beyond this may be due to adding tracks to pictures, but it
> started to wind down even before then. And as others have noted, most tinted
> films were a single color, with maybe a couple inserts of another color. It
> was quite rare (and quite beautiful!) to find a film with many color changes
> throughout.
Would it be fair to assume that the slow rise of two-strip Technicolor
in the mid 20s might also have been a factor in the demise of tinting?
Specifically, that studios/directors who wanted "artistic" touches
would opt for Techicolor sequences and might keep tinting down to a
minimum in other features/programmers in order to offshoot the TC
costs.
I'm not suggesting this would be the primary reason for the death of
tinting, but a contributing factor.
Andrew Henderson
should have a single shot in Prizmacolor. For all the elaboration, a bit of
tining and toning combined might possibly saved the expense!!!
Andrew Henderson
Salt (I understand banned in the US!!!), notes that from the mid to late 20s
(and I quote) - "80 to 90% of prints were tinted, with the colours
continuing much as before...'. I in no way wish to denigrate anyone who has
mentioned their own estimates based on seeing surviving nirate, but it would
seem to me reasonable to look at the problem from another angle. How many
silent films were completely 100% untinted? It is difficult to imagine
certain famous films without tints, be it the 'gold' effects in Greed, for
example. On the other hand, I'm sure there are prints (nitrate) of films
such as 25 'Merry Widow' which have the finale only in b/w (instead of
Technicolor). I hope no-ones going to argue the latter now!!
Glamour Studios
U.S.". Elaborate please.
Archie Waugh
Precode
> >Did tinting cause nitrate to decompose earlier?
>
> I don't think it did. I think the big marker for decomposition is initial
> lab work, followed by long-term storage.
>
> I've seen a fair amount of tinted nitrate from 1920 or so that's perfectly
> fine and projectable. (And my beautiful print of From Russia With Love is
> complete junk today!!!)
>
> Eric
Umm, I'm not so sure. A few years back at Cinecon we ran FATE OF A
FLIRT, which Grover Crisp had preserved from an original nitrate print
that was tinted virtually throughout. Two scenes tinted rose had
decomposed to the point that they were virtually unwatchable; the rest
of the film was absolutely fine. I have to believe that there was
something in that particular dye that hastened the decomp--though I'm
willing to be proven wrong.
Mike S.
(not that many have ever succeeded)
Bob Birchard
> I do agree with your comments about tinting. An excellent UK book by Barry
> Salt (I understand banned in the US!!!), notes that from the mid to late 20s
> (and I quote) - "80 to 90% of prints were tinted, with the colours
> continuing much as before...'.
Just received an "out of office" e-mail reply from David Pierce, so he
probably isn't seeing this thread, but my recollection is (and Eric G. may be
able to back this up as he's seen David's research as well) that far fewer than
90% of films were tinted. And among the films that were tinted in some manner,
most major studio films from the mid 1920's on had only a few tinted scenes.
The converse of this is in the sound era. Tinting, toning and hand coloring
did not disappear--but they were relatively rare. As Sam Sherman points out,
there were pictures being tinted into the 1960's.
Bill Coleman
of the second edition that book (which was printed in London)
"Glamour Studios" <glam...@gte.net> wrote in message
in a store in New York in about ten years ago. It was very
good in general, though I don't know how accurate that specific
statement quoted is....
Bill Coleman
==========
news:3D37593D...@gte.net...
Bill Coleman
"Bill Coleman" <malt...@nospam.net> wrote in message
news:ah7r86$r8sfl$1...@ID-137234.news.dfncis.de...
> Is he talking about "Film Style and Technology"? I bought a copy
> of the second edition that book (which was printed in London)
Andrew Henderson
'Psychoanalyis is apparently an area of blind faith for most American
academics, and their closed minds are shown by their inability to produce
any rebuttal of cirtisism of its validity'.
Salt set out to deconstruct that theory (and a few others too!). It was a
dangerous path insofar as those academics sought to oppose the books
distribution in the US. This is remarkable in a democracy. You are lucky if
you managed to get a copy of the book!! It (analysis) in that sense is a
'heavy' area and I don't want to comment, but remain neutral. It seemed to
me, though, that Salt made a strong statement, but he does explain why in
his book. It rather goes back to 'theorists' who would ask the aged John
Ford why he did a particular shot a particular way. Eagerly expectiong
confirmation, Ford would reply 'Hell, I just point the camera' etc ec.
Discuss!
James Russell
That one two-colour shot with nothing going on it? That's Prizmacolor? I
thought that *was* tinting/toning...
James R.
--
The Black Room http://www.ans.com.au/~jgwr/
Celluloid Dreams: Mondays, 7pm AEST, 2SER 107.3 FM http://www.2ser.com/
Bob Birchard
the U. S. It was printed in Britain and was distributed in the U. S. by a
small company. It just didn't get any penetration in the market place save for
a few bookstores that specialize in movie books. But I bet you could find
copies on abe.com or bibliofind.com
Glamour Studios
Banned implies some sort of government censorship, obviously not the case here.
Archie Waugh
Eric Grayson
a) David's research shows much what Jon Mirsalis said. Most of the studios
declined sharply and Fox was the major holdout, doing the most tinting.
Smaller indies did more tinting than others. MGM did the least tinting.
b) The idea that movies are historically incorrect if not tinted is
specious at best. I'm the first to say that lab work is crappy, and very
often so today, but bad lab work is universal. Tinted nitrate was
inconsistent through the run of a film. I have a reel of an old Billy West
comedy that is made up of two prints, both amber, both noticeably
different. There was a LOT of slop in the standards even in the old days.
c) The reason that a lot of prints aren't tinted is multi-fold. Part of it
is money. Part of it is that to do it RIGHT means you have to use tinting
that is similar to the way it used to be done in the old days. Simply
duping a print onto color stock and calling it tinted reproduces the look
differently. It is VERY expensive and VERY time-consuming to do tinting in
the old-fashioned way. Furthermore, by duping the print onto color stock,
you run the risk of having your print fade on you, losing the tints AND the
image (black and white stock is more stable). I'd much rather see a black
and white print made for preservation purposes because THAT will be around
a while.
d) There seems to be an assumption that there are magic tinting guides that
apply to certain pictures. Metropolis was probably tinted on initial
release, but God knows how? I've seen half a dozen different black and
white versions of the movie, so who knows how it was tinted on original
release? Where? In Germany, in the US (where it was probably black and
white from Paramount). In Europe at large? The initial release or the
general release version? What's the canonical answer???? The problem is
that too often we DON'T KNOW what the tints were and we're only guessing as
to what they looked like. As far as I know, we don't know what the tints
were on Nosferatu, but people will whine like stuck hogs if you don't run
the film with a blue tint over the night scenes. (The Kino release was
made with electronic tints).
e) People talk about magic nitrate and old lab work, etc. I love the look
of nitrate, but a good lab can produce results that look pretty darn close.
I was persuaded a few months ago when I saw a Betty Boop cartoon on new
Mylar stock. Impressive. People go on about Technicolor being wonderful.
I love Technicolor, but someone showed me a dye transfer print of
Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed the other day that was two stops
underexposed, with a white line on the dupe negative, and a lot of dirt on
the matrices. This print is lousy, and it was Technicolor's fault. It may
look lousy and not fade, but it's still lousy. It it possible that your
old nitrate of Casablanca looks wonderful? Sure, but I'll bet there were
awful prints, too. I saw a new print a while back that was a stunner. OK,
the contrast was too thin, but a lot of people now LIKE that look...
f) For Mike S: I recently had some deteriorating nitrate that was OK in the
tinted scenes and deteriorating in the b/w ones. How's THAT affect your
theory?
My point is that you can kill yourself over historical accuracy, and often
for no good reason. History isn't that magical or that accurate in the
first place. I do a lot of restoration work on my own historic prints, and
I can tell you that you almost never see two prints that look the same.
Even on beautiful nitrates or stunning IB Technicolor shots, you'll find
that the nitrate is different contrast in one shot or that the IB printing
was more red or yellow in one print.
You can capture 90% of the magic by doing preservation the right way:
a) Preserve the negative and prints if possible.
b) Wet-gate your dupes.
c) Use 35mm if you can afford it.
d) Keep a record of your tints as they occur.
e) See if you can reproduce new tinted prints if possible.
And some people complain about tinting that aren't even seeing the films on
the big screen. If you see the film on DVD and not on the big screen, then
you forfeit your right to complain about historical accuracy.
It's like complaining that your "collector" Franklin Mint silver dollars
are bigger than the real ones, so they're not historically accurate! Well,
duh! Isn't that the point?
Eric
Bruce Calvert
Grayson stated...
>f) For Mike S: I recently had some deteriorating nitrate that was OK in the
>tinted scenes and deteriorating in the b/w ones. How's THAT affect your
>theory?
Couldn't this have been because the tinted scenes and non-tinted scenes were
from a different batch of film stock?
Andrew Henderson
opposition from getting the 2nd edition out in the U.S. The tinting
comments come from the 1920-26 technical notes.
"Glamour Studios" <glam...@gte.net> wrote in message
news:3D37F78B...@gte.net...
Bob Birchard
> On 19 Jul 2002 15:00:43 -0500, in article <B95DDA1...@192.168.0.32>, Eric
> Grayson stated...
> >f) For Mike S: I recently had some deteriorating nitrate that was OK in the
> >tinted scenes and deteriorating in the b/w ones. How's THAT affect your
> >theory?
>
> Couldn't this have been because the tinted scenes and non-tinted scenes were
> from a different batch of film stock?
Generally not. As I pointed out earlier the negs I've seen that were set up for
tinting had all the shots for say Reel 1 on the same printing roll, but segregated
by color with numbered frames between chunks that would be later intercut after
tinting. The film would be printed, the sections pulled apart, then tinted, and
then the prints would be assembled in positive assembly.
In my experience in negative the titles (with little emulsion because they
are clear to print black) tend to decompose first, in positives the picture tends
to go first. Certain tints and/or tones do seem to exacerbate deterioration
problems--some of the formulas, especially the bleaches used to prepare for
toning, use stuff that is not friendly to celluloid if not properly washed.
Evaluation
upon which way one looks at it, there's a kind of "lumping together"
happening here that blurs some of the more important issues.
1) Agreed without a doubt that the process of tinting (or toning or
both) IS expensive. Nonetheless, that's only an explanation and not an
excuse. Certainly, no one expects a private individual to be able to
do it, but Archives and commercial outlets can and need to be
responsible.
Kino's release of The Cheat is a case in point: it's in black and
white. If ever there was a film with clear documentation and intention
for tinting and/or toning it's The Cheat, and here's this lovely new
DVD that was obviously done with care that is missing the tinting!
Why, for example, does George Eastman House persist in sending around
B&W prints of major films known to be tinted with clear historical
color guides? Is it because they're so expensive? If that's true, why
do the top administrators at GEH make so much money? Why are the fees
charged by the GEH so high? Why is there so much controversy about
their monetary donation process for film preservation at that
particular institution? Clearly, the "tinting is expensive" argument
doesn't wash any better than the bad laboraties washed their prints.
2) One might as well say that all modern movies are bad because "Dumb
and Dumber" is a stupid movie as to say that caring about tinting and
toning is useless because there were so many crappy laboratories and
such uneven quality control.
All movies are NOT the same. An amber or sepia print of a minor comedy
may actually be a subject for legitimate debate on the real necessity
of reproducing the amber or sepia. When it comes to a major film
like, say, Intolerance, then there is no debate. The film was tinted
andt toned and ought to be shown that way. Period. Lawrence of Arabia
in black and white is not Lawrence of Arabia.
If a discussion of tinting and toning continues to conflate good and
bad movies and use that conflation to justify shabby and inauthentic
restoration of important films, then it is a morally bankrupt
discussion. (Look, for example, at the discussion elsewhere of "The
Mysterious Island" where individual taste has crept in and is
emotionally overwhelming the question of what the film actually,
really looked like when it was first released.!)
We're all entitled to our taste and what we want to waste our time
looking at, but that is DIFFERENT THAN HISTORY. History is it's own
reality. And the careful and particular tinting and toning of the
great majority of films during the silent era is a fact. You don't
have to like it, you don't have to care, but your taste doesn't change
history or the conscientious desire to see what little shards of film
history are left to us in their most authentic form so that we can
decide for ourselves whether we like it or not.
3) Tinting and Toning are SEPARATE AND DISTINCT processes. Folks here
carry on as though they are the same thing. Clearly there are informed
individuals who know better, but "tinting" has become a kind of lazy
shorthand for an array of color effects that are really distinct.
Ignoring this is to muddy the water.
Granted that few people have actually seen examples of these processes
on the screen, but that becomes a dog chasing its tail: if there are
no proiper tinted/toned prints then no one can see them and no one
will know how they should have been. Just for the sake of puitting it
on the record, though it's so obvious, the more properly restored
tinted/toned silent films are shown, the more the interested portion
of the public will become aware of and impressed by what it's all
about and the more that the restoration process will be sustaned.
One might as well argue that because of entropy we shouldn't bother at
all and I'm sure that there are some postmodern philosophers who'd
agree with that.
Proper tinting, toning, combination tinting/toning, hand coloring,
dipped effects are all complex and expensive: they are an art that has
nearly died with few human beings left who can reproduce them
properly. That's no excuse for not doing it right.
On 19 Jul 2002 15:00:43 -0500, "Eric Grayson" <er...@wolftechnical.com>
wrote:
Bob Birchard
> 3) Tinting and Toning are SEPARATE AND DISTINCT processes. Folks here
> carry on as though they are the same thing. Clearly there are informed
> individuals who know better, but "tinting" has become a kind of lazy
> shorthand for an array of color effects that are really distinct.
> Ignoring this is to muddy the water.
Dear Evaluation (whoever you are),
You are clearly a newbie to this group, because you are clearly unaware
that there has been much discussion in the past about tinting and toning, that
tints color the base and that tones replace the silver image with a color and
that there were also combined tinting and toning within the same scene to
achieve certain effects. There have also been discussions about hand coloring,
stencil coloring, whether these practices continued into the sound era, why they
were discontinued, etc. This is not to say that we don't enjoy talking about
any of these issues again (especially since there are a number of newer
subscribers to the news group), but in general the "folks here" do know the
difference between tinting and toning, and you seem to be intent on insulting
our intelligence to make points that for the most part we already agree with.
What's up with you?
The Cheat is in B&W on a DVD that (if I remember correctly) also has a
mediocre print of Manslaughter from a poor 16mm dupe. It's too bad, we wish it
was better, but we can't do anything about it. Why not celebrate the DVD
release of The Affairs of Anatol which preserves all the tints, tones and
Handschlagel stencil colors and point out the virtues of this and all the other
DVD's that have color effects instead of bitching about this one that doesn't?
Evaluation
You seem VERY intent on taking this personally as though whatever your
own knowledge might be is the sine qua non of other people in this
group.
No one has said -- despite your attempt to make this an ad hominen
argument -- that no one has ever heard of tinting, toning etc etc.
It's only been asserted that in the various conversations here the
terms are conflated in a single term "tinting" and that this is
incorrect and inexact and that it would be
WHile "Anatol" is certainly worthy of celebration, that doesn't mean
that "The Cheat" is acceptable.
There's an old expression about the "squeaky wheel" and if enough
people here squeek, perhaps archives -- who should know better -- and
commercial companies -- who have a choice -- will start getting it
right.
DShepFilm
leaves out the more tendentious ones.
However, with respect to the Image DVD of THE CHEAT, it is tinted according to
the specifications of the original cutting continuity in the D. B. DeMille
manuscript collection in the University of Southern California Library of
Performing Arts.
DeMille's CARMEN, on the same DVD, is mastered from an original tinted nitrate
print. The colors are original except for blue, which had faded away almost
completely and which was therefore electronically reinforced.
David Shepard
Bob Birchard
And, so it turns out there are two versions of "The Cheat" on DVD. David
Shepard's (which is packaged with "Carmen") meticulously reproduces the colors
from the 1918 reissue as I remembered, and the other (which is packaged with
"Manslaughter") is the one that is in B&W. It would seem that "Evaluation" bought
the wrong disk and has been complaining for no good reason about the lack of
availability of a properly tinted/toned version of "The Cheat" when it has been
available all along.
Evaluation
The last one I saw was in black and white which is what inspired the
comments.
If it has changed, then of course the criticism is withdrawn.
DShepFilm
The DVD pairing of THE CHEAT and CARMEN was released February 23, 2001.
Being unaware of it puts you in good company. Fewer than 1000 copies have sold
to date.
David Shepard
Evaluation
thinking, the fact remains that Kino released The Cheat in B&W.
Why is that?
Clearly Mr. Shepard has separately done another version which IS
correct and that's a tribute to his care and intelligence.
But left to their own devices (apparently) someone at Kino didn't
bother and THAT is the sort of thing being pointed out.
Yes, on the whole KINO does an excellent job of doing little
appreciated work for a limited market, but they are also in the
position to do it right much more often than anyone else, and it is
not an unreasonable question to ask why it is done wrong.
Since (for whatever reason) you seem to take this all so very
personally, why do you think this is?
Eric Grayson
>personally, why do you think this is?
Probably because a number of us know and respect the people you're treating
with disrespect. It's an easy thing to say "they could get it right."
Jessica at Kino may be able to answer more closely about The Cheat. Are
you aware that Kino people are probably reading what you're saying?
These people are putting their pocketbooks on the line to bring you rare
films and you whine about it.
Do you realize that 10 years ago you'd be doing WELL to have even SEEN The
Cheat, much less have it on video? People who put silent films on video,
unless it's a bargain-basement $2 deal, are doing it as a service more than
anything else. They're to be congratulated and thanked instead of being
picked apart.
Yes, it's find to suggest things, but to accuse them of sloppy work is just
not fair.
I've worked with people who are in the midst of putting stuff out on video,
and there comes a time when you have to say, "This is done. I've spent
enough time and effort on this, and it needs to go out now." You can
expect to sell fewer than 1000 copies and end up making less than minimum
wage for your time, IF you even recover your costs. Becoming too much of a
perfectionist with it only raises your costs and shoots you in the foot.
Just to give you an example of the way people can get trashed here: I spoke
to the guy who restored Hands of Orlac for LSVideo one time. This was
about 10 years ago, when you couldn't easily get access to the original
material even to see (much less to license for video).
This poor guy had 3 prints he was working with, all of which had a totally
different continuity, and in 3 different languages. He pieced this film
together, over a period of two months, having spent hundreds of dollars on
translators for the titles and some extra thousands for video equipment.
I guess that some of the scenes got put in in the wrong order, and, since
then, the Germans have aired their version on TV.
Some schmo comes on here and trashes the LSVideo restoration as amateurish
and incomplete, with problems X, and Y.
How nice. They did the best they could with what they had, and tried to
use the best material for everything. They used reviews and even the 1935
version for reference when necessary. And theirs was available probably 7
years before anything else was out there.
If you're not going to get your money back on a project, and you're not
going to get respect for doing it, then why do it at all?
I say, thank you KINO.
Thank you Dave Shepard and Serge Bromberg.
Thank you Grapevine.
Thank you LSVideo.
Thank you Sinister Cinema.
I also revoke your right to complain about DVD historical problems if you
don't attend 16mm or 35mm live screenings of silents. I submit that you
can't complain about historical accuracy in a DVD until you've experienced
history the way it SHOULD be in a theater.
Eric
Jeremy Bond Shepherd
"DShepFilm" <dshe...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20020721154605...@mb-fi.aol.com...
Sorry David. I have that nice DeMille laserdisc box set and couldn't see
paying for THE CHEAT and CARMEN again. (Although I guess I got another copy
of the latter anyway when I bought MANSLAUGHTER.) You-know-who gives me
enough grief about re-buying things I already have. You should have heard me
trying to explain why I need the DVD of THE IRON MASK when I already have
that in the Fairbanks box....
-Jeremy
Rob Farr
Art bookstore, a U.S. government owned and operated venue. No doubt a
subtle ruse to throw a red herring in the path of those on the trail of that
diabolical U.S. government/academic cabal!
Rob Farr
"Andrew Henderson" <Mfgen.Co...@btopenworld.com> wrote in message
news:ah8ghf$284$1...@paris.btinternet.com...
greta de groat
DVD purchase. Have to get a player one of these days (though it does work on my
computer at least). I couldn't pass up the bargain of two of the best films of
1915 plus the Chaplin Carmen parody. I thought this was one of the all-time great
film deals. Have to actually get around to watching it now!
greta
James Roots
> Gee, i'm one in a thousand! Actually it was my very first DVD (and so far only)
> DVD purchase. Have to get a player one of these days (though it does work on my
> computer at least). I couldn't pass up the bargain of two of the best films of
> 1915 plus the Chaplin Carmen parody. I thought this was one of the all-time great
> film deals. Have to actually get around to watching it now!
Once you do watch it, you might not think it's one of the all-time
great film deals.
Bevare! Bevare!
Jim
Jeremy Bond Shepherd
"Jeremy Bond Shepherd" <jb...@eskimo.com> wrote:
> "DShepFilm" <dshe...@aol.com> wrote in message
> news:20020721154605...@mb-fi.aol.com...
> > << Is there a NEW DVD of the Cheat? >>
> >
> > The DVD pairing of THE CHEAT and CARMEN was released February 23, 2001.
> >
> > Being unaware of it puts you in good company. Fewer than 1000 copies have
> sold
> > to date.
>
> Sorry David. I have that nice DeMille laserdisc box set and couldn't see
> paying for THE CHEAT and CARMEN again. (Although I guess I got another copy
> of the latter anyway when I bought MANSLAUGHTER.)
>
Oy, checking my collection again tonight I realized it's the FIRST
AMERICAN FEATURES box that contains THE CHEAT, and it's the same B&W
transfer as on the Kino DVD. Which of course means that I need to buy
THE CHEAT again to get the new tinted transfer.
Not that I mind too much -- it's a great picture. One can never have too
much De Mille on one's shelves.
-Jeremy
Stephen Cooke
On Fri, 26 Jul 2002, Jeremy Bond Shepherd wrote:
> Not that I mind too much -- it's a great picture. One can never have too
> much De Mille on one's shelves.
You're telling us none of his films are "run of DeMille"?
swac
Ow! Don't hit!
Jeremy Bond Shepherd
"Stephen Cooke" <am...@chebucto.ns.ca> wrote in message
news:Pine.GSO.3.95.iB1.0.1...@halifax.chebucto.ns.ca...
> You're telling us none of his films are "run of DeMille"?
>
> swac
> Ow! Don't hit!
How about DeMille stone around your neck and over the cliff wit' ya?
-J
Precode
> OK, I have got to jump back in here:
>
> tinted scenes and deteriorating in the b/w ones. How's THAT affect your
> theory?
>
Well, it's a theory, not a fact. Maybe the tint on that particular
print acted as a kind of preservative. Hell, if I had all the answers,
I'd go on Regis.
Mike S.
(and that's my final answer)