Old sitcoms.... why did they use film for location shoots?

Hopefully they haven't cropped it in to 16:9 in the process as they did with Thunderbirds.

I think 16mm B&W stands up to HD remastering, certainly an episode of Fireball XL5 has been colourised from a 16mm print then released to Blu-Ray (with quite good results from what I've seen). I was always under the impression that 16mm colour was a bit crap though?

EDIT: nevermind, Fireball XL5 was 35mm B&W!

16mm can be scanned to HD (and there's a few things being released which originated on 16mm), but I think noggin mentioned that it doesn't reach the quality threshold and standard the BBC require.

I suppose there's a bunch of filtering or other processes involved in removing grain artefacts from 16mm stock - so perhaps that's the reason for the BBC not liking it.

(standby noggin... and CUE)

Super 16 - which is the widescreen 16mm format - isn't accepted by the BBC for HD production (and they aren't alone in that).

However some US HD production HAS been shot on Super 16 (The West Wing?).

The BBC's argument against HD Super 16 is that the usual stocks used in general production have to be fast (i.e. sensitive) and this means that they are often grainy - generating noise which is difficult to compress and reduces picture quality as received in the home (though in an edit suite with little compression it can look great).

35mm (4perf) has a much larger frame, and thus you get less grain for a given film speed (as more light hits the film). That said the BBC is allowing 3perf and possibly 2perf 35mm to be used now to reduce cost. (I think their argument is that 3perf 35mm is better quality than Super 16 and not hugely different in budget terms)

Non-Super 16, regular 16mm I'm less aware of. My understanding is that it is the same image height as Super 16, but 16mm camera film has sprockets both sides, whereas Super 16 camera film has a wider image because it only has sprockets on one side of the film allowing the image to be wider and to use the space where regular 16mm camera film has a second set of sprockets.

(Regular 16mm film prints for projection also have only one set of sprockets because the sound track occupies the space taken by the second set of sprockets on the camera film. Super 16 isn't designed for projection - it is designed for TV or for blow-up to 35mm for projection I believe - so there isn't an issue not having space for a sound track on Super 16?)

However this suggests that the same vertical resolution and horizontal angular resolution - roughly - is available with both formats (if you pillarbox regular 16mm)

If the original production was shot using slow stock and very heavily lit (say in a studio style) then it might look quite good in HD. However if the production was shot in available light (or not much more) on location it will probably have been shot with fast stock and be too grainy for HD.

Pride and Prejudice (the BBC series from the mid-90s) was shot Super 16, originally edited in the 4:3 SD domain, remastered for 16:9 SD (apart from the titles which were PAL composite 4:3 SD zoomed), and then remastered again for HD 16:9 Blu-ray release (with cleaner titles). Whilst the Blu-ray does look very nice it does show the limitations of Super 16 as actually used in anger...

It wouldn't be good enough for an original HD commission - though releasing archive content in the highest quality possible is a good idea. (It doesn't mean because the archive content looks good in HD we should use that as a reason to use the same technology for modern HD production)

Aha. I presume aswell, whilst Pride and Prejudice would have a high budget many shows simply wouldn't have the background detail in the sets to stand up to a remastering either?

I've never got round and keep meaning to see the remastered Star Trek episodes. How the kitchy 60s sets appear in HD is the part that has caught my curiosity the most.

Possibly - though often period drama sets and the lighting style used is such that many of the backgrounds are quite high quality and/or not shot in focus.

There is a lot of talk about HD demanding much higher quality sets - and in some cases this is true - particularly on studio shows (acrylic panels can't be as scratched, floors not as scuffed etc.) However it isn't always the case.

And of course if they're shooting on location for period pieces, then the interiors and exteriors are going to look as good as the real thing does!

I agree with them on this. I was watching the final series of 'Scrubs' on E4 HD, which I believe is shot on Super 16, and the amount of grain in it is really distracting. It's actually quite a nice effect when you first see it, but becomes annoying after a while.

As we're talking about old film productions being rescanned for HD, it might be a good place to mention that the BBC's 1969 documentary series, Civilisation, is going to be shown on the HD channel next month. The press release says it was shot on 35mm film, and was one of the first series shot in colour for BBC Two.

(interestingly too, the /programmes page has all its original air dates listed)

I mentioned it on the last page

How do production costs compare these days for shooting on film as opposed to HD video? I would have thought, perhaps naively, that everyone would be ditching film for video in droves.

David

Not sure. Low end drama that was shot on SD DigiBeta (or even DV) is switching to HD video camcorders (HD Cam, XD Cam HD etc.) - but higher end stuff that was shot on Super 16 is moving to more specialised electronic capture which might not best be described as "HD video" - as often they are higher resolution than HD and don't actually generate an "HD video" signal that is recorded.

Doctor Who is shot on Sony F35 (and F23) electronic cameras, and I think recorded to HD Cam SR tape but possibly as unprocessed data rather than normal video? Other shows are using Red, Arri D21, Genesis, Viper etc. and these can all record as digital data - though not always to tape and not always in a format you'd call "video".

The main difference between shooting on HD Video (like shooting multicamera HD cameras or on HD Cam / XD Cam HD / DVC Pro HD camcorders) and shooting 'digitally' on stuff like Red, F35 etc. is that you don't do anywhere near as much 'in camera' processing with the latter and have to create proxies for offline editing based on LUTs used for on-set monitoring (and used as guides only in the grade) The actual full quality pictures aren't really 'created' until the grade in the online - which is a much more powerful process than when dealing with stuff that is shot using standard broadcast cameras (which record a picture that has already been colour balanced, exposed, knee-ed, gamma-ed etc.)

Whilst HD video and Digital capture remove the requirement for film stock and processing, rushes transfer etc. they introduce new requirements for data wrangling, backing up content, coping with proxies etc. - AND you are introducing new technologies that some DoPs are not familiar with.

Some productions have moved from Super 16 to Digital capture (Silent Witness is a good example), some have moved from DigiBeta to Digital capture (Doctor Who), whilst other productions that would have been shot Super 16 have moved to either 3-perf 35mm (Tess of the Durbervilles) or 2-perf 35mm (Emma). Some shows have stuck with Super 16 (Spooks) and as a result are not broadcast in HD by the BBC.

When BBC HD launched - most BBC drama was shot on Super 16, and at that time 2-perf and 3-perf 35mm weren't seen as options. Any BBC drama that was being shot for BBC HD either had to be shot on standard 35mm (way out of most BBC budgets apart from major co-pros - though I think The 39 Steps was an exception) or to shoot electronically, either on HD camcorders or using digital capture cameras - so initially almost all BBC HD drama was captured electronically (Bleak House on HD Cam camcorders for instance).

Robin of Sherwood has been remastered in HD and released on Blu-Ray but I haven't seen it so don't know what the quality is like. I think it was probably shot on standard 16mm.