Watch: ‘How a 100-Year-Old Animated Film is Restored’ Short Doc

Watch: ‘How a 100-Year-Old Animated Film is Restored’ Short Doc

by Alex Billington
April 7, 2023
Source: YouTube

If you’ve ever wondered, how do they restore old films? What is the process, and how long does it take, and how delicate is it? Then this is a must watch video. Adam Savage’s Tested YouTube channel released this nerdy video in December last year, but we’ve just caught up with it now. How a 100-Year-Old Animated Film Is Restored is a short minute short doc taking a trip to the restoration house known as Blackhawk Films, based in Burbank, CA. The 20 minute video follows the team as they received an old 35mm print of a classic Koko the Clown cartoon from 1924, cleaning up the reel and feeding it into a scanning device. They use a 10K Lasergraphics scanner, then work on cleaning up the rest of the dust and dirt and everything else digitally in computers. I’d love to learn more about the laser scanning machine, and more about the 35mm film stock itself, but this is still a fascinating look at how modern film restoration works. Check it out below.

Thanks to Kottke for the tip on this video. Full description from YouTube: “In a century of animated cinema, the importance of animator Max Fleischer cannot be overstated. Fleischer created Betty Boop, produced the original Popeye and Superman cartoons, and also invented the Rotoscope. Fabulous Fleischer Cartoons Restored is on a mission to restore the films of Max Fleischer from original prints and negatives. We visited the team and restoration expert Steve Stanchfield at Blackhawk Films (website), a film scanning facility in Southern California to learn about the restoration process and watch a classic ‘Koko the Clown‘ short brought back to life.” The video was filmed and edited by Josh Self – see more of his work on his official website. Featuring music by Jinglepunks. Additional footage courtesy Fabulous Fleischer Cartoons Restored and in public domain. For more info, visit the YouTube page. To discover more shorts, click here. Thoughts?

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