From Newsgroup: uk.tech.broadcast

There's a discussion between Alfred Hitchcock and Bryan Forbes dating
from 1969 which is being shown on BBC Four tomorrow morning
(00:20-01:15). I remember seeing it when it was shown a few years ago.
It was shot on film rather than video, with many cuts between different
camera angles which were *during* someone speaking (ie not at natural
pauses) and which seemed to preserve lip-sync.

Using 1969 technology, how did they achieve synchrony so the editor got
the various films for the different cameras in sync to allow him to cut between cameras whenever he wanted to? Presumably the longest film that
a single camera could shoot would be about 10-15 minutes without a
reel-change so it wasn't just a case of loading the cameras with a
couple hours of film and syncing them once at the beginning (a
clapperboard that they could all see).

Nowadays I imagine each camera would have a common timecode source that
wrote to an unseen part of the film, which would allow the film to be
stopped and started, and reels to be changed, but what technology would
they have had nearly 60 years ago?
--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: uk.tech.broadcast

NY <me@privacy.net> wrote:

There's a discussion between Alfred Hitchcock and Bryan Forbes dating
from 1969 which is being shown on BBC Four tomorrow morning
(00:20-01:15). I remember seeing it when it was shown a few years ago.
It was shot on film rather than video, with many cuts between different camera angles which were *during* someone speaking (ie not at natural pauses) and which seemed to preserve lip-sync.

Using 1969 technology, how did they achieve synchrony so the editor got
the various films for the different cameras in sync to allow him to cut between cameras whenever he wanted to? Presumably the longest film that
a single camera could shoot would be about 10-15 minutes without a reel-change so it wasn't just a case of loading the cameras with a
couple hours of film and syncing them once at the beginning (a
clapperboard that they could all see).

Nowadays I imagine each camera would have a common timecode source that wrote to an unseen part of the film, which would allow the film to be stopped and started, and reels to be changed, but what technology would
they have had nearly 60 years ago?

I believe the point of the clapperboard is to make a loud clap on the audio track. For (analogue) optical sound, you can see that on the negative and
can then line them up.

For a long running piece, perhaps there's a way to also align the optical
sound tracks - for the same audio the shapes would be similar across
different film strips, although not as clear as the clap?

In other contexts other sounds can be used - eg the honk of a car horn.

I'm not sure if the kind of cameras used for these shoots could swap on the
fly from one reel to another, at which point you know precisely how many
frames of overlap (or missed) you have?

Theo
--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: uk.tech.broadcast

On Thu, 16 Jul 2026 18:16:03 +0100, NY <me@privacy.net> wrote:

Using 1969 technology, how did they achieve synchrony so the editor got
the various films for the different cameras in sync to allow him to cut >between cameras whenever he wanted to? Presumably the longest film that
a single camera could shoot would be about 10-15 minutes without a >reel-change so it wasn't just a case of loading the cameras with a
couple hours of film and syncing them once at the beginning (a
clapperboard that they could all see).

There were many ways they could have done it.

The simplest way would be to have one tape recorder and multiple cameras
and a common board would be put on at the start of camera rolls. Then the filming would stop as the camera rolls ran out at about ten minutes.
Cameras would be reloaded and off they would go again with a common clapper board. The ARRi BL camera did have 1200ft magazines which gave just
over 30 minutes duration, so these could have been used. I think the Arri
BL was around in the late 60s.

If continuous, non-stop recording was required then a way to do it would
be to have multiple cameras each with a sound recorder running with it.
All would start with a common sound clapperboard, then as cameras were
coming close to the end of a reel, they would change reel and re-start.
If the recorder associated with a camera stopped and started with the
camera, the film would be close enough for lip synching. There was also
a facility on the Arri B L for blip sync which put a flash on the edge of
the film along with a blip on sound for synching "silently". This setup required a bit of arranging and you would probably have three cameras with
two on the subject and one on the interviewer so that there was less chance
of a camera running out on the subject. If an interviewer's question was missed, then they could do cutaway questions at the end.

Synching would be done on a synchroniser which was a fairly basic machine
with one or more picture heads and several sound heads. This was the key
to synching all the various bits of material. Sound tracks could be mod-matched for sync, then pictures could be synced to sound using clapper boards or lip syncing.

After synching of pictures and sound, all the material could be edge
numbered to give a constant sync reference while the material was being
edited.

That's two ways of doing it but there could be many more ways of doing it.

And even with no clapper boards or other sync marking method, you could
still "rescue" a job by lip synching. An interview is a pretty easy lip sync operation since there are obvious stops and starts of interviewer and interviewee.

Jim.
--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: uk.tech.broadcast

On Thu Jul 16 18:16:03 2026 NY wrote:

There's a discussion between Alfred Hitchcock and Bryan Forbes dating
from 1969 which is being shown on BBC Four tomorrow morning
(00:20-01:15). I remember seeing it when it was shown a few years ago.
It was shot on film rather than video, with many cuts between different camera angles which were *during* someone speaking (ie not at natural
pauses) and which seemed to preserve lip-sync.

Using 1969 technology, how did they achieve synchrony so the editor got
the various films for the different cameras in sync to allow him to cut between cameras whenever he wanted to? Presumably the longest film that
a single camera could shoot would be about 10-15 minutes without a reel-change so it wasn't just a case of loading the cameras with a
couple hours of film and syncing them once at the beginning (a
clapperboard that they could all see).

Nowadays I imagine each camera would have a common timecode source that
wrote to an unseen part of the film, which would allow the film to be
stopped and started, and reels to be changed, but what technology would
they have had nearly 60 years ago?

Clapperboards and skilled editors.
--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: uk.tech.broadcast

On Fri Jul 17 14:22:39 2026 Theo wrote:

NY <me@privacy.net> wrote:

There's a discussion between Alfred Hitchcock and Bryan Forbes dating
from 1969 which is being shown on BBC Four tomorrow morning
(00:20-01:15). I remember seeing it when it was shown a few years ago.
It was shot on film rather than video, with many cuts between different camera angles which were *during* someone speaking (ie not at natural pauses) and which seemed to preserve lip-sync.

Using 1969 technology, how did they achieve synchrony so the editor got
the various films for the different cameras in sync to allow him to cut between cameras whenever he wanted to? Presumably the longest film that
a single camera could shoot would be about 10-15 minutes without a reel-change so it wasn't just a case of loading the cameras with a
couple hours of film and syncing them once at the beginning (a
clapperboard that they could all see).

Nowadays I imagine each camera would have a common timecode source that wrote to an unseen part of the film, which would allow the film to be stopped and started, and reels to be changed, but what technology would they have had nearly 60 years ago?

I believe the point of the clapperboard is to make a loud clap on the audio track. For (analogue) optical sound, you can see that on the negative and can then line them up.

Are you suggesting that there was sep opt recorded when it was shot?
The rushes might have been rubber numbered at the processing plant. I'm still going with skilled editors and assistants
--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: uk.tech.broadcast

On 08/08/2026 10:50, Jim Spriggs wrote:

I believe the point of the clapperboard is to make a loud clap on the audio >> track. For (analogue) optical sound, you can see that on the negative and >> can then line them up.

Are you suggesting that there was sep opt recorded when it was shot?

The rushes might have been rubber numbered at the processing plant. I'm still going with skilled editors and assistants.

Is sep opt used as a *recording* format at the time of filming? I
thought all recording was on magnetic tape (or digitally) with a sep opt
film being one of several print-distribution formats.

My original question was partly driven by wondering how synchronisation
(both between cameras and between those cameras and a common sound
track) was achieved at a live event where you want something
non-intrusive, and you can't stop the event during reel changes.

When did technology first allow a timecode to be broadcast to all the
cameras and to the sound recorder, to avoid the need for clapperboards
and to allow cameras to change reels at different times so at least one
of them would always be filming the continuous uninterruptible event,
even if it meant that there were times when the director had a
restricted set of camera angles to choose from.
--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: uk.tech.broadcast

Didn't anyone see the video message issued by Rupert Lowe a few days
ago? A couple of switches whilst he was talking from front view to side
view and vice versa in beautiful sync.

How do they do it??
--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: uk.tech.broadcast

On Sat Aug 8 18:56:01 2026 Woody wrote:

Didn't anyone see the video message issued by Rupert Lowe a few days
ago? A couple of switches whilst he was talking from front view to side
view and vice versa in beautiful sync.

How do they do it??

,
Vision mixing used to be a skill - more likely that some sort of Time Code is involved, given that such an item is likely to be professionally made.
--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2