[Frameworks] question regarding color preservation of early animation films

[C Keefer]

Stefan Drossler of the Munich Filmmuseum screened a digital copy of their
recent restorations of Ruttmann's Opus films with the color, a few years
ago in Los Angeles. Afterwards we spoke about their restoration, and he
confirmed the intensity of colors (seen on their Ruttmann DVD compilation)
could only be achieved digitally, not through photochemical means. Contact
Munich Filmmuseum re the original Ruttmann material used in their
preservation projects, and their Ruttmann DVD is quite useful.

For the definitive book on Ruttmann and his films, see  Walter Ruttmann:
Eine Dokumentation. JeanPaul Goergen, Ed., Published by Freunde der
Deutschen Kinemathek (1989). German language. Goergen, a Berlin-based
animation historian, would likely have other more recent information useful
for your research.

Re older 16mm Ruttmann prints with color, mentioned in this thread.
Correction to the below email from Pip, new Ruttmann prints don't come from
CVM. Center for Visual Music (CVM) has *Cecile Starr*'s 16mm Ruttmann
prints, but we don't have "new prints" restored by William Moritz, nor any
quality restored Ruttmann prints done by Moritz. I remember reading about a
project he did for this film, funded by the Frankfurt Filmmuseum, but have
no information that he was able to work with any nitrate originals. He did
often complain that for his attempted preservation projects, archives
wouldn't release originals for him to work with (which is understandable).
In any case, if funded by Frankfurt they'd have the negative, though I have
to say the tinting test fragments done by Moritz that I've seen are not
sophisticated restorations. I'd go to Munich Filmmuseum as a primary source.

I'm not positive re the source of Starr's 16mm Ruttmann prints, but she was
in close contact with his daughter Eva Riehl and distributed these on her
behalf, so they may have come directly from her. We also have Starr's 16mm
Richter and Eggeling prints, which derive from Richter's own originals.

Re inquiry on other early abstract tinted/toned films - CVM preserved some
of Oskar Fischinger's early tinted nitrate film for the *Raumlichtkunst*
(c.1926/2012) 3 screen reconstruction projection, which has screened at
Tate Modern, Whitney and Palais de Tokyo. It's currently on view, installed
in Brisbane, Australia until May 2015, and there's a tentative German date
for June. Contact me off list if you would like further information about
that project. Also I published a few stills from some of Fischinger's other
early hand-tinted tests, see page 110 in my book, Oskar Fischinger
(1900-1967), Experiments in Cinematic Abstraction. (Amsterdam and Los
Angeles: EYE Film Institute and Center for Visual Music, 2013). Distributed
by Thames & Hudson.

best regards,
Cindy Keefer
Center for Visual Music
www.centerforvisualmusic.org
CVM email - cvmaccess at gmail.com

Fischinger research site:  www.centerforvisualmusic.org/Fischinger


>
>
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> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Pip Chodorov <frameworks at re-voir.com>
> To: Experimental Film Discussion List <frameworks at jonasmekasfilms.com>
> Cc:
> Date: Sat, 31 Jan 2015 23:46:10 +0100
> Subject: Re: [Frameworks] question regarding color preservation of early
> animation films
> I don't know where the hand painted originals are or if any exist at all.
> There must be an internegative at the Eye Institute (Amsterdam) because I
> think the 16mm print originally in circulation in Paris came from the Dutch
> Filmmuseum in the 1980s. New prints come from CVM and were supervised by
> Moritz but I don't remember the exact source of the older prints.
> (I may be confusing with Ballet Mecanique because Moritz also restored
> that.)
>
> We released a VHS in 1998 called "Dancing Images" with a Dutch company and
> we included Opus. We got the rights from Ruttman's daughter Eva Riehl and I
> made a Beta master from one of those original prints. Write me off-list if
> you are interested in obtaining a digital file transfer from the beta at
> cost.
>
> -Pip
>
>
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>
>
>
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