The BBC used 35mm and 16mm in the days of black and white. I don't think many colour series were ever made on 35mm due to the enormous cost?
Today it would be easy to shoot on film, transfer the negative to video, and edit on video. But until the 1990's video editing was difficult and involved costly equipment so programmes that were mainly shot on film, were edited on film, the negative was cut and a print was made.
By the mid-1980's the preferred format was Super 16mm - which was the same width strip of film but with smaller sprocket holes, which gave a larger image area and therefore better picturequality.
Although the Super 16mm format gave good quality, film grain was visible and this isn't particularly compatible with the compression used by digital technology (DVDs and digital TV) today, which works better with a smooth, grain free picture.
That is why DVDs of old series can sometimes be disappointing.
Monday 24 January 2011 6:55PM
The BBC used 35mm and 16mm in the days of black and white. I don't think many colour series were ever made on 35mm due to the enormous cost?
Today it would be easy to shoot on film, transfer the negative to video, and edit on video. But until the 1990's video editing was difficult and involved costly equipment so programmes that were mainly shot on film, were edited on film, the negative was cut and a print was made.
By the mid-1980's the preferred format was Super 16mm - which was the same width strip of film but with smaller sprocket holes, which gave a larger image area and therefore better picture quality.
Although the Super 16mm format gave good quality, film grain was visible and this isn't particularly compatible with the compression used by digital technology (DVDs and digital TV) today, which works better with a smooth, grain free picture.
That is why DVDs of old series can sometimes be disappointing.