From: team8martinland@hotmail.com   
      
   See last paragraph... ;-)   
      
   ML   
      
   ///   
      
   From: "Steve Kraus"    
   Newsgroups: rec.arts.movies.tech   
   Subject: Re: Storing 35mm 1968 film trailers...   
   Date: Wed, 05 May 2010 03:57:11 +0100   
   URL: news://   
      
   Steve Kraus wrote:   
   > If it's just the two trailers why not just seal them up and put them   
   > into the freezer?   
      
   CineSIght wrote:   
   > Are you SERIOUS?   Cool & Dry I can see, but frozen, no....   
      
   Absolutely serious.  Do a little research and you'll see.  I'm not sure   
   if it's a good idea for mag tracks but for ordinary film it's the best   
   way to preserve it.  Read some of the AMIA listserve archives.   
      
   I'll share a little anecdote.  When I was a kid I got my first 16mm   
   projector; something my dad saw at a garage sale.  It came with a little   
   400' sponsored film which is what I used to tinker with before I started   
   borrowing features from our local library system.  The film, color print   
   stock from 1960, was, at almost 20 or so years old, extremely faded but   
   still had some cyan left so not totally gone.   
      
   In 1980 Weekly Variety published their story about the color fading   
   crisis headlined "OLD PIX DON'T DIE, THEY FADE AWAY," building upon an   
   earlier story in Film Comment.  I was very interested and I was quite   
   sure that in the few years I had my little film roll it sure seemed to be   
   getting more and more red (magenta).   
      
   Even though the film is a worthless piece of junk I liked to think maybe   
   it's the only print left and the negative is long gone (it might be a   
   reduction from 35; I've never been sure.  Columbia produced it).  So I   
   wrapped it up in plastic and aluminum foil and more plastic and stuck it   
   in the freezer for what was supposed to be a brief period.   
      
   The brief period went on for years before I finally retrieved it and   
   checked it and it was fine.  Then back in the freezer.  And all but   
   forgotten.  Probably a decade went by before I looked at it again.   
      
   It's been kept frozen now for somewhere between 25 and 30 years.  Before   
   posting this I pulled it out and let it warm up before unwrapping it.  I   
   just screened it now and it looks just as it has in the past.  Still some   
   cyan there and essentially unchanged since the last time I saw it.  No   
   issues with the general condition of the base or emulsion either.  I am   
   absolutely convinced that ordinary storage would have resulted in a   
   totally magenta image by now.   
      
   So yes, in my very limited personal experience with what is admittedly   
   something nearly worthless I would say it was highly successful.   
      
   I wish I could turn back the clock and store my 35mm print of "Blade   
   Runner" (original release) in a freezer.  Mint condition and gorgeous   
   when I got it, it was on non low fade stock and all those rich blacks are   
   now see-through magenta.  It's enough to make you want to cry.  It used   
   to be so great to dazzle people with the images and pull the aperture   
   plate and point out (from differences in the frame edges) what shots were   
   65mm.  I guess I can still do that until it goes vinegar--but to actually   
   view one would be better off with the Blu-ray.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)