The big fear of a digital accident

The Swiss film archive in the Canton of Vaud's land community for Sale is well hidden. The long-drawn-out, 50.6 million francs expensive building with its rust-brown facade looks color fit gently in the environment. However, the interior of the building poses a contrast: the floor, walls and ceiling are bright white and well lit. On the first floor, where recently a huge empty space, there is a lively life. Here, the Cinémathèque opened in the late summer of her Studio for the digital Film . The Federal government hesitated for a long time, until he approved the 6 million francs for the establishment of a Digital Studio.

The reason was the Intervention of the Swiss Federal audit office (sfao). The EFK, the legal, contracts had been awarded without a tender and the accounting of the archive is opaque. But above all, for Sale I have "no digitization and archiving strategy". to clarify

the fundamental issues and to resolve things, was the former new Burger SP-cantonal councillor Jean Studer, President of the Board of Trustees. Studer made sure that the Cinémathèque had a Controlling and a modern personnel management. It was sometimes, to resolve cases in which employees were long-time sickness absent. Under Studer's leadership, the film archive got finally his first own digital Department and of the EFK required digital archiving strategy.

The new Burger says: "Today, we know how we want to proceed in the coming 20 to 30 years for storage of digital movies, and digitizing analog twisted movies." Basically, The national and international movies, collecting, the archive, receives, opens and conveyed, must necessarily have a relation to Switzerland. The local film is a top priority to create.

"digital cinema is fragile,"

in 2020, will migrate the Cinémathèque your digital inventory for the first Time on the new disk. The nervousness is great. There is the risk of data loss. If something goes wrong, are destroyed all the movies at once and for ever, if no other copies exist. It's an archive of Aryan Super-GAU could be like. "In the case of restorations of film can't happen to us the roles," emphasizes Frédéric Maire, the Director of the film archive. That's why he digital want to restore films shot in future film roles, the New quasi, thanks to the Old store. If a movie file, something would happen, you can use the archive on the analog copy and then re-digitize.

lead, But also Frédéric Maire white: two Parallel archiving systems, is costly. The Cinémathèque has an annual operating budget of approximately 11 million Swiss francs. Of these, around 2 million Swiss francs invested in the operation of the digital studios. However, for the so-called Output of digital movies to movie roles, this amount is not enough. According to research provided by the Swiss Federal office for culture (BAK) for Printings in the coming year, 700'000 Swiss francs. BAK-spokesman Daniel Menna notes that the main part of the amount directly to the Cinémathèque, but film labs beneficial. It is still unclear whether and how much money the BAK in the coming years that is ready.

the Color of the environment, The Cinémathèque adapted from: suisse for Sale. Photo: Keystone

The Zurich film laboratory Cinegrell is one of the last of its genus that can produce in his wet lab still rolls of film. To him, a part of the BAK flow of money. "The Output of a digital film costs per film minute 285 francs", says managing Director, Richard Bright. For a movie so 25'000 to 40'000 Swiss francs will be charged. This money was well invested, especially since a movie production amounts to anyway rapidly over 2 million Swiss francs. "The storage of digital files is generally extremely difficult," says Bright. "Modern rolls of film of Polyester, however, hold 200 to 300 years." He's not primarily a business interest in the continuation of the roll of film production? Zurich denied. He says: "The necessary laboratory we can't operate today, to cover costs, but need to Finance it landscape. It is closed once, it costs up to 1 Million Swiss francs to rebuild it."

A chain of 150'000 images

Not everywhere to put film archives more on analog Material to digital accidents secure. In France and the USA, it is still producing rolls of film as a Back-up. Different in Germany. There film archives rely exclusively on digital technology. The Swiss Federal archive do in Bern, which collects all the state politically important information, data, records, and documents. According to spokesman Simon Meyer waived the Federal archives of digital Original analog copies. Meyer says: "We have a digital archive and store all digital documents in this archive. In our case, the large Parts of text files, and few audio-visual documents."

A text archive could not compare with the films, throws in Frédéric Maire. "A Film is a chain of 150'000 frames connected with sounds and noises. There are no sufficient powerful automatic control, in order to guarantee that the stored Material is not damaged." Maire sticks to it: "Ideally, we should manufacture of each digital-produced Swiss Film a roll of film. But that would require a significant investment." That's why you have to select movies. A Commission is to be responsible. As the next Problem comes. According to which criteria are the films selected? According to the Maire to be films that win prizes in competitions run and movie theaters fill up.

Created: 21.11.2019, 13:16 PM