Project MUSE®: The Moving Image - Latest Articles
https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232
Project MUSE®: Latest articles in The Moving Image.daily12026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00text/htmlen-USVol. 3 (2003) through current issueLatest Articles: The Moving ImageTWOProject MUSE®The Moving Image1542-42351532-3978Latest articles in The Moving Image. Feed provided by Project MUSE®Guest Editors’ Foreword: Introduction
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950985
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The recent commemoration of more than a century of 16mm celluloid has yielded university conferences, public screenings, and both popular and academic publications. Introduced by Eastman Kodak in 1923 primarily as a domestic or amateur format, 16mm played a vital role in a wide array of social, cultural, and educational activities around the world for much of the twentieth century. Documenting everything from families and communities, educational outreach, and medical training to corporate marketing and government propaganda, this “nontheatrical” film gauge enabled global moviemaking (and enjoyment) for decades. Not just the realm of hobbyists, 16mm versions of Hollywood films found new lives in domestic and
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallGuest Editors’ Foreword: Introduction2025-02-13text/htmlen-USGuest Editors’ Foreword: Introduction2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®132782026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-1316mm Horror Stories
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950986
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I will never forget when I first encountered mag soundtrack separating from film. I was prepping newsfilm for digitization. As I was winding through a reel, I heard a light tearing sound. At first I thought it was just because the film was sticking to itself, something I had encountered many times. But I quickly noticed that the mag soundtrack was separating and sticking to the other side of the film. I stopped immediately, but when I realized there was nothing I could do, I proceeded, while the tearing sound made me feel uncomfortable. I would eventually learn to live with this discomfort.I have yet to find a way to treat film with this condition, to keep the mag track from separating like that, but if anyone has
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmall16mm Horror Stories2025-02-13text/htmlen-US16mm Horror Stories2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®22562026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Ethnographic Film and the John Marshall Ju/’hoan Bushman Film and Video Collection
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950987
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Subtitles inspired by foreign art house films; experiments with narration and sound effects; a lifelong quest to capture and share truths about human experience through the medium of film: the history of 16mm ethno-graphic filmmaking illustrated by the John Marshall Ju/’hoan Bushman Film and Video Collection (1950–2000) offers far more than what the popular imagination might conjure. This article presents a case study of one of the most extensive longitudinal collections of ethnographic film held at the Human Studies Film Archives (HSFA), Smithsonian Institution.1 Ethnographic filmmaker John Marshall documented the lives of a group of Ju/’hoansi (also known as San or Bushmen)2 of the Kalahari Desert in Namibia on
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallEthnographic Film and the John Marshall Ju/’hoan Bushman Film and Video Collection2025-02-13text/htmlen-USEthnographic Film and the John Marshall Ju/’hoan Bushman Film and Video Collection2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®412952026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Snapshot A
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950988
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Snapshot A. Misshapen core. Courtesy of Laura Jean Treat
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallSnapshot A2025-02-13text/htmlen-USSnapshot A2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®13902026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Circus in Reel Time: Experiences with Filmic Technology’s FI-16 Sprocketless Scanner
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950989
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Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Combined Circus at Madison Square Garden, 1932. Gelatin silver print. Photograph by Edward J. Kelty (American, 1888–1967), Century Photographers. Tibbals Circus Collection, ht0004777. The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art.Circus. It’s a magical word that immediately inspires visions of a dynamic, colorful world where humans fly and animals dance and where wonders of nature and technology, impossible to imagine, are right before one’s eyes. Part of the draw is the seemingly limitless character of the circus, where anything and everything belongs. Within the collections of the Circus Museum at The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art (The Ringling) in Sarasota, Florida, this
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallCircus in Reel Time: Experiences with Filmic Technology’s FI-16 Sprocketless Scanner2025-02-13text/htmlen-USCircus in Reel Time: Experiences with Filmic Technology’s FI-16 Sprocketless Scanner2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®211642026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Snapshots B, C
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950990
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Snapshot B. Misshapen film. Courtesy of Laura Jean Treat Liebhaber.Snapshot C. More misshapen film. Courtesy of Laura Jean Treat
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallSnapshots B, C2025-02-13text/htmlen-USSnapshots B, C2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®17692026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-1316mm Film in the Archives of Six European Broadcast Archives: Holdings, Conditions, Preservation, and Significance
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950991
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Public broadcasting in western Europe is a product of the 1920s and early 1930s. Although all European public broadcasters started off with radio, experiments with television also happened from the very beginning. In Europe, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) was not only the first public radio broadcaster; it was also the first to start with a regular schedule of television broadcasts, starting in November 1936. Film (moving image captured photographically on a tape usually made of cellulose nitrate, cellulose acetate, or polyester) was from the beginning an essential part of the technological chain to bring what was filmed to an end device, thanks in particular to the so-called intermediate film system.
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmall16mm Film in the Archives of Six European Broadcast Archives: Holdings, Conditions, Preservation, and Significance2025-02-13text/htmlen-US16mm Film in the Archives of Six European Broadcast Archives: Holdings, Conditions, Preservation, and Significance2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®287532026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Chips and Cookies
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950992
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Vinegar is a common smell for any archivist working with 16mm film subject to acetate decay. My coworker claims that it makes him crave salt and vinegar chips more. For me, it has the opposite effect; I’ve had maybe a handful of the chips in the last five years.Usually, an archivist might get a whiff of it near the film in question and upon opening a tightly sealed metal film can. My supervisors, however, could smell it upon exiting their cars, the vinegar becoming more potent as they approached the building housing the archive’s next acquisition. The donor had passed the year before, their executor left to carry out their will. The archive would be carrying out its own portion. Or hauling it out, rather, armed
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallChips and Cookies2025-02-13text/htmlen-USChips and Cookies2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®58652026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Interview with Larry Weidman
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950993
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Larry Weidman began his forty-year career in broadcast news as a photographer, reporter, and anchor at KAUZ Channel 6 in Wichita Falls, Texas, in 1963. Three years later, he moved to KPRC Channel 2—the oldest television station in Houston and the second-oldest station in Texas. There, he increasingly worked behind the camera, rising to the position of news director. In 1980, Weidman joined NBC News, serving as bureau chief in Houston, Tel Aviv, and Rome and as a correspondent and producer in Dallas. He received two National Emmy nominations for news stories he worked on as a producer: “City on Fire,” a 1992 NBC News Special about the Los Angeles riots, and “Attack on America,” a 2001 broadcast of NBC Nightly News
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallInterview with Larry Weidman2025-02-13text/htmlen-USInterview with Larry Weidman2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®380852026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Snapshots D, E
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950994
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Snapshot D. Tangled and misshapen core. Courtesy of Laura Jean Treat Liebhaber.Snapshot E. Unspooling film. Courtesy of Laura Jean Treat
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallSnapshots D, E2025-02-13text/htmlen-USSnapshots D, E2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®18252026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-1316mm, 35mm, 70mm, 3-D: “In the End, the Art and Language Is the Same”
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950995
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Thomas G. Smith is best known for running Industrial Light and Magic’s special effects unit during the early 1980s, stewarding enduring cultural touchstones like Return of the Jedi (1983), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), E.T. (1982), and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982). In the years that followed, Smith accrued multiple Emmy nominations for television work and won a BAFTA for his work on the visual effects for Honey, I Shrunk the Kids (1989).Smith, however, began his career as a 16mm producer and director for Encyclopaedia Britannica Films (EBF). Smith has written about his experiences at EBF and graciously shared his recollections with historians Amanda R. Keeler and Geoff Alexander in 2008 and 2010
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmall16mm, 35mm, 70mm, 3-D: “In the End, the Art and Language Is the Same”2025-02-13text/htmlen-US16mm, 35mm, 70mm, 3-D: “In the End, the Art and Language Is the Same”2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®552252026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Stripes Incident
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950996
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Those in the field who know me are aware that I am very fond of smaller-format films like 16mm, so my ego makes me want to turn in a story about something wonderful that I have figured out in regard to the format, for instance, stumbling upon a way to take those brittle, solid brick reels that shatter into a million pieces when you touch them and instead unroll them and scan them. Instead, I will recount a cautionary tale, because I have also had many mishaps along the way.Over the years, I have done many presentations, ranging from the simplest—projecting some film for a private or public screening—to hauling lots of equipment to demonstrate how a certain type of projector works. At one of these screenings here in
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallStripes Incident2025-02-13text/htmlen-USStripes Incident2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®51192026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13For All Time or Simply a Lark? At Long Last Love and the Role of 16mm in the Hollywood Restoration
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950997
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When Twentieth Century Fox decided to release Peter Bogdanovich’s 1975 musical flop At Long Last Love on Blu-ray in 2013, it did not check with private collectors of 16mm distribution prints to see if the studio was missing any material. Why would it? The director had given the studio a go-ahead, it had an existing 35mm edit in its vaults, and the release itself was a small Amazon exclusive with no more than a few thousand copies printed. Unbeknownst to both Fox and Bogdanovich, however, 16mm prints of the film that had circulated for decades contained more of the narrative than did the 2013 release’s new cut. The recent reincorporation of two heretofore lost musical numbers from one of these prints complicates the
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallFor All Time or Simply a Lark? At Long Last Love and the Role of 16mm in the Hollywood Restoration2025-02-13text/htmlen-USFor All Time or Simply a Lark? At Long Last Love and the Role of 16mm in the Hollywood Restoration2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®371642026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Snapshots F, G, H
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950998
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Snapshot F. Bad splice. Courtesy of Afsheen Nomai.Snapshot G. Another bad splice. Courtesy of Afsheen Nomai.Snapshot H. A final bad splice. Courtesy of Afsheen
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallSnapshots F, G, H2025-02-13text/htmlen-USSnapshots F, G, H2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®22252026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Film for Film’s Sake: Reintegrating 16mm Film into the University of Tennessee’s Classrooms
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/950999
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Although oohs and aahs as the lights go down for a classroom film screening might seem an unattainable ideal in the twenty-first century, the recent reintegration of 16mm film projection into University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UTK) film studies classes has garnered much enthusiasm. Students delight at seeing and touching film reels and enjoy decoding the original context for countdown leader; the whir of the projector has energized and illuminated student insights into film form, materiality, and archiving. Thanks to the mutual research interests of a UTK subject liaison librarian/film archivist and a cinema studies professor, a 16mm film collection that went unused for years now has new life in the classroom.
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallFilm for Film’s Sake: Reintegrating 16mm Film into the University of Tennessee’s Classrooms2025-02-13text/htmlen-USFilm for Film’s Sake: Reintegrating 16mm Film into the University of Tennessee’s Classrooms2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®388212026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Kabuki
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/951000
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Anecdotes are likely born of stress a-go-go with all technologies, of course, but with regard to 16mm, there are so many—ask any lab tech about 16mm track application (the additional process development of the track area to improve contrast, signal-to-noise ratio, etc.), possibly the main reason lab staff could be heard cursing—but I’ll simply recount what was written on the Christie 16mm projector operations cheat sheet at the infamous multiplex in San Francisco known as Kabuki (though I never officially worked there): the document taped to the projector was titled “How to Operate the 16mm Projector,” under which a poor soul had written, “. . . if you are so unlucky.” That said, I wouldn't make films in any other
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallKabuki2025-02-13text/htmlen-USKabuki2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®22742026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Why 16mm [Still] Matters
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/951001
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It’s hard not to conflate moving image production content with format: it exists, therefore it is. Do we really care about the technology that brings forth that content once we’re tucked into a sourdough bread tutorial or cat video? Cogito ergo just press play. Is anyone bemoaning the new digital rerelease of the IMAX film on beavers? (If one could only see these industrious rodents on the original 70mm!) Independent filmmaking thrives on digital technologies and online exhibition platforms. Archives are scanning, scanning, scanning. Now enveloped in a world of moving image ubiquitousness, we are, collectively and universally, residing in the Digital Era (DE).So, does 16mm film still matter? Not as a broodmare for
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallWhy 16mm [Still] Matters2025-02-13text/htmlen-USWhy 16mm [Still] Matters2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®246152026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Snapshots I, J
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/951002
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Snapshot I. Damaged frames. Courtesy of Afsheen Nomai.Snapshot J. Damaged film. Courtesy of Afsheen
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallSnapshots I, J2025-02-13text/htmlen-USSnapshots I, J2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®18302026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Thirty-Six Thousand Reels Later: The History and Future of the A/V Geeks Educational Film Archive
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/951003
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In 1992, North Carolina State University undergraduate student Skip Elsheimer bought a Bell & Howell Filmsound 16mm projector from a state surplus auction in Raleigh, North Carolina, as part of a lot that included TVs, turntables, and reel-to-reel decks. To determine if the projector worked, he bought a 16mm film, Conception and Contraception (1972), at a local flea market, which became the first film in his collection. The film was silent, so Elsheimer went back to the flea market to purchase his second 16mm film, Uncle Jim’s Dairy Farm (1963), with which he determined that his newly acquired projector was in perfect working order.Months later, when Elsheimer’s roommates headed to a nearby auction that he couldn’t
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallThirty-Six Thousand Reels Later: The History and Future of the A/V Geeks Educational Film Archive2025-02-13text/htmlen-USThirty-Six Thousand Reels Later: The History and Future of the A/V Geeks Educational Film Archive2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®318122026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Snapshot K
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/951004
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Snapshot K. Reel as core. Courtesy of Afsheen
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallSnapshot K2025-02-13text/htmlen-USSnapshot K2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®13662026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Funding Opportunities
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/951005
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Through the initiative of Melissa Dollman (Deserted Films and cochair of AMIA’s Publication Committee), The Moving Image is pleased to reserve this space for short descriptions of relevant grants of which our readership and AMIA’s membership more broadly should be aware.Want to make folks aware of a grant? Send queries to Melissa (msdollman@gmail.com).Interested in applying? Send queries directly to the grantor.The Moving Image hopes that this forum will raise awareness and demystify the
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallFunding Opportunities2025-02-13text/htmlen-USFunding Opportunities2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®16122026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Women’s Film Preservation Fund
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/951006
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The Women’s Film Preservation Fund (WFPF) of New York Women in Film and Television (NYWIFT) is the only program in the world dedicated to preserving the cultural legacy of women in the industry through preserving films made by women. It was founded in 1995 by NYWIFT in conjunction with the Museum of Modern Art.The WFPF’s goal is to ensure that the contributions of women to film history are not forgotten. To date, the WFPF has preserved a remarkable spectrum of films. These include works by early feminists, women of color, social activists, queer filmmakers, and artists that represent a unique and irreplaceable part of our nation’s cultural legacy. Preserved films range from award-winning documentaries—such as Mirra
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallWomen’s Film Preservation Fund2025-02-13text/htmlen-USWomen’s Film Preservation Fund2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®94422026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13Homage to Penny
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/951007
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I want to pay my respects to a horror story—one that happened ninety years ago, the details of which are somewhat of a mystery but have led to my having a constant companion.I’m the project manager for the Media Preservation Department at the University of Illinois. I will unabashedly say that we’re popular: lots of staff, patrons, and students are interested in what we do and how we do it. The Media Preservation Labs are our pride and joy; I have an extra soft spot for the Film Lab. Film was my gateway to media preservation. So when it is time to provide a tour of our space, I’m happy to host the Film Lab. When I do, I exhibit things—not just equipment or setups but objects that have an obvious story to tell; they
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-18T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/232/image/coversmallHomage to Penny2025-02-13text/htmlen-USHomage to Penny2025-02-132025TWOProject MUSE®73942026-05-18T00:00:00-05:002025-02-13