Looking to learn about film leaders

[Jim Cassedy]

The "Standard Academy Leader" and cue marks came into general use in late 1930.
Before that, leaders and cues, as we now know them, were pretty much non existent.

Many of the markings you see on leaders, like "Picture Start" and "Sound Start" are really
of more use to laboratories in lining up the negatives for printing the film than they are in
the projection room. The 'clock wipe' or TV leaders which count down in seconds came
about in the early days of TV, when stations had to cue commercials or programs for air.

I noticed that a couple of the frames in the original post, had some numbers burned into
them, like in the example below. These images either came from a print that was made
from a video source, or vice-versa, and more likely, these were screenshots of a film
that had been transferred to video for editing or airing. I worked for several years as
a 1" Broadcast Videotape editor, and "LTCR" stood for 'Longitudinal Time Code, which
was one of two types of time code commonly in use when I was working. The other
was "VITC" or 'Vertical Interval Time Code' . The difference was that Longitudinal Time
Code was usually laid down on one of the spare audio tracks available on a 1" tape
machine, and so, being basically an audio signal, it could not be accurately read at
either very low, or very high tape speeds, both of which are encountered when shuttling
while editing. When the signal became too distorted to read, the machine would start
counting frame-sync pulses, which was pretty close, but not 'frame accurate' . When
you slowed down to a readable speed again, it then switch back to reading the actual
time code and begin counting accurately again.

"Vertical Interval TIme Code" was embedded into one of the unused lines in the Vertical
Blanking Interval of a video signal. (Typically line 19 or 21, I think.) Vertical interval
Time Code could be read accurately at almost any tape speed, and even when the
tape was paused. Most later models of professional vidoetape decks were able to
handle both types of time code. I'm not sure about the example below, but do you see
the 'box" after LTCR? On some readers I worked with, that sometimes signaled if the
machines were working with "regular" or if they were reading "DTFC". (Drop Frame
TIme Code) which counted in such a way that compensated for the 29.97 frame rate
of NTSC TV. The "RT" reader on the left could mean either ""REEL TIME" or "RUN
TIME" depending on how your system was set up. The RT read-out did not always
match the Time Code readout. If you didn't compensate for the 29.97 frame rate,
there would be a 3.6sec per hour difference between the time reading and "Real" or
'Running" time readout. Not too bad for editing purposes, but the cumulative time
errors would have caused issues back in the days of split-second timing on Network TV.

LTCR_PIC.jpg

[Ryan Gallagher]

For anyone else curious about all the other marks etc, this 2016 article "The Beginning and Ending of Film" from Univ of Minnesota Press is chocked full of goodies, as are the SMPTE standards, but standards are often not free, this article is.

"The Beginnings and Ends of Film"
https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/23/article/657445/pdf

Beginnings and Ends of Film_Cover.png

[Frank Cox]

SMPTE standards, but standards are often not free,

And that has never made any sense at all, in regard to film work, construction codes or anything else at all.

"We need you to meet the standard."

"Okey dokey, what's the standard that I have to meet?"

"Can't tell you. Pay up."

[Jim Cassedy]

For anyone else curious about all the other marks etc, this 2016 article
"The Beginning and Ending of Film" from Univ of Minnesota Press is chocked full of goodies,

Nice article, Ryan. Another great source for obscure film stock info is this book:
"Physical Characteristics Of Early Films As Aids To Identification" By Harold Brown.
It was originally published over 20yrs ago, but has been updated every few years.
Someone who is actually in the film restoration business, told me that this is pretty
much "The Bible" of film restoration books when I mentioned that I have it. The
book as over 300pages of more than you'll ever probably need to know about
decoding all of those mystery marks in between the perforations on most prints.
A good deal of this book concerns itself with films going back to before WWI,
and identifies old film stocks by perforation type, frameline position, intertitle type
fonts, and a few other clues. Now, I realize that most of us will never stumble upon
an original Mèliés or Vitagraph print. . . but without this book, how would you know?

But, fear not! - - It also has info for some of the 20th century film stocks many of us
have run across like ORWO, DUPONT, FERRANIA, ILFORD, etc and so on. . .
The KODAK section not only has all the well known date-code charts that have
been published online over the years, but also charts for decoding a lot of those
other little symbols that can actually identify emulsion batch, slitter and perforator
machine ID numbers, and even the film stock "strip number" . (35mm film is cut
from rolls of raw stock 54½ inches wide, so strip nunbers go from 1 to 38)
Some of this info I've never seen published anywhere before. It also covers a
number of 16mm amatuer an professional film types.

Like I said, this is more than you'll ever want or probably need to know, but it I
find it pretty interesting! I've had my copy for several years and I recently gave
a copy to someone who is actually studying to be a film archivist.

THE BOOK
My copy is a bit dog (or cat) eared, because I refer to it often
BrownFilmBook_1.jpg
A typical page- - many pages are in color
BrownFIlmBook_2.jpg

Another page example-
BrownFilmBook_3.jpg

Of course, one of the easiest ways to identify old film stock is to hold a lit match to it.
- - If you wind up in the hospital with 3rd degree burns, it was nitrate.

[Steve Guttag]

And that has never made any sense at all, in regard to film work, construction codes or anything else at all.

"We need you to meet the standard."

"Okey dokey, what's the standard that I have to meet?"

"Can't tell you. Pay up."

Consider this...when it comes to industry standards, entities like SMPTE, IEEE and the like are not tax payer funded. The work that is done to develop standards need to be paid for somehow. Or, you would not have any standards and it is the "wild west" and nothing is compatible with anything else. Now, building codes, those are, presumably made by government and therefore paid for by taxes and should be included (free) from the agency.

To make matters worse, maintaining standards in organizations like the SMPTE takes quite a bit of time/work as they have to be periodically reviewed...and that is for ones that are in publication. Developing new ones or even procedures takes quite a bit of effort. And you want that work, for free. It is copyrighted work. It is of value and that value is not $0. What else would you like for free? A light meter? An RTA? It's all well and good that these high flatuten organizations what us to meet standards that they won't give us but now they want us to spend money on test equipment to follow the procedures they charged us for?

The realities are, the work that SMPTE does (and it is perpetually poor...trust me) gets out. Does anyone here not know the center lumens needed in a cinema? Of those that have that number, have you seen the SMPTE documents where that number appears for either film or digital cinema? It's not really all that tightly held secrets. Procedures are not as widely dispersed as much as the hard numbers.

Consider this...at this point in time, if you want to be in the Standards Community (be one of the people that can actually participates in creating, reviewing, testing...etc. standards/RPs and EGs), you get to pay EXTRA on your SMPTE membership. Now that one I never agreed with. You donate your time and get to pay them for that!

So, buy the documents, as you would a book or other printed (electronic or otherwise) media or ask someone willing to share the information you desire.

[Frank Cox]

Anyone who wishes to charge for their standards is welcome to do so, just as anyone who wishes to provide a standard free of charge is also welcome to do so.

Those who require someone to meet a standard (building inspectors, fire department) should be required to provide that standard free of charge.

If you want someone to meet a SMPTE standard, then provide that standard to whoever needs to meet it free of charge as well. It's obviously making someone's life easier when they can just say "it meets the standard", rather than having the so-called wild west, so the work that went into writing it is compensated for that way.

If it's not to your advantage to be on the standards writing committee, then don't be on it. And if it's worth actually paying extra to be on that committee (as you said) then the value of being included in the committee's discussions is self-evident.

[Steve Guttag]

Ah, but it isn't the engineering society that "wants" you to meet standards. They created the standards because the industry wanted them. It is those that make the movies that want you to meet standards so that you present their product as they intended. You are welcomed to ask them for free copies of the standards. In fact, they, more or less, tell you what they want (at least the buzz words of what they want) without you actually reading the document that they may be referencing.

[Frank Cox]

I don't have an issue with that, as such. What I object to is being required to meet a standard (any standard) without being provided with the standard that must be met.

It's like being told that you must not exceed the speed limit on a highway but we won't tell you what that speed limit is.

Your new house can't exceed the maximum square footage allowed on that lot. You're welcome to guess how big that is, or you can pay us $5,000 for the actual number. But if you guess wrong we'll be right along to tear your house down.

[Josh Jones]

With a little digging, you can find almost all of the relevant SMPTE standards on the web. I went digging a while back and was able to find all that I was looking for.

[Steve Guttag]

Again, with respect to something like a speed limit...that is your government setting a rule and you paid taxes for that rule to be set. I can understand the entitlement. Part of building a house or anything else is paying for permits and trades people, that do have to spend a fair amount keeping up with codes. It isn't like the electrician gets free code books each year or renewal. That is part of the cost of the job.

When you go to school and are expected to work or reference a text book, they most certainly charge you for that material too.

If you are in an industry, part of the cost of doing business is working within that industry's standards. If you are setting up 100s or 1000s of screens, the cost of buying the standards is pretty trivial (per screen). If you are doing a 1-off, yeah, it may seem expensive but then again, buying tools for a 1-off may also seem expensive. Try buying a spectroradiometer for just one screen so that you can meet the current specifications. As someone that has worked in this industry for over 45 years now, we have spent a LOT of money on equipment and yes, attaining knowledge, including specifications, to do that job. But that is like other industries.

Now, perhaps, if you belong to a group like NATO...er Cinema United and they could set up a deal with SMPTE to provide their members copies of standards so you and other exhibitors could get your "free" copies...but they wouldn't be free, they would be built into your membership that set up the deal (this deal has not been set up, to be clear...I'm only using it as an example of what could, possibly, be done). But somewhere, someone(s) need to cover the cost of establishing and maintaining the standard(s). Truthfully, I think it would be a better financial model for entities like ICTA and CU to indeed have such a deal. SMPTE would get a steady source of money to maintain the service that the industry wants.