Glossary
of Terms
Foreword
The following terms are all widely used throughout the film laboratory and archive world wherever English is used as the language of communication. The FIAF Preservation Commission has published a short definition of some of the terms, and where a FIAF definition exists this is used in this publication. However the editor has added other definitions in order to clarify the text. The additional terms, which make up the majority, are all terms used throughout the film laboratory industry, or in archives today or are terms used in the past but generally lost to the industry now. Wherever possible the glossary definitions come from the British Kinematograph Sound and Television Society publication.
In film laboratory work there are some marked differences between the terms used in the USA and those used in areas influenced by the British laboratories. The best example is GRADING and TIMING, the first being the British term, and the second being the American term for the same procedure. The British term is used throughout the text, as it is familiar to all the authors and the editor. However a number of important American terms are included where they differ from the British.
A complicating factor in film terminology is the variation in usage and terms between different laboratories. Many laboratories, particularly in London, operated for a great many years with the same staff, and through many important technical changes, some of which they themselves brought about. It was inevitable that local terms became used and some of these spread to their customers, the filmmakers, and to editors.
A good example of this is the British Pathe Laboratory, which existed from the early 1920's to 1970 and in that time introduced many specialist newsreel methods. Local names were invented and while some of these filtered out to the world at large many were entirely "in house" terms. Others were terms in common use in the industry but used in a different context by Pathe technicians! A good example was the Pathe technician’s use of the term "lavender", which was Kodak’s 1930's term for a duplicating material coated on a pale blue coloured base. Pathe may never have used this stock and certainly preferred to use conventional print film for duplicating, processed to a lower contrast instead. Nevertheless their technicians continued to call any duplicate negative they made”lavender" for the next 30 years. This makes the process of reviewing the literature and paperwork of a long established company difficult. In 1992 when a large proportion of the British Pathe material was transferred to digital videotape a special glossary had to be written to explain about 25 unique or unconventionally used terms to the technicians involved.
Many other laboratories had similar local terms and this occurred in France and Italy and probably elsewhere.
The stock manufacturers did their best to rationalize terms and to create uniform ones, but sometimes introduced even greater diversity and in some cases just added to the confusion. A good example of this was the change in name by Eastman Kodak of one of their film stocks from Colour Internegative to Colour Intermediate in the early 1950's. To this day filmmakers, and unfortunately some laboratory staff, confuse these two, and therefore confuse the terms INTERNEGATIVE, DUPLICATE and INTERMEDIATE. A B/W duplicate negative is called a DUPLICATE NEGATIVE, while a colour duplicate negative is still frequently called an INTERNEGATIVE.
Sometimes even today, laboratory technicians contribute to these problems - largely still due to the insularity of the companies. These confusions have become less since the publication of the B.K.S.T.S and S.M.P.T.E. glossaries but great care needs to be taken with old documentation especially if it is a can label or technicians notes in a can with a reel of film. It is better not to assume a modern usage especially for such terms as DUPLICATE, SLASH PRINT, COPY, MUTE, INTERNEGATIVE or INTERPOSITIVE.
A further area of confusion is the tendency to jargon or slang usage that describes an ELEMENT in terms of the type of film stock used to make it. The most common occurrence of this form is the use of the term FINE GRAIN. Eastman Fine Grain Films are a category of monochrome duplicating films that are used for making duplicate positive, duplicate negatives and printing, and in some cases, whose contrast is controllable by processing within quite broad limits. It is still common for laboratory technicians to use the term "a fine grain" when they mean a duplicate negative or positive made on an Eastman Fine Grain Film. For some years the term "fine grain" was used in price lists to mean duplicate elements of one sort or another even when the film stock used was not Eastman Fine Grain but some other. Just to confuse the terms still further Kodak still call their normal print film Eastman Fine Grain Print Film. "Fine grain" is simply a promotional term.
From this it can be seen that motion picture film terminology is a major pitfall for the unwary, and it is recommended that in all discussions about elements and duplication in particular be continually conscious of misunderstandings. The problems diminish as standard terms become accepted but always judge the contents of an old can by the film, not the label or the paperwork inside it.