Alec has chided me for allowing the blog to shift from the filmmaking focus. While I find the conspiracy and freedom of information sites to be great material for story ideas, Alec is more concerned wtih the nuts and bolts of feature and documentary film production. So, yesterday, a nod to a Festival selection. Today, a shift from my personal archive of photos to some of the largest historical archives of film and still footage.
British Pathe is an incredible site offering over 3,500 hours of video and 12 million images from their nearly eight decades of archives. All of the footage can be downloaded for FREE in low resolution windows media format. Storyboards of the films and detailed summaries help you avoid wasted download time.
ITN Archive is their for-profit parent. When you find the footage you want and want it in a higher, editable format, ITN can help you out.
Archive.Org is a 501(3)C organization located in the Presidio of San Francisco. With their fabulous Wayback Machine, Archive.Org offers permanent access for researchers, historians, and scholars to historical collections that exist in digital format. Amazing things can be found here.
Another for-profit option is the Stock Footage section of the LA_411 Directory. All of this searching for archival footage is, of course, a result of the Robert Evans Documentary The Kid Stays in the Picture with its innovative approach to combining still images and archival film to create more drama and tension.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
George Santayana (1863 - 1952)
Spanish-born U.S. Philosopher
“History never looks like history when you are living through it.”
John W. Gardner (1912 -)
U.S. Administrator
0 responses so far ↓
Please add your comment.
Leave a Comment