#steenbeck

To be frank, we’re ready for the weekend!

Re-assembling a film I shot on film but cut digitally, I think of ways to trace back my digital edit to the physical film copy, which is necessary to produce a film print. I have made work prints (contact prints) of the camera negatives, assembling shots from the workprint will provide a cutting copy that I can then emulate with the camera negative. I label shots I can identify and hang them in the film bin.

With the film fastened to the up take reel on the right hand side of the Steenbeck, a lever directs the speed and direction of the film. The opening countdown passes in between of the prism and the light source. Holding the tail of this shot in hand I reach for the incoming shot, joining it the head to the tail of the outgoing shot. With clear tape the two shots are joined on the film splicer. The lever is engaged with my right hand pressing it into forward motion and the newly joined shot is pulled through my left fingers, sprockets allowing the film to hold steady pulling the film past the light filled prism. Hand and machine get into a system together. With the film passing through my hands, I get a tactile sense of the length of the shot. Duration is seen as a length of so many feet and so many frames. Continuing this assembly I witness different lengths, short after long, long after long, short after long. I imagine I am seeing and feeling rhythm.

Editing analogue film is non-linear in the sense you can lift out shots and move them around. However, it leaves a linear feeling of structure. When assembly you put each shot through the machine, you have a strong sense of head and tail. Head goes first and then the trail. We write head or tail on rolls of film. Without labelling head or tail on a roll of film or not labelling it at all means you have to at least open it up and hold it against a light source or run it through the machine. It might be tail out meaning the film hasn’t been rewind yet. So labelling camera shots or rolls, noting the head or the tail or a roll, assembling short and long lengths together you get a feeling for structure like this. You get a strong sense of beginning, middle and end.

Film in the digital Era

I took these images during the 90s and early 2000s when I was working as an assistant editor in the independent feature industry in Melbourne and Sydney. It was working in this capacity that left its unique mark on my approach to film making. It was exciting to work with film materials and the large editing apparatus within the big machine of feature film production itself. The image at the 16mm Steenbeck was taken on while working as an second assistant on the film Mallboy (Giarrusso, 2000). My job was to sync up rushes, film the rushes on a video camera off the Steenbeck monitor for distribution to the director and producer, put away trims back into their camera rolls, as well as lay up sound effects to enhance the soundtrack. Mallboy was a low budget film so the production decided to take the rare step (at that time) to cut on film. Digital edit suites were expensive and the hiring of Steenbeck and edit rooms were cheaper which meant the edit schedule could last for longer. We would have more time with the material and longer time to try things out. I am forever grateful that the production took those steps because I learnt valuable lessons about editing with physical materials. An assistant editors role now is much less interesting than during the time of editing on film. Syncing audio to picture digitally is now automatic, files are copied at the stroke of a mouse click which means the assistant might not even watch the raw rushes. The editor needed more assistance with filing and syncing and laying up music and sound effects which meant more time with them so we witnessed their craft and learnt what they do by being present at all the stages of the edit. A digital timeline may be navigated swiftly, you go to the head of a sequence in a stroke. At the end of a reel it must be physically rewound on a winding bench or on the Steenbeck. Rewinding on the Steenbeck gives you the opportunity to watch the film back and notice patterns in the edit from another point of view. This is useful information to the editor that time and the physical matter of a film reel imposed on them. Now because the digital edit suite is so quick at performing many seemingly mundane functions, this opportunity must be purposely sort out or is lost.

Another effect of cutting on film might be learning how to cut in your head. Because film handling can be laborious one becomes adept at watching rushes and cutting them in your head before you make the effort to find the shot, mark it up, take the spicer and trim away the excess. I want to know what other things can be learned by constructing a film on the Steenbeck that I may have not paid attention to before. So one of the tasks I have set myself in this research is to cut something on the Steenbeck again. So far I have used it as a way to make DIY digital copies of my film negs and I have also used it as a way to reconstruct a film shot on film but edited digitally. To cut on the Steenbeck I will need to make film prints or what we used to call a work print. Something you feel free to cut up before cutting the original film negative. This will have a financial cost and I am aware I don’t need to apply all the industrial methods of the feature film process to my personal process but I want to think through what might be useful. I have also read about using the Steenbeck machine as a DIY contact printer (in the Artist Film Workshop magazine Film Is) too which would make the Steenbeck an even more valuable tool to have use of. There is a great many possibilities and avenues to explore. I will be documenting them here on this blog.

Fun with 16mm