Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1189824
www.postmagazine.com 46 POST NOV/DEC 2019 timing to demonstrate societal troubles in the wartime capital. The film, which was recent- ly the subject of a 4K restoration by Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE), was a huge success in its release, earning six Academy Award nominations, with one win for Best Supporting Actor for Charles Coburn. As a result of the film's popularity, the nega- tive sustained serious damage in printing in its original and re-releases. While a photochem- ical restoration was undertaken in the early '90s, in a partnership between Sony Pictures and New York's Museum of Modern Art, most of the damage was replaced using second- to fourth-generation elements, which had various problems of their own, including running scratches, density shifts and soft focus due to printing issues. The resulting restoration allowed the material to be seen and appreciat- ed, but much of it still looked compromised. Despite the advancements that have come with digital restoration tools, using alternate elements can still be an important option for restoring damaged frames. Scanning such elements can yield much better results than photochemical printing could, without incur- ring additional generational degradation. "For The More the Merrier, we went back to the archives and located a nitrate duplicate negative at the British Film Institute from the date of the original release," recalls Rita Belda, SPE's vice president for asset management, film restoration and digital mastering. "At first, it didn't appear promising, as it was noted to have mold damage. Since it was several gener- ations away from the original camera negative, it was also likely to have more inherent dam- age and laboratory flaws." However, in a test scan of the DN, techni- cians at Cineric, Inc., New York, using a custom wet-gate scanner, noted that the mold dam- age was virtually invisible. "In comparison to some of the alternate source materials previ- ously used for photochemical restoration, the duplicate negative was surprisingly sharp and detailed, with less noticeable grain than might be expected," notes Belda. "When conformed with the original picture negative on a Baselight at Roundabout West, Santa Monica, the dupe negative shots blended in quite closely, partic- ularly when colorist Sheri Eisenberg addressed the density and contrast differences." The seamless blending of duplicate and original picture negative to eliminate damaged frames would not have been possible without high-quality preparatory and scanning services, supplied by Cineric, and the access to elements from the BFI. "Regardless of the generation of nitrate materials, they still can represent the best quality next to the original negative," explains Belda. "One of the most important aspects in this, and many other restorations, is access to nitrate source materials, cared for in archival collections, as they allow us to capture the most detailed and undamaged version of frames and shots." INDIECOLLECT ON A MISSION NEW YORK — IndieCollect's (www. indiecollect.org) mission is multi-purpose — the or- ganization strives to save American independent films from extinction as a result of neglect or faulty preservation strategies, to educate filmmakers about the urgent need to preserve the collective body of work, to secure long-term archival storage for independent films at no cost to the filmmak- ers and to register every independent title in its IndieCollect Index so that each film becomes discoverable. Launched by Sandra Schulberg in 2008, IndieCollect's in-house colorist team devotes its time to restoring im- portant films that reflect a broad spectrum of American independent cinema. Restorations are funded through grants, donations, crowdfunding campaigns and the filmmakers' own money. Thanks to its work, IndieCollect colorists, including Oskar Miarka and Anastasia Cipolla, have completed more than 40 4K digital restorations to date, including films such as Nationtime (top, right), The Amusement Park (bottom, right) and FTA, and outside colorists are invited to work on projects as needed. IndieCollect's restoration workflow begins with sourc- ing the best possible film and sound elements, prefer- ably the original film negative and the magnetic track. However, in many cases the filmmakers have lost track of the originals, so the team also works with Interpositives (IPs), dupe negatives and occasionally prints. Film ele- ments are inspected and bar-coded, then mounted on cores for scanning using a Kinetta Archival Scanner. The raw scans are assembled in-house and synchronized with the digitized audio files. To avoid editorial issues down the line, IndieCollect seeks an editorial reference copy if available. IndieCollect then invites the filmmakers to sign off on the sync. Next is color correction, and IndieCollect relies on DaVinci Resolve Studio and a DaVinci Resolve Mini Panel for all color grading. DaVinci Resolve Studio's automat- ic dirt removal and deflicker tools, as well as dynamic keyframing, are staples during grading, and the DaVinci Resolve Mini Panel has expedited the overall process and made it much more efficient. Once color is finalized, IndieCollect QCs using a large screen where tiny artifacts are more obvious. After final fixes are made, restoration credits are added, includ- ing funding acknowledgments, and then a wide variety of digital deliverables are produced, including a digital preservation master for the Library of Congress with an updated copyright notice if required.