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So there’s this music video floating around
the Interwebs.

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Something about giving your cardiac muscle as a Christmas gift,

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and being distraught upon its subsequent re-gifting?

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Anyway, I checked it out, and people are just

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FREAKING OUT

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about how good the video looks.

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“The quality is so good, looks like people
in 2019 trying to dress like people in the ‘80s!”

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“Why is nobody talking about
how amazing this 4K transfer is”

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Well, I am, and in fact so many people are that it’s
getting news coverage.

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And some people are left wondering how they managed to do it.

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Well, the answer is simple. The music video
was shot on film, and somebody had the master

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(or a very good print) transferred in 4K.

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But wait, you say, "I was alive in the ‘80s, and everything looked all fuzzy all the time.

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There’s no way my favorite hits from MTV would survive into the 2020’s!"

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You’re right!

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But also.

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You’re wrong!

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It all depends on how the material you’re watching has been produced.

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Was it shot on
film?

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Or was it shot on tape?

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And while there was never a clear rule-of-thumb for what technology was used under what circumstances,

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there are a few tell-tales which will reveal which is
which.

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So let’s talk about those, as well as what the difference is between film and tape.

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Just as a note, this discussion takes place prior to the advent of

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digital video and high definition television.

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So, for the most part, we’re talking about stuff made
in the 1990’s or earlier,

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with a hint of the early 2000’s peppered in.

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Photography may seem like a trivial thing
today, but it wasn’t so easy for the vast

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majority of its history.

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The goal of this video isn’t to go through the entire history of photography,

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so we’re gonna fast forward to about 1900 when we’ve settled on this film stuff.

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Photographic film consists of
a substrate covered in a photosensitive goop

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called the emulsion.

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Silver halide crystals
in this goop will undergo a chemical change

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when they are hit with photons.

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Specifically,
tiny seed particles of metallic silver will

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form on the surface of these crystals when
incoming photons liberate an electron from

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individual atoms on the halide crystals.

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If you focus light onto the film with a lens
and expose it briefly with the aid of a shutter,

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the incoming photons will forms what’s called
the latent image.

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Wherever the film has been exposed to light,

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some of those crystals will
now have trace amounts of metallic silver

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hanging out on the surface.

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To obtain a usable
image, a chemical process called development

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will cause the metallic silver in the exposed
halide crystals to spread and turn the entire

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crystal into solid silver.

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The metallic silver
then blocks light from going through the film,

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and the result is that areas exposed with
light become dark, and a negative image is

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now captured on the film.

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This is what film negatives look like.

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You can see the images quite clearly,

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and if we use magnification we can see the individual
silver crystals.

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This is known as the film’s grain, and depending on the properties of the film,

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these grains may be larger, smaller, or even differently shaped.

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The grain of the
film is what defines the image.

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While these certainly can’t be called pixels, at least
not in the way we use that term today,

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they represent the smallest amount of detail that
the film can capture.

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However, because the grains are distributed randomly,

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and since they are themselves found in all sorts of shapes and sizes,

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we can’t exactly define
the resolution in any numerical terms other than

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“X number of grains per millimeter
on average”.

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Over the course of film’s development, and
I mean technological development, we created

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better film that was more sensitive to light

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(sometimes known as faster film),

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we created color films,

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we created sharper films,

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and we created safer film that wouldn’t burst into flames if the nitrate substrate were to get too hot.

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But throughout the entire history of film, into present day, the basics are the same.

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Tiny grains of silver halides react to light, and these form the base of the image after development.

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In color films the silver halides are used as a sort of intermediary

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and are replaced with color dyes in the development process,

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but the original grain structure
remains intact and visible.

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Of course, where’s there’s photography,
motion pictures are soon to follow!

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The motion picture cameras used in Hollywood would typically use film just like this,

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though instead of being run horizontally through a camera like these have been,

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it would be run vertically, using a smaller portion of the film with each exposure.

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This film is 35mm across which gave it the name

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35mm.
(shocker)

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A typical motion picture
camera would expose the film 24 times in a second,

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creating a frame rate of 24 frames
per second.

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And if you create a positive print from these original negatives,

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then run it through a projector which will shine light through it and project it onto a surface,

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you’ll be able to recreate the illusion of movement!

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This was the only way we knew how to make
moving pictures happen for a long while.

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We took the technology of the photograph, sped
it up, and projected it.

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Each individual film frame was itself just a photograph,

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made up of those tiny silver grains,

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and with surprisingly high visual fidelity.

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And we were all having fun watching these amazing movies at the cinema,

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enjoying our popcorn, socializing with the
neighbors, and then a little thing happened

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called television.

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Television.

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An invention with limitless potential.

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When it works.

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One day, I predict millions of people might learn Latin and Greek sitting in front of their TV sets.

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Anyway, with television, we were building images in a whole new way.

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With ELECTRONICS.

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Analog television is some fascinating stuff, and I’ve made a number of videos about it,

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which you can check out in this playlist.

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But here’s the gist.

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A scanning electron beam creates a pattern
of light on the face of a cathode ray tube (CRT)

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called a raster.

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This raster is a series of
horizontal lines.

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Variations in the intensity of the beam will create variations in brightness as the line is drawn.

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By synchronizing the scanned raster of the television with the scanning raster of a television camera,

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we can instantly transmit moving images across
the globe.

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All it takes is a television set and favorable receiving conditions.

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In the earliest days of television, all television
was produced live.

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We didn’t have a way to store television signals to be rebroadcast later.

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Eventually, we found that we could  just adapt motion picture film for use in television

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using devices called telecines and kinescopes.

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While perhaps a primitive
and brute-force way to go about it, these worked.

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All you needed to do was to film a
television screen to capture it on film.

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And to rebroadcast it, you point a television
camera at a movie screen and tada!

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Now, to be clear it was a little less janky than that,
but indeed the principle was

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“film a TV”

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and “Broadcast a movie”

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But this was kind of annoying. For one thing,
television was created using interlaced video,

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meaning we had a refresh rate of 60 hz in
the US.

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Typically, when stored on film, the frame rate would be cut in half to 30 frames per second,

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if not lower to 24, reducing the fluidity of motion.

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But the most annoying thing was
that film is expensive!

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You can’t re-use it, it takes time and effort to develop it,

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and in general it presented a limitation to television production.

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Enter, videotape!

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The Quadruplex recorder
by Ampex was the first real success in this field.

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Suddenly, we had a way to store the
electronic signals of television…

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electronically.

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By writing them directly onto tape, we’d
have the full 60 hz refresh rate, in fact

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we’d have a literal television signal ready
to be re-transmitted at any time, and most

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importantly, the tape could be re-used.

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Now television could be recorded earlier in the day, broadcast later that evening,

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and the same tape could be re-used for the next day.

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Much to the chagrin or archivists.

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But anyway...

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Here’s the key thing.

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Videotape is simply
storing a television signal.

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And that television signal, unlike our friend Film, is not a physical object

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made of microscopic silver crystals that we can see with our own eyes.

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Granted, the tape is made of microscopic particles,

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but they don’t hold an image. It’s just
the television raster frozen in time, which

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means it does have a limited and defined resolution.

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That raster?

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That’s as much resolution as you can ever have, and for NTSC televisions,

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like this one, that’s only 480 lines.

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PAL countries got closer to 600 lines, but still.

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That’s it.

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I’m gonna stick to NTSC numbers from now on, so back to 480.

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Those 480 lines are sort of like the speed
limit of analog television.

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Television is a technical standard, after all.

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You can’t exceed 480 lines of resolution or else you’ve made something that no television set can display.

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So if you’re using a television camera, you’ve got those 480 lines.

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No more.

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No less.

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The best videotape will record the television signal almost verbatim, but that’s still just…

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are you ready?

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480 lines.

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Which today we call Standard Definition.

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So, anything that was mastered on tape will
forever be limited to those 480 lines of resolution.

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We can’t get any more detail out of it unless
we start doing some goofy AI stuff.

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But film?

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That’s an entirely different story.

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Film isn’t an electronic signal following a technical standard.

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It’s just a bunch of microscopic
silver crystals!

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So even though we might have used film to make something for TV,

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if we still have the film we can go back,

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transfer the film with modern technology,

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and suddenly
have the same thing in MUCH higher quality.

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When shooting with film, the result will be
as sharp as the person could focus and as

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fine as the grain of film is.

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This is why some older television shows, like
Star Trek the Next Generation,

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are looking great into the 2020’s.

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The producers of
TNG had decided to shoot on film.

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Why might they do that? Well, while it would make the
production more expensive, it also gave them

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tons of flexibility in the editing.

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Because film has a high level of detail, you can crop the frame without impacting the quality

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as it appears on-screen.

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But best of all, this decision paid future dividends.

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Thanks to shooting on film, we aren’t stuck with a bunch of tapes in standard definition.

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We have the original film negatives that we can

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scan at modern resolutions and enjoy in the
highest quality possible.

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But lots of television shows didn’t go that
route.

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It’s easy to argue that,

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"well if we’re making this for TV, why would we use
film?

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If everyone’s watching this on a standard definition television,

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what’s the benefit
of exceeding that quality aside from, maybe,

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some freedom in the edit bay?"

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And so, other shows like Star Trek Voyager, shot directly to tape.

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Quick correction / clarification.

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The actual live-action was shot on film, which

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in hindsight seems pretty obvious considering
the refresh rate is definitely NOT 60 Hz...

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I haven’t actually seen any of Voyager until
now… forgive me.

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The catch with Voyager

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was that the film was immediately transferred
onto videotape,

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and all of the editing and special effects --so basically the entirety of post-production-- were done on tape at

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NTSC resolution. Anyway...

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Which in fairness didn’t matter at all back
in the day since it was only seen on the tube

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TVs of the day.

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In fact you might argue itwas better than film since you had a true 60Hz refresh rate again.

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If you like that
sort of thing.

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But that decision means we cannot improve
the quality beyond how it was in 1995.

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It’s stuck that way forever.

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The video is hard-coded
onto magnetic tape, either in the analog domain

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or (in later years) in the digital domain,

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and there’s literally no room for improvement.

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If it was shot in standard definition, standard
definition it shall forever be.

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And so, that music video?

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It was simply shot
on this stuff!

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While nobody saw it on film back in the ‘80s, at least aside from the people doing the editing,

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that film was always there in storage somewhere,

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ready to be transferred
a second time using today’s technology.

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And now that’s it’s been done, it’s
blowing everybody’s mind.

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So. How can you tell if something’s been
shot on film vs. tape?

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Well, first of all, it it wasn’t produced for television, as
in, if it’s a movie,

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it was shot on film.

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Digital cinema wasn’t viable until the 21st century, so if it’s a movie from the

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‘90s or earlier, that’s film.

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And this is why so many old movies have been reissued on Blu-Ray with great results.

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We have the film prints to scan in HD, or even 4K.

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Unless of course they’ve been lost.

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Now if it was produced for television, the
easiest thing to look for is the soap opera effect.

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This is the name given for the oddly
smooth motion commonly seen in soap operas

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which were, I believe without exception, always
shot to tape.

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Television programming that was shot on tape will be just as smooth as that,

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because the temporal resolution of 60 Hz is maintained.

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In contrast, film is usually at 24 frames
per second, even when used for television,

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so the motion won’t be nearly as smooth.

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If you see a so-called “cinematic” framerate

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for television programming, odds are that
was shot on film.

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You might on rare occasion see something filmed at 30 frames per second,

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00:13:00,060 --> 00:13:05,640
which is the frame rate I’m using with this camera, but I can’t see much evidence of this being a thing.

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In the US, anyway, most TV that was shot on film was done at 24 frames per second,

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and 3:2 pulldown was used to fit the 60 hz refresh rate of television.

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00:13:14,740 --> 00:13:17,600
Now the refresh rate may not tell you the
whole story.

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00:13:17,600 --> 00:13:23,320
For instance, lots of times you’ll find something online that was originally recorded in 60 hz interlaced,

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00:13:23,320 --> 00:13:26,620
but now exists as 30 frames per second progressive.

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00:13:26,620 --> 00:13:28,940
So that can be hard to tell.

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00:13:28,940 --> 00:13:35,760
But if you ever see the buttery smooth motion of true analog video, that’s for sure on tape.

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00:13:35,760 --> 00:13:37,540
Again. We’re talking old stuff.

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00:13:37,540 --> 00:13:41,700
People seem to increasingly like 60hz video these days which…

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00:13:41,700 --> 00:13:43,180
yeah sure whatever floats your boat.

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00:13:43,180 --> 00:13:46,540
Another thing to look for are actual film
artifacts.

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00:13:46,540 --> 00:13:48,640
If you see specks or scratches,

244
00:13:48,649 --> 00:13:50,360
odds are that’s film.

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00:13:50,360 --> 00:13:53,580
Those sorts of things
just don’t happen on videotape.

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00:13:53,580 --> 00:13:58,689
It’s not like there aren’t any artifacts at all with
tape, but they’re usually very minor and

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incredibly brief. At least on anything recorded
professionally.

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00:14:02,560 --> 00:14:06,120
And if you see any sort of grain in the image… that’s film.

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00:14:06,120 --> 00:14:11,260
Something recorded from tape wouldn’t have grain to begin with, so whenever it’s visible, that footage was

250
00:14:11,260 --> 00:14:13,780
(at some point anyway) on film.

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00:14:13,780 --> 00:14:18,199
Note that digital noise can look sorta like
grain, but you’re not likely to see that

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00:14:18,199 --> 00:14:20,760
on things produced professionally for television.

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00:14:20,760 --> 00:14:24,300
Other caveat, dot crawl on analog video tape

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kinda looks like grain, but it’s not that
random.

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00:14:27,509 --> 00:14:31,720
One of the easiest film artifacts to spot
is known as gate weave.

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00:14:31,720 --> 00:14:35,320
Because film traveling through a camera is a mechanical affair,

257
00:14:35,320 --> 00:14:39,160
the frame can’t ever be perfectly aligned with each exposure.

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00:14:39,160 --> 00:14:43,780
Slight misalignments in the
camera’s gate with the film from one frame to the next

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00:14:43,780 --> 00:14:49,360
create a slight shakiness to the end result,
so if the frame ever seems slightly unstable,

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there’s a pretty good chance that was on
film.

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00:14:52,240 --> 00:14:56,480
A lot of modern film restorations have removed gate weave digitally, so

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00:14:56,480 --> 00:15:00,880
this can’t be entirely relied upon as a means to spot a film source.

263
00:15:00,880 --> 00:15:02,380
What do you mean this sounds
dubbed in?

264
00:15:02,380 --> 00:15:04,679
This was totally recorded at the same time as everything el --

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00:15:04,679 --> 00:15:09,920
A lot of television programming in the ‘60s,
‘70’s, and ‘80s would use a mix of film and tape.

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00:15:09,920 --> 00:15:14,920
Often you’d see tape being used
in the studio, and film being used for location shoots.

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00:15:14,920 --> 00:15:18,120
One particular example is Monty Python’s
Flying Circus.

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Here, tape is clearly used whenever on-set, and film is used whenever on-location.

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00:15:23,020 --> 00:15:27,460
A large part of this is simply down to the fact that video equipment was for many years

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00:15:27,460 --> 00:15:31,320
huge, monstrous stuff that wasn’t particularly portable,

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00:15:31,320 --> 00:15:36,980
so for location
shoots, a much less bulky, all-in-one 16mm film camera

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00:15:36,980 --> 00:15:38,680
(and a sound guy on the side)

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00:15:38,680 --> 00:15:40,520
will fit the bill just fine.

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00:15:40,520 --> 00:15:46,420
In this case, it’s easier to notice film artifacts because
they used 16mm film, and not 35mm,

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00:15:46,420 --> 00:15:51,419
but even just looking for the difference in motion
between studio sketches and location sketches

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will help you spot the difference.

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00:15:53,220 --> 00:15:56,600
But the number one sign of something shot
on tape is…

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00:15:56,600 --> 00:15:59,640
it looks like it was shot on tape.

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OK, this isn’t helpful, I know, but
honestly you sorta get a feel for this after a while.

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Analog video is just kinda smooth
and soft and fuzzy, and film just…

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00:16:09,440 --> 00:16:11,109
isn’t.

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00:16:11,109 --> 00:16:14,639
If you’ve seen a tape of something that
was originally on film, like for instance

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00:16:14,639 --> 00:16:19,840
a VHS tape of pretty much any movie, you’ll
get that smooth look, sure.

284
00:16:19,840 --> 00:16:21,209
But even there…

285
00:16:21,209 --> 00:16:24,220
you can often tell a film source from a tape
source.

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00:16:24,220 --> 00:16:27,560
It just has a… look to it.

287
00:16:27,560 --> 00:16:28,920
Yeah that’s not helpful.

288
00:16:28,920 --> 00:16:30,980
Well, here, let’s look at another example.

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00:16:30,980 --> 00:16:31,940
Cosmos.

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00:16:31,940 --> 00:16:33,780
Just like Monty Python, Carl Sagan

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00:16:33,790 --> 00:16:38,040
was being shot on tape in the studio, and
on film when on location.

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00:16:38,040 --> 00:16:43,060
Even though this is just from a VHS copy, you can definitely see a difference between the studio’s video

293
00:16:43,060 --> 00:16:45,419
cameras and the film cameras.

294
00:16:45,419 --> 00:16:50,519
The huge asterisk on this video, of course,
is that digital video in standard definition

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00:16:50,519 --> 00:16:51,420
exists.

296
00:16:51,420 --> 00:16:52,900
Ever heard of DVDs?

297
00:16:52,900 --> 00:16:57,880
Those aren’t analog, but they are still capped at the 480 lines that this thing uses.

298
00:16:57,880 --> 00:17:01,220
But now we have
each of those lines subdivided digitally into

299
00:17:01,220 --> 00:17:03,120
720 pixels.

300
00:17:03,120 --> 00:17:06,750
And in the professional realm,
there were plenty of digital recording formats

301
00:17:06,750 --> 00:17:09,960
being used in the latter part of the standard
definition era.

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00:17:09,960 --> 00:17:15,050
So the “tape look” isn’t everything, but the same limitations apply.

303
00:17:15,050 --> 00:17:19,060
So what sort of detail can we get out of something
shot on film?

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00:17:19,060 --> 00:17:23,680
Well, this depends on a whole bunch of factors, mainly to do with film stock.

305
00:17:23,680 --> 00:17:27,820
Just as consumers used to be able to pick between their Kodak Golds, their Fujichromes,

306
00:17:27,820 --> 00:17:29,560
and their dollar store brands,

307
00:17:29,560 --> 00:17:33,260
different qualities of film stocks were offered for use in motion pictures.

308
00:17:33,260 --> 00:17:34,640
Some were great.

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00:17:34,640 --> 00:17:36,920
Others not so much.

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00:17:36,920 --> 00:17:41,440
Another thing about film that sorta hangs
around even to this day is that faster films,

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00:17:41,440 --> 00:17:46,320
meaning those more sensitive to light, tended
to have physically larger film grains.

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00:17:46,320 --> 00:17:51,050
So films used in low-light scenes would have
a grainier image, just like your camera today

313
00:17:51,050 --> 00:17:54,700
looks like crap when you turn the ISO up to
12,800.

314
00:17:54,700 --> 00:18:01,040
Which, by the way, that ISO is literally the same thing as the film speed you see on a film cartridge.

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00:18:01,040 --> 00:18:03,260
Ain’t that some fun history for ya?

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00:18:03,260 --> 00:18:07,980
But if you want to come up with an average,
you could argue that many 35mm motion picture

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00:18:07,980 --> 00:18:12,160
films have an image roughly equivalent to
today’s 4K.

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00:18:12,160 --> 00:18:14,980
But, see, it gets tricky to even say that.

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00:18:14,980 --> 00:18:19,000
Because the grain is random,
if you want to digitize film and capture all

320
00:18:19,000 --> 00:18:22,750
its quality, you need to basically just increase
the resolution until it doesn’t seem to

321
00:18:22,750 --> 00:18:24,140
make a difference anymore.

322
00:18:24,140 --> 00:18:28,640
And at that point,
you can say “well the resolution is roughly this”.

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00:18:28,640 --> 00:18:33,050
But I think it’s safe to say that
only the WORST film stocks would be incapable

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00:18:33,050 --> 00:18:38,220
of producing an image that today we’d call
“Full HD” with 35mm film.

325
00:18:38,220 --> 00:18:43,520
If I were in charge, I’d say all film transfers should
be done in 4K so that the best of the best

326
00:18:43,530 --> 00:18:46,010
can be seen to their full potential.

327
00:18:46,010 --> 00:18:50,790
And then of course, there’s other film formats
like 16mm, which would probably rarely benefit

328
00:18:50,790 --> 00:18:52,740
from anything over 720P.

329
00:18:52,740 --> 00:18:56,320
Or 70mm. 
Which you should probably scan in 8k.

330
00:18:56,320 --> 00:18:59,000
Or IMAX, which you should just give up trying.

331
00:18:59,000 --> 00:19:01,930
Film can hold
incredible detail, and while that’s certainly

332
00:19:01,930 --> 00:19:06,990
not always the case, I’d argue it’s better
to go a little overkill and capture more data

333
00:19:06,990 --> 00:19:10,840
than you need than to have to keep scanning
the print every decade or so.

334
00:19:10,840 --> 00:19:16,460
That’s the thing. Old film won’t change
unless, you know, it degrades really badly.

335
00:19:16,460 --> 00:19:20,360
But our scanning techniques have, and will
continue to do so.

336
00:19:20,360 --> 00:19:24,820
One day we’ll be able to get all the quality that we possibly can out of it.

337
00:19:24,820 --> 00:19:26,540
Perhaps we already have.

338
00:19:26,540 --> 00:19:30,500
But electronic signals on tape for television are just that.

339
00:19:30,500 --> 00:19:36,820
They’re built to draw 480 lines on a CRT, to a standard that was set in the 1940’s.

340
00:19:36,820 --> 00:19:40,680
And so long as that’s the standard we’re working in, that’s what we’re stuck with,

341
00:19:40,680 --> 00:19:42,670
and that’s as good as it’s gonna get.

342
00:19:42,670 --> 00:19:46,540
But of course, here in the 21st century, we
have the luxury of digital video.

343
00:19:46,540 --> 00:19:47,940
Which is always perfect.

344
00:19:47,940 --> 00:19:48,960
[camera beeps]

345
00:19:50,160 --> 00:19:51,200
[laughter]

346
00:19:52,360 --> 00:19:54,960
♫ analogly smooth jazz ♫

347
00:19:56,700 --> 00:20:01,380
Hey, so while discussing this topic on Twitter,
I realized I should have added a little something

348
00:20:01,380 --> 00:20:07,040
to the script, which… well I forgot to do
so here’s me with a helpful post script!

349
00:20:07,040 --> 00:20:09,540
Huh. A literal PS.

350
00:20:09,540 --> 00:20:10,720
Go figure.

351
00:20:10,720 --> 00:20:14,640
Anyway this
whole “lots of TV was shot on film” thing

352
00:20:14,640 --> 00:20:19,440
is the reason why often times a Blu-Ray re-release
of something that was made for television

353
00:20:19,440 --> 00:20:20,900
actually makes sense.

354
00:20:20,900 --> 00:20:24,690
If you thought there was no point to
something like that, well you might be wrong.

355
00:20:24,690 --> 00:20:29,390
So long as the show was mastered to film before
being transferred to tape, and those negatives

356
00:20:29,390 --> 00:20:34,190
(or prints) are somewhere in storage, a true
high definition remaster is possible. In the

357
00:20:34,190 --> 00:20:39,850
case of Star Trek Voyager, and shows like
it, in theory there could be an HD re-release,

358
00:20:39,850 --> 00:20:44,311
however it would require duplicating essentially
all of the post-production work, so it’s

359
00:20:44,311 --> 00:20:46,320
a fair bet that won’t happen.

360
00:20:46,320 --> 00:20:48,840
Plus, we don’t
even know if those negatives were kept.

361
00:20:49,640 --> 00:20:53,640
...something about giving your cardiac muscle
as a Christmas gift and being distraught upon

362
00:20:53,640 --> 00:20:55,000
its subseq… nope.

363
00:20:56,340 --> 00:20:57,710
Already messed it up!

364
00:20:57,710 --> 00:20:59,440
*sigh* why did I keep going?

365
00:20:59,440 --> 00:21:01,330
There was a…
I made a mistake.

366
00:21:01,330 --> 00:21:03,380
This was the only way… eugh.

367
00:21:03,380 --> 00:21:06,420
This was the
only way we… stop it!

368
00:21:06,420 --> 00:21:09,720
They worked. All you needed to do… eugh
blebi buh

369
00:21:09,720 --> 00:21:10,800
Those four hun…

370
00:21:10,800 --> 00:21:12,480
Those four hundred eighty
line…

371
00:21:12,480 --> 00:21:14,480
those four hundred eighty lines….

372
00:21:14,480 --> 00:21:15,380
Four hundred eighty.

373
00:21:15,720 --> 00:21:17,080
Four hundred eighty.

374
00:21:17,080 --> 00:21:19,480
The best videotape… yeah no no no.

375
00:21:19,480 --> 00:21:21,400
The emPHAsis
is all wrong.

376
00:21:22,480 --> 00:21:26,380
Join us next week as the adventures of Freddy the Feces continue!

377
00:21:27,540 --> 00:21:30,300
Actually, I take that back.

378
00:21:30,700 --> 00:21:33,320
It's Freddie the Feces

379
00:21:34,720 --> 00:21:36,000
Like it always was.