35mm reels

Hello,

I have just finished editing a 98 mins hdv-feature film, and preparing to break it into reels for a 35mm blow-up. Does anybody know how long the reels should be? I have heard both 20 mins and up to 22 mins. Unfortunately I can't get hold of the lab...so therefore does anybody know?
Will it be more expensive with the lab costs if I break it into six reels instead of five?

Thank you.

Helle

You should definitely check with the lab doing the blow up. In fact I can recommend one as I have a movie now in pre-production that I'm planning to print to 35mm.

Anyway, you're better off going with 1000 ft reels, not 2000 ft reels. You'll end up with ten reels. Then each two reels will be spliced together to make up one theatrical reel.

If there are any problems or corrections to be made later, you're dealing with 1000 ft reels. But the real limitation is how big a reel the transfer facility can handle. If you give them 20 minutes of digital they may end up having to break it in two and that could mean lab time which will be charged to you. That's why you should check with the lab doing the blow.

up. LOL

Don't even think about 10 minute reels (actually 11 minutes). You will pay more in neg cutting (extra leaders) and assembly and I'm not even sure if Eastman makes 1000' rolls of print stock anymore.

2000' of 35mm grinding along at 90' per minute gives you 22 mins. You have to allow for threading the printer camera and for leads and tails. Talk to the lab. If your lab is charging you for multiple answer prints then you've got a poor deal. You should be charged for your final Answer Print only. At least, that's the deal with Fotokem here in LA. They will not print out the first few passes as a complete film, but rather as single frames sampled from the mid point of each shot which you view on a filmstrip projector with your color timer. The final couple of versions are printed to film for final corrections.

Best of luck,

Harry.

Harry Bromley-Davenport

yeah, 2000 ft spools is the way to go.
after lace up, and clock leader i think it comes down to 21 min max
as every one else says talk to your lab.

less spools is cheaper for reasons harry outlined.
but 5 or 6 spools isnt a huge cost difference, i think.

i;d try hard for 5 spools.
5 spools is good for mixing:
you mix one spool a day!

not that you;d have to, but avoid going to 7.
shippers carry 3 spools.
if you've 1 left over, it'll get lost


a 98 min film could easily break into 5 spools.
it could also be tight, depends on your luck...
there are certain things to look for that make good spool breaks.

audio:
NO MUSIC ACROSS THE BREAK!
also need at least one second of quiet (no dialogue) on the incoming spool.
why?
the sound break actually comes after the pic break, due to the way sound is laid out on hte print. ( that;s old fashioned optical sound - digital sound is different, i think, but who knows where your film will be shown)
a second is probably to short: successive joining and un-joining by lazy projectionists will lose you a frame each time the spools are made up.
go for 2 seconds
best to have quiet atmos on both sides is the common thinking (i question that a little: wouldnt you hear an edit in a quiet passage more than a busy, but non-descript one?)
i think the ideal is supposed to be going from loud to quiet.

PIC:
no cuts within scenes.
impossible to grade both sides to match.
if you have to cut within a scene, do it thru a cut away, or detail cu shot.

brightly lit scenes are no god near hd & tl of spool.
why?
because those sections get handled the most and show it the most.

black or fades to black are a no-no
why?
because the projectionist had no definite frame to cut on.
you could include a note with a frame count.
ha! as if they;ve got time to read that!
they'll just cut on the last frame visible to them,
and you lose your fade.


here's how i do it:
create a sequnce with the whole film in it.
open the basic text generator.
remove it;s in/outs,
type in a duration of 21minutes in it;s duration feild.
(clearing in/outs gives you a clip that has no handles after you enter the duration, so you cant accidentally make it longer than 21mins)
clear the text, or write in a discrete "Spool 1"

lay that on your cut sequence & use it as a guide.
you have to find a spool break point before the end of the text clip.
when you think you have a good spot, go forward one second and play from there. is the sound clean? good. is there dialogue hard on the start? bad


when you find the perfect spool break, trim the text to that point,
copy it, and lay it down again, changing the text, if you have it, to "Spool 2"

etc, etc


all the best with your film,
nick

Kickass post, Nick...this doesn't get talked about enough -- prepping for film.


www.derekmok.com

Dear all,

thanks so much. It has been very helpful! I ended up splitting it into six reels
since the film ends up more than 98 mins with front and end credits.
I will speak to the lab tomorrow morning to double check before I hand it
over to the sound.

Helle

Nick seems to have covered it pretty well, but here is one last tip:

Make the first reel less than 1800 feet if possible. Why? Well, it is standard practice in the studios to leave a little room on the first reel for trailers and this way the projectionist won't be running a short trailer reel and have to start your first reel on a "change over" (switching projectors). Of course most theaters platter up the whole feature along with the trailers these days, but we still try to keep reel 1 under 1800 feet.

--Dan

Humm--with the amount of trailers being shown before the feature, the shorter reel 1 is, the better.

Although I can see Daniel Fort's point of view, I doubt if there is a single theater, chain or independent, which would join the trailers and advertising onto the front of Reel 1 of a feature if they are using a dual projector system. It's not worth the time.

Ages ago, I owned a tiny little independent cinema for about nine years and for half of that time, before we "upgraded" to a "changeover-proof" tower system, we projected in 2000' reels. The ads and trailers, however, were always on the "B" projector (the one on the right hand side) and, even after we went to a "long runner" we kept the ads on the "B" machine (which we retained) because our Main shows were different to our Late shows and -- well, you can see, right?

Blah blah ...

Why am I droning on like this?

Shuttup, Harry.



Best

H.


Harry Bromley-Davenport

Good post, Nick.

Harry.

Hi Harry,
-------------------------------------------------------
> Although I can see Daniel Fort's point of view, I
> doubt if there is a single theater, chain or
> independent, which would join the trailers and
> advertising onto the front of Reel 1 of a feature
> if they are using a dual projector system. It's
> not worth the time.


Yeah, there's lots of things that we are required to do when working for the studios that's not worth the time--like many of the movies these studios churn out.

But I digressed.

--Dan

Did we leave out the 20-frame -- or was that 26-frame? Been so long-- sound overlap from the previous reel on the beginning of the new release reel? That's for the offset of the optical sound head. Dan, Harry, Nick, confrm that?

- Loren
Today's FCP 5 keytip:
Preview effects sections with Option-P or Option-Backslash!

The FCP 5 KeyGuide?: a professional placemat.
Now available at KeyGuide Central:
www.neotrondesign.com

Actually, (he said in a snotty British accent) it's 20 and a half frames. So there!

Best

Harry

Good hearing from you Loren!

Oh yes, the sound leads the picture but that doesn't really have to do with how long to make the reels. This offset is addressed on the dubbing stage when laying down the final mix. Just to make thing a little more confusing the sound mixers call the process of adding the little piece of audio that overlaps the reels "adding the pullups."

The sound head is in the middle of the picture frame so you could argue that it is 20.5 frames ahead of picture but I don't want to go there now. However, let's get specific and mention that the analog optical audio track is 20 frames (20.5 frames in Harry's case) ahead of picture while Dolby Digital is 26 frames ahead of picture--though it can vary depending on the processing presets.

What about DTS and SDDS? How about someone finding out and updating Wikipedia:

[en.wikipedia.org]
[en.wikipedia.org]

--Dan

yeah, i was trying to explain that sound offset, without actually going into any details!

best example for me is old episodes of "the Adams Family" i see on TV here,
where the opening titles are invariably broken.
you see a cut in the picture, then about a second later, a jump in the music...
they're kooky and they're // click! click!

i generalised by saying don't have dialogue in that first second, as the sound edit will happen around there.
i think it's 22 frames for 16mm?
if i cant remember... i just call the lab,
which takes us back to the beginning.

Isn't it 19 frames?

OK. So here's my final blockbuster piece of useless information about the 20.5 frames. Once upon a time, when people cared about the presentation of movies, if you had a big venue, you installed projectors with a moveable sound head. This head could be cranked CLOSER to the picture by about 4 frames in order to shorten the distance between sound and picture, thus making the sound play back earlier than if it were in sync.

Why? You cry ...

Because sound travels, when I last measured it, at 761 mph which I think is 46 ft per second, the sound heard by a customer in a venue where the farthest seat was say 200' from the screen, would hear the sound about 4 frames late. The projector could compensate for this and the moment that a customer in an average seat heard the sound could be adjusted.

How about zat?

And in 16mm I think it's 40 frames.

Pip Pip.

Best

Harry.

Right you are, Harry.

And for digital system they can adjust the offset, well, digitally. In addition, the surrounds have a seperate delay that needs to be tweaked in order to give the proper spacial effect.

As for 16mm--is anyone still doing 16mm sound composite prints? The specs say the sound is 26 frames ahead of picture. What you're thinking of is 16mm film having 40 frames per foot.

Anyway, more useless off topic film trivia.

--Dan

Ah. Quite right. My mind is so full of useless information.

Best

H.