"Emulsion side out" request for returning 35mm prints?

[Michael Rousselet]

Recently my work has been getting archive prints that request to be returned "Emulsion Side Out" and for the life of me my brain can't rack it. Which side is Emulsion side out? Like, if I'm inspecting the film print and the sound track is close to me (looking down at the image from left to right is bottom to top) that's the emulsion side, correct?

Sorry if this is such a noob question. I've read things that say "oh just fog the image with your breath and the emulsion side gets foggy" but both sides never look foggy.

Also why is it better for storage to have emulsion side out?

Thank you for any help you have.
-Michael

[Randy Stankey]

On release prints for projection in a theater, the emulsion layer is on the side that faces the screen as film travels through the projector.

Regardless of the way you THINK the film should be wound on shipping/storage reels, you should wind the film the way its owner asks you to when you send it back.

From Kodak.com: https://www.kodak.com/en/motion/page...sed-film/#wind

Historically, 35 mm release prints in the United States have been wound emulsion out when ready for projection. In this orientation, the film comes off the supply reel in a counterclockwise rotation but winds onto the projector take up reel in a clockwise rotation with the emulsion in. When 35 mm film is kept wound emulsion in exclusively, there is a tendency for reduced focus drift and other screeming problems.

[Jim Cassedy]

On release prints for projection in a theater, the emulsion layer is
on the side that faces the screen as film travels through the projector.

Are you sure about this Randy?
All my prints run with the emulsion towards the lamp.
SMPTE 194-2002 seems to agree with this:
"Motion-Picture Film (35-mm) ---Projector Usage --- Release Prints Having Four
Perforations per Frame: The photographic emulsion shall be on the side of the
film which faces away from the projector lens"


SMPTE_1942002.jpg

I think it's different south of the equator, or on 8 & 16mm film which usually has
the emulsion towards the lens, but can also run with the emulsion away from the
lens, depending on if it's a reversal print or a dupe.

[Nick Quintana]

If the print arrived heads out, and the soundtrack is on the side closer to you, then it is already emulsion out.

[Phillip Grace]

This is how I remember it for 35mm film. (16mm is a more complicated story).

• In the camera, the negative is exposed with the emulsion towards the lens.
• The positive print is made from the negative with both emulsion surfaces in contact.
• Therefore the emulsion surface of the print faces the lamphouse when running through the projector. (This is the industry standard emulsion position for 35mm prints).
• The emulsion orientation is retained throughout the entire negative/positive duplicating process, no matter how many generations are involved.

Hold the print with the image upright and the (analogue optical) soundtrack on the left side and you are looking at the emulsion surface of the film. Armed with that information you can check the location of the soundtrack as you wind or rewind it across the bench - which is the simplest, easiest-to-see indicator as to which side is up.

Other methods:

On the rewind bench, the base surface of the film appears shiny, and the emulsion surface is dull. This is clearly visible on pre-print materials but is sometimes difficult to see on release prints for various reasons.

If you breath on the film the base surface will fog, and you can see the condensation as it evaporates from the surface of the film. The emulsion surface will not fog when treated the same way.

If you really must, you can also find the emulsion by placing each surface alternately on the tip of your tongue. The emulsion surface will adhere a little, but the base surface will not. Every now and then you might find evidence that someone has pressed the film between their lips, which yields the same results. Yuk!

Yes, you should return the film wound as its owner requests, if they express a preference. If nothing else it helps maintain a good relationship with the suppliers.
The general practice in film archives is to store film elements wound with the emulsion out. This is because as the film ages and dries out it tends to curl inwards towards the emulsion, so the idea is to counteract the curl by winding with the emulsion out, to keep the film "flatter". There is also a conflict between the ideal wind tension for storage versus that for shipping, which is a whole can of worms that is best left closed.

Randy's quote from Kodak makes good sense to me.

[Phillip Grace]

Hi Jim. Here in the southern hemisphere the water goes down the plug hole in the other direction, but the light goes through the film exactly the same way it does up north!

[Randy Stankey]

Are you sure about this Randy?
[B]All my prints run with the emulsion towards the lamp.

Yes, you are right. Sorry... It's that thing where I get stuff bass ackward all the time.

[Leo Enticknap]

Emulsion out is part of the FIAF "archival wind" specification, the thinking being that it is less likely to lead to emulsion cracking/separation if the base shrinks in storage. As almost all prints in circulation these days are polyester and that doesn't shrink (at least, not significantly), this rule is now largely academic, but it's still there.

As noted above, the most reliable way to tell is base side = shiny / emulsion side = dull. If you're struggling to see in unhelpful ambient light, an LED flashlight held at a 45° angle to the film surface should be all you need. As Jim notes, there is no absolute rule of emulsion faces the lens or emulsion faces the lamp, and there are also 16mm "DIN prints" to be confused by.

[Steve Guttag]

Oddly, historically, emulsion-in was considered safer for the emulsion since it didn't put the emulsion under tension, which would lead to cracking. And that was in the acetate days.

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

I think what they are trying to do is cut down on needlessy having to rewind the print unless the film is actually being projected. Rewinding also damages the film and it attracts dust and damages, abrades, both sides of the film.

[Paul H. Rayton]

The "emulsion-in" concept was really pushed for a while. "Emulsion IN or your focus is OUT!" was one slogan used. At the time, some places did modify their methods of (reel-to-reel) projection, so that the emulsion would pay out from off the front of the upper feed reel, turning clockwise, as opposed to the long-standing tradition of running that upper reel with the film feeding of the back side, i.e. running counterclockwise. Under the new "focus stability" concept, both the feed reel and the takeup reel would thus be turning in a clockwise direction. And for rewinding, it would be run top-to-top, thus the emulsion always remained "in". When this was in vogue, I was working a 6-screen multiplex with platters; by the time I returned to reel-to-reel projection, there didn't seem to be anybody advocating for it any more.

[Steve Guttag]

At the Uptown in DC, we switched to Emulsion-in wrap. The improvement was very apparent to all that worked there. Focus on a Cinerama screen was always a challenge. The longer the film ran (number of weeks) the worse it got. After switching to emulsion-in, that problem vanished. Nothing sells to traditional union worker like the concept of being able to not get off their butt for longer periods! And that was with us running 8" hub reels (35/70 standard 8" hubs, 22" flanges).

And yes, we had over-over on the rewind bench (with Film-Guard too). An advantage of Film Guarding on the rewind is we avoid the streaks that platter houses got on the first show(s).

RewindFilmCleanB.jpg

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

If you ask Kodak, they will tell you that it's best to run film the same way it's manufactured. With them, that is emulsion in.

[Leo Enticknap]

Oddly, historically, emulsion-in was considered safer for the emulsion since it didn't put the emulsion under tension, which would lead to cracking. And that was in the acetate days.

My guess is that this does not factor in base shrinkage over time of acetate (and nitrate): the "archival wind" recommendations have optimal long-term storage as their goal, not optimal theatrical presentation. Keep in mind that archivists spend most of their time working with pre-print preservation elements, and tend to regard projection as a necessary evil that they would rather did not happen at all. My view of all of this is that if the print in question has been struck from preservation elements and therefore can be replaced by writing a check, it should be handled for optimal projection rather than optimal preservation, which, for all the reasons you give, means emulsion in. But if, however, it's a surviving original release print (or any print that has not been struck from printable elements in the archive's custody), the question becomes more complicated.

[Ryan Gallagher]

It's an interesting subject. From an archival perspective... somewhat separate from the emulsion orientation subject, of which way it is better to store, it seems like shipping tails out reduces film handling and risk for damage. Everyone is expected to inspect their change-over prints, and receiving one tails out means you your act of inspecting potentially also has you set up for playing, without an additional rewind step. Provided suitable take-up tension, your change-over reels also come off the projector "ready to ship", without yet another rewind step.

Obviously if you are shipping them in a different orientation than storing, you have to do both those rewinds back at the archive, but the archive seems like a generally safer place to do them? I get that distributors and others that no longer employ adequate film-handling staff don't really have the luxury of choice anymore. But at the archives they do (in theory).

But perhaps I'm missing something due to my experience level. If you do a lot of stop/start or work on a print while inspecting, perhaps it's better to do a full rewind anyway to eliminate tension variations that resulted from the non-continuous inspection wind.