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Author Topic: Vote RP40 for Historical Status
Martin McCaffery
Film God

Posts: 2481
From: Montgomery, AL
Registered: Jun 99


 - posted 11-24-2014 07:44 AM      Profile for Martin McCaffery   Author's Homepage   Email Martin McCaffery   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Campaign to get the RP40 in the National Film Registry:
quote:
If you’ve ever come especially early to one of our screenings, you may have seen this image on the screen: the black and white pattern of the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers‘s “RP 40″ test loop that we use to set the 35mm projector’s focus and framing.

We’ve wanted to nominated it for inclusion in the National Film Registry for years, and now we’ve done it! (Cross your fingers, and maybe it’ll make the cut!)

Here’s the text of our nomination, written by Film Society board member Andy Uhrich:

* * *

We’d like to recommend a film for the Registry. The title is 35mm Projector Alignment and Image Quality Test Film (Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers, 1971/1995, silent, 00:02:13 or loop). It’s colloquially referred to as RP 40, which is the SMPTE standard that describes the construction and use of the film. Though it might be a well known film to you, we’ve included a still from the 1971 version of the film for your reference.

35mm Projector Alignment and Image Quality Test Film was created by SMPTE to, according to the standard’s documentation, “reproduce motion pictures to make faithful and pleasing reproductions of images and sound.” There’s only one image in the film. Its unchanging nature makes it a powerful tool to discover and fix issues that can be obscured during regular projection. RP 40’s seemingly abstract squares and lines become markers by which to set image focus, check the image resolution, adjust the projector’s shutter to remove travel ghost, and create plates for different aspect ratios.

Why recommend RP 40, which is clearly not an aesthetic work and doesn’t document an important social event?

The film was part of the everyday operations of a movie theater. In this way it can be seen as part of the sub-genre of functional films for cinema operation alongside snipes like 1953’s Let’s All Go to the Lobby.

It’s arguably one of the most common and most regularly projected American films of the last 40 years. Every projection booth worth its salt had one. Repertory and archival theaters still projecting film use it daily to ensure the highest standards of projection.

The RP 40 test film is a medium-specific use of film technology. It’s entirely about cinema as a projected art form. It exemplifies the practices and technologies that regulate the moviegoing experience.

35mm Projector Alignment and Image Quality Test Film is a calibration film recognized by projectionists and lab technicians everywhere. With the ending of film projecting in mainstream cinemas, adding RP 40 to the Registry is a way to honor the behind-the-scenes labor of projectionists as an occupation and skill that was central to twentieth century theatrical cinema.


Full Article

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Leo Enticknap
Film God

Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000


 - posted 11-24-2014 10:28 AM      Profile for Leo Enticknap   Author's Homepage   Email Leo Enticknap   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Very elegantly written and I fully support the sentiment. There's only one problem, though: when a movie goes into the National Film Registry, it tends to end up being lavishly restored and made widely available on beautiful new DCPs and BDs ... but it'll be snowing in Hell before you get to see it actually on film again!

What I'd really like to campaign for is for more actual RP-40 film footage to be printed and made more easily available. If anyone from FotoKem is reading this... As someone who is trying to keep a hard core of customers happy that want to continue seeing 35mm prints, I still do use an RP-40 loop on pretty much every shift that includes showing a 35mm print. For a reasonably priced source of new RP-40 to become available again would surely be a huge help both to rep/cinematheque venues and to places that are reinstalling film projection for Interstellar-type gigs.

The same goes for RP-91, too, which is now pretty much as rare as gold dust.

I'd just take one tinsy issue with his nomination, though: although the RP-40 specifically is unique to film technology, equivalent test images exist to do the same thing in both video (e.g. color bars and test cards) and digital cinema (various DCP test charts around the place). That doesn't detract from its historical importance - in fact, it elevates it, because test/calibration images on film set a precedent for their invention and use in other moving image media. But his wording kinda implies that they aren't used elsewhere (to me, at any rate), which isn't the case.

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Martin McCaffery
Film God

Posts: 2481
From: Montgomery, AL
Registered: Jun 99


 - posted 11-24-2014 11:11 AM      Profile for Martin McCaffery   Author's Homepage   Email Martin McCaffery   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I think they overplay their hand by saying RP40 was part of everyday operations at movie theatres. When I was a relief projectionist in DC and LA, I only found RP40 in specialty houses like AFI or the MPAA screening room. Even if the loop was in the booth somewhere, it was not used on a daily basis. Certainly used on sound calls and set-ups.

And I heartily second your call for a good source for new RP40.

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Sam D. Chavez
Film God

Posts: 2153
From: Martinez, CA USA
Registered: Aug 2003


 - posted 11-24-2014 11:42 AM      Profile for Sam D. Chavez   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
SMPTE still carries this film and McTech's Clyde McKinney makes it for SMPTE for as long as there is demand. BACP like other dealers stocks it.

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Scott Norwood
Film God

Posts: 8146
From: Boston, MA. USA (1774.21 miles northeast of Dallas)
Registered: Jun 99


 - posted 11-24-2014 12:03 PM      Profile for Scott Norwood   Author's Homepage   Email Scott Norwood   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Was RP40 (err...35PA) ever reasonably priced? It has been expensive as long as I have paid attention to such things (since the late 1990s).

And how do we vote?

Someone should nominate Buzz Track, pink noise, and Dolby Tone, too, since these are (along with RP40) all needed to properly screen the other titles in the film registry.

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Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99


 - posted 11-24-2014 02:35 PM      Profile for Gordon McLeod   Email Gordon McLeod   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
It was reasonably priced when one considers that it was not a print but actually expossed as a camera original

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Leo Enticknap
Film God

Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000


 - posted 11-24-2014 03:50 PM      Profile for Leo Enticknap   Author's Homepage   Email Leo Enticknap   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Surely a direct laser filmout would be the best way to make calibration test films now?

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Brad Miller
Administrator

Posts: 17775
From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall)
Registered: May 99


 - posted 11-24-2014 06:21 PM      Profile for Brad Miller   Author's Homepage   Email Brad Miller       Edit/Delete Post 
Sure would be nice if Clyde McKinney had the ability to create new RP91. (hint, hint)

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Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99


 - posted 11-24-2014 07:12 PM      Profile for Mark Gulbrandsen   Email Mark Gulbrandsen   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
The only problem with this film is that it has a weak sound mix.

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Sam D. Chavez
Film God

Posts: 2153
From: Martinez, CA USA
Registered: Aug 2003


 - posted 11-24-2014 08:05 PM      Profile for Sam D. Chavez   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Don't see this happening from Clyde as it requires a 70mm camera and a test pattern. It would probably come out to $10,000/Ft.

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