10 Crucial Questions to Ask a Film Restoration Laboratory
A practical checklist of technical questions to ask a service provider before shipping your precious film elements.
Before shipping rare or historically significant film reels to a laboratory, walk through this checklist of technical questions to ensure your materials will be handled safely.
Mechanical Questions: Handling and Transport
First, ask: 'Do you use sprocketless scanners to transport film?' and 'How do you handle film with shrinkage exceeding 2%?' A professional lab should immediately answer with details about continuous capstan drives and optical tracking systems.
Optical and File Delivery Questions
Next, ask: 'Do you offer optical wet gate scanning for physical scratch removal?' and 'What file formats do you deliver as archival master files?' Ensure they deliver uncompressed, archival-standard formats like DPX or ProRes 4444 XQ rather than highly compressed H.264 MP4 files.