Inside the Archive #39

On 22 July, myself and fellow film conservator Lynn Loo presented a workshop to a project called ‘Undocumented’ organised by the London Screen Archives and The New Black Film Collective. This project has been established to address the lack of Black home movies within film archives and create a space to celebrate the importance of preserving the Black experience in London, whilst highlighting the crucial role screen archives play in preserving our stories.

Our session ‘Caring for Your Personal Collection’ began with a screening of the short “home movie” Lynn and I shot at the BFI Conservation Centre. We then introduced participants to film handling, giving them some hands-on experience with 16mm and 35mm film and discussing popular amateur formats, common types of damage to look out for and the preservation techniques they could use. Lynn then spoke about the principles of projection and why archiving is important, both at home and professionally…