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Markee: Guide To Stock Footage: May 2006 - Volume 21 #5
LOST AND FOUND IN HARLEM
Historic Films in Greenport, New York presently offers text searches and anticipates
clips of 50,000 hours of material will be available on-line in the near future. "Some
systems are better than others", says President Joe Lauro. While a simple on-line search
for a sunset over Miami may quickly turn up appropriate clips, "finding something more conceptual in nature could be simplified with the help of experienced staff who know the
library", he notes.
Screening and broadcast-quality clips are delivered any way the customer requires,
including via T1 line, which has enough bandwidth to deliver good video images. Apple
iPod delivery is also available for screening clips, although customers have not yet
requested it. Interestingly, Lauro finds the most-requested medium for screening material
is still VHS cassettes which offer easy scanning and freeze framing. Historic Films is
streamlining the way it delivers clips on DVD with chapters and other features.
Always searching for rare and forgotten footage, Lauro recently discovered over 40 hours
of never-before-seen film. "There was a black Woodstock in New York in the early
summer of 1969," he says. The musical performances at the Harlem Music Festival were
shot by five cameras using 2-inch video for a television special but it never saw the light
of day. Sony has already snapped up some footage for a Nina Simone double-sided CD
and Historic Films plans to produce its own documentary on the festival where
performances by Pigmeat Markham, Moms Mabley, Sly and the Family Stone, B.B.King,
Mahalia Jackson, Gladys Knight and the Pips and others have been captured forever, as
fresh as the day they were shot.
Another new discovery is a fascinating collection of home movies shot by the African-American concert promoter and philosopher known as The Prophet. Shot on 8mm color film in the 50s and 60s, the behind-the-scenes footage shows Aretha Franklin, Dizzy Gillespie and other jazz greats at informal parties. Historic Films is seeking a grant from the Grammy's to properly restore the material.
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