The first. I recently watched The Wraith (1986) on the Sci-Fi Channel; also, last week I watched a DVD of The Heavenly Kid (1985). In both cases I was struck by the fuzzy-edged look of the images.
:rolleyes: Walloon, I never said that I positively knew what format they were shot on, I did say that my understanding was that it was 16mm. This I got from my video professor who had worked in the industry for 30 years… as I was recieving my bachelor’s degree in Television Production. I’m willing to admit that my professor, never having worked in Hollywood, may have been wrong, but that’s what he said.
But I can state positively that if that old 2 inch survived for 40 years, it’s the first tape I’ve ever heard of that did. Even my college resume tape, which was a brand new Ampex 3/4 u-matic didn’t last four years without the control track drop-out making it unusable. The digital beta tape I shot on for years before I finally left the industry (multilayered tape to ensure against dropout) still fell apart after five years, and it used adhesive a heck of a lot better quality than anything they had in the 60’s. I’ve seen miles of tape in my time and can tell you positively that the stuff just doesn’t last.
If you’ve got a cite showing that the original 2-inch, undubbed and untransfered is the master they’re using to cut the DVDs of those shows, then I’d love to see it. In the meantime, do me a favor and park that high horse of yours.
You are wrong. ( then again, you did say “virtually” )
A friend of mine is the Steadicam Operator on “Walker, Texas Ranger”. Doesn’t get much more current than that. It is shot in 16mm. It is not the only network episodic series to be shot in 16mm, but I know for a fact that it is shot that way.
As for what you said about smoke efx, god yes. I had athsma from the moment I was born till I was 6. It came back with a wicked awful vengeance, the day/night I worked on the Billy Joel video for his song, " The Night Is Still Young". We were shooting at the Sony stages ( previously famous as the Camera Mart Stages, and before that much more famous as the Fox/Movietone Stages ). They were using a DynaFogger. It gushed thick efx smoke with such rapidity and density that the entire main stage was filled in less than 20 minutes. This was one of the largest single room stages on the East Coast at one time. We are talking gargantuan.
I walked outside, saw bright colored halos around the streetlights…and started choking. Rather weird- I have had athsma since that night. 
Large price to pay, considering how crappy PA’s were paid back then…
Cartooniverse.
p.s. They use an Arriflex 16 SR-III on Walker, Texas Ranger.
Walloon, I can’t put this any more gently, but stop telling people they don’t know what they are talking about when you don’t know what you are talking about. It’s insulting and tiresome in the extreme. You quote as gospel what you do not know. Please…stop.
I encourage you to research the development and use of the Panavision Elaine, before you insist that no television series in a studio has ever been shot on 16mm film. In addition to the series I already mentioned, before NFL Films built their video studio, they produced at least one weekly series highlighting the previous weeks games. It was hosted by the son of the founder of NFL Films ( one Ed Sabol ). The host, Steve Sabol, appeared weekly in the show. Which was filmed in 16mm REVERSAL STOCK for many years, before NFL Films switched finally to 16mm negative. Look, I spent a lot of years at that facility, I knew the writers, shooters and directors of that show as well as all of their football films.
16mm negative stock was, and still is used to shoot network television shows and series. Just…deal with it and stop condescending when you are in fact incorrect. Had I the time, and were it before 5pm west coast time, I’d freakin’ CALL Woodland Hills and get the straight dope on the Elaine myself, straight from Panavision’s corporate headquarters. But it isn’t, and I’m in the studio right now on a meal break. The Panavision “Elaine”.
Please, please, stop slamming Dopers as being totally ignorant when you in fact are showing your own ignorance. 
You clearly know a lot about broadcast and cinema standards but when you are this meanspirited to someone- and are dead wrong to boot - all it does is reduce respect…and I respect your posts. So, research some more first, yes?
Cartooniverse
Thanks, Cartooniverse. Sheesh. To back up your point, I also am pretty sure that network TV has never used anything but 16mm for their filmed shows. 35mm is just too damned expensive. Even some motion pictures (Like Leaving Las Vegas) are shot on super16mm. TV movies of the week might be in 35, but that’s it.
One of the events that really drives home the difference between taped shows vs filmed is the ER episode that was shot live in (I think) 1995. If you ever get a chance to catch it on reruns, look out for it - it looks like poo compared to how ER usually looks.
Easy there. Walloon was basically on the money, I was calling him/her on their tone as much as their accuracy. Sorta. 
I have shot quite a few t.v. shows. Almost ALL t.v. shows are shot in 35mm. The cost differential is NOT that huge and there are no lab costs past developing, since they go negative to digital media. Most but NOT all shows are cut on non-linear edit systems.
I’ve shot The Sopranos and Sex & The City. Both are shot in 35mm. I’ve friends on Law & Order. It is shot in 35mm. Ditto C.S.I. I cannot personally cite any other shows shot here in NYC. Oh, I shot an episode of " Early Edition" in Chicago back when it was on. It was shot in 35mm too.
The ER episode looked like poo because it was supposed to be a newsy t.v. show shot in the “ER”. They shot it with video cameras. The Steadicam Operator of record during that season bowed out for that episode, to allow a Steadicam Operator who was extremely well-versed in that camera and handling cables, etc. to shoot the footage for the show. It was not a terribly good-looking show. Then again, that show looks pretty nice for a series that relies so heavily on " One-ers", long snaking Steadicam shots that traverse a lot of real estate without cutting. Helps to have all of those “overhead fluorescent” banks using real lights, dimmable and adjustable and not fluros at all. Still, the series has a very pretty look for episodic.
The UCLA Film and Television Archive is full of 2-inch videotape masters, and at the moment I have on order a reduction copy from a 2-inch master from the series Insight shot in 1968. I’m having to pay extra because no intermediary tape exists.
Clip from a 2-inch black and white Ampex videotape made in 1957.
Clip from a 2-inch color Ampex videotape made in 1958.
If you check out the sidelines during NFL games, you’ll still see an Arri SRIII or two out there. I’ve only been watching football for about three years, and it surprised the hell out of me to see film cameras out there. I think they still use the film for weekly highlights shows.
[quote=Leviosaurus]
Thanks, Cartooniverse. Sheesh. To back up your point, I also am pretty sure that network TV has never used anything but 16mm for their filmed shows. 35mm is just too damned expensive. Even some motion pictures (Like Leaving Las Vegas) are shot on super16mm. TV movies of the week might be in 35, but that’s it.
[quote]
I’ll have to back up Cartooniverse on this. Although I have never personally shot 35mm, I do know that many TV shows use 35mm. You can find out the formats shows use by searching on them in IMDB and typing /technical after the URL. For example, Jag, a show currently in production, shows 35mm.
As for the OP, I don’t know. Could be the use of fog. It’s good for making the atmosphere seem denser. (cartooniverse: Were they using oil-based fog, or the current water-based fog?) The biggest difference I see in films from the '70s is that they appear to have more grain. Modern film stocks tend to have less grain and more latitude than the older stocks, and techniques have changed as well.
That’s all I have time for. Gotta run!
From the journal Broadcast Engineering, Nov. 1, 2000:
Maybe everyone is partially correct?
Video used Here, 35mm hEre, and 16mm heRe.
btw, whatever happened with Super 16?
Super-16 is still being used. The last time I looked into it, as far as major productions went, Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman was being shot on that format.
In case anyone didn’t doesn’t know, super-16 is shot on single-perf 16mm film. Since single-perf film does not have perforations on one side, that part of the film can be used for image. Super-16 cameras have modified gates, and the lens is moved over by 1mm. The ground glass is marked with super-16 lines, and some ground glass also have lines for regular 16mm. Super-16 offers a larger image on the film, and more closely matches the aspect ratio of 35mm film. This makes it better for 35mm blow-ups than regular 16mm.
Some cameras, such as Aatons, can be easily converted back and forth between 16 and super-16. Practically, however, it doesn’t make sense. If you want to shoot regular 16mm, just frame it for 16mm.
The one drawback to super-16 vs. 16mm is that the larger image takes up the space that regular 16mm uses for the soundtrack. This is not a problem if you’re planning on blowing it up to 35mm or if you’re planning to transfer it to video. Unlike home-movie super-8 cameras and video, professional cameras do not record sound. (Some news-gathering cameras could be fitted with single-system sound devices back in the '60s and '70s.) Instead, sound is captured on a seperate, synchronous, recorder. The sound and the image are joined on the print.
I’m thinking of having my Éclair NPR modified to super-16. Once altered, unlike an Aaton, it cannot easily be changed back.
It was oil-based. Water-based, at the time, did not hold in the air as long.
-gag-
Huh?
Super 16 looks like a great compromise of price vs quality. 80% the image area of 35mm with the equipment costs of 16mm (more or less). I always wanted to see a side by side of the three formats. Since the film runs thru the gate vertically, 35mm Movie is actually equivilent to still photography’s half frame, right?
Thank you, that’s very helpful.
Foggers used to use mineral oil-based ‘juice’. I thought it smelled rather nice, but it did leave a bit of residue all over things and did cause respiratory problems in some people. Nowadays ‘fog juice’ is water-based and is much friendlier to the set and the body.
Film more affordable than video tape? I’d always understood that film processing costs were (and are) breathtakingly expensive compared to video tape…? Or did you mean that, in the 60’s, video cameras and such, not the tape per se, were the costly factor?
This poster was mistaken on many counts. This was one of them. Proof cited above already.