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Poster: z.x.study Date: Feb 1, 2023 3:41pm
Forum: feature_films Subject: Re: Is this movie PD? If so, please move

Films released in the U.S. before 1964 had to have copyright renewals after 28 years. Lack of copyright renewal is the most common reason that some of those films became p.d.

A far less common reason is the lack of a valid copyright notice in the credits. A valid notice consists of "Copyright" or "Copr." or a "C" in a circle, the year, and the holder of the copyright.

The copyright of this movie was renewed:

R579843.
The Trap. By Monogram Pictures
Corporation. 7 reels. (C) 26Nov46;
L728. Allied Artists Pictures Corpora-
tion, formerly known as Monogram
Pictures Corporation (PWH); 24Jun74;
R579843.

It seems that if it has a valid copyright notice, it is not p.d. (Since Monogram was a poverty-row studio, it's not surprising that many of its films are p.d.)

Before people upload to the Archive, they should be aware that they shouldn't use the filename extension ".mp4". If some other one is used, then the Archive will derive a (usually) smaller file with the extension ".mp4".


"Colorized using DeOldify tech."

Would it be unfair to say that those who want to "de-oldify" old movies are people who don't like old movies?

Some of those people even want to change the aspect ratio of old films. Imagine taking a portrait painted by an expert artist and cutting off the top and the bottom in order to convert it to landscape mode.

How does removing part of the picture make the picture better? How does removing part of the information give us more information?

Since wider and shorter is better, they ought to remove everything except a single scan-line in the middle of the picture. Then they would experience the thrill of watching a video with an aspect ratio of 640:1.

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Poster: EzzyLovesClassicMovies Date: Feb 2, 2023 2:52am
Forum: feature_films Subject: Re: Is this movie PD? If so, please move

Hi, I'm aware of that info about The Trap, thanks, it's only that some sources claim the movie is PD anyway and others say it's not. I just need a moderator to decide whether to move or remove. I don't seem to be able to delete it myself.

'Would it be unfair to say that those who want to "de-oldify" old movies are people who don't like old movies?'

Yes, it would be unfair to say that. I love old movies, that's why I choose to colorize certain ones (mostly lively/comedic 20s-30s). I feel it brings the era and people 'to life' to put them in vibrant colour rather than monochrome. OTOH, I wouldn't colorize a Film Noir (although I have a Film Noir fan friend who keeps asking me to! Nope, it would be sacrilege!). If you don't like colorized movies you don't have to watch them, stick with original B&W. :)

I know about renaming mp4s to mpeg4 here. Mine are mostly 450-800MB and I feel that's small enough without losing quality. My last upload was 1.1GB so I did rename it mpeg4 and it got derived to a much smaller mp4 which had notably lower quality.

Don't know what you mean about changing aspect ratios or removing part of the picture, that's not something I would do. ??