SVT’s archive is extensive. We have nearly 1000 square meters of archival facilities filled with film. The oldest film dates to 1897 (re-copied in the 1950s), and the most recent series recorded on film was made in 2011. In addition to this, we had a tape robot, which has now been decommissioned, and during an EU project, we migrated all tapes to low-resolution files. Once that project was completed, we launched the ‘Save the Films’ project with the goal of making the analog archive accessible.
We have over 500,000 hours of film, and initially we used a TeleCine scanner that ran the film in real-time – which would have taken us a lifetime to complete. Instead, we purchased scanners capable of scanning all material at five times the speed. Within five years, we had made 80% of the analog archive available in Full HD. However, there was demand for material in higher resolution and better audio capture, etc., so we invested in new scanners capable of scanning up to 4K and retired the old TeleCine scanner.
Now we have a MAM system filled with files in a mix of different formats and resolutions, and much of it does not meet today's technical standards. With the new scanners, we can rescan films up to 4K, but when the material was originally recorded on tape and has a resolution of only 576 pixels, the challenges are greater.
To help us, we have brought in an AI service that offers digital restoration and cleaning of files, upscaling from low resolution to high resolution, and colorization of black-and-white film.
David, a media technician, will share his experiences not only working with scanning but also supporting many major productions with colorization.
