(A.) Policy and legislation
(A.1) Policy objectives
The 2005 European Parliament and Council Recommendation on film heritage recommended Member States to ensure preservation of cinematographic works. The fourth application report on this Recommendation, published on 3 October 2014, shows that very few Member States are implementing digital workflows to preserve digital or digitised cinema. Those that have done it have used diverging standards.
(A.2) EC perspective and progress report
The film heritage sector would benefit from European standards that describe the most efficient digital workflows and data formats for preservation of digital films. The resulting standards for digital preservation of films could also be of interest for digital preservation of other type of documents in public administrations. Some Member States, as Germany and France, are planning to adopt national standards.
(A.3) References
- Recommendation of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 November 2005 on film heritage and the competitiveness of related industrial activities, OJ L 323 of 9.12.2005, p.57. http://eurlex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32005H0865:EN:NOT
- Council conclusions on "European film heritage, including the challenges of the digital era", adopted in November 2010 http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_data/docs/pressdata/en/educ/117799.pdf
- Council conclusions on "European Audio-visual Policy in the Digital Era" adopted on 25 November 2014 http://www.consilium.europa.eu/homepage/highlights/council-addresses-european-audiovisual-policy-in-the-digital-era?lang=en
- 4th Application report of the Film Heritage Recommendation, from 2.10.2014 https://ec.europa.eu/digital-agenda/en/news/european-commissions-report-film-heritage
- Archival Policy of the Swedish Film Institute http://www.sfi.se/Global/Filmarkivet/Policy%20of%20the%20Archival%20Film%20Collections%20of%20the%20Swedish%20Film%20Institute%20(2012).pdf
- British Film Institute Strategy "2012-2017" Film forever http://www.bfi.org.uk/about-bfi/policy-strategy/film-forever
- Results of the EU-funded research project EDCine ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/ist/docs/ka4/au_concertation_1006_edcine_en.pdf http://ec.europa.eu/avpolicy/docs/reg/cinema/june09/edcine.pdf
- Recommendations from the International Federation of Film Archives (FIAF):
- FIAF Technical Commission Recommendation on the deposit and acquisition of D-Cinema elements for long-term preservation and access http://www.fiafnet.org/commissions/TC%20docs/D-Cinema%20deposit%20specifications%20v1%200%202010-09-02%20final%201.pdf
- FIAF Technical Commission Recommendation on the Principles of Digital Archiving http://www.fiafnet.org/commissions/TC%20docs/Digital%20Preservation%20Principles%20v1%201.pdf
(B.) Requested actions
Action 1: SDOs to develop and adopt a European standard and the related guidelines on preservation of digital films, based on existing standardisation activities at national and international level.
Action 2: SDOs to promote awareness and implementation of the European standard among relevant stakeholders (e.g. European film heritage institutions). Relevant stakeholders are invited to participate in the development of standards within CEN/TC 457 'Digital preservation of cinematographic works'. CEN/TC 457 will ensure a proper information exchange between stakeholders and will actively seek cooperation.
(C.) Activities and additional information
(C.1) Related standardisation activities
CEN
CEN/TC 457 finished its work in 2022 with the publication of two documents:
- EN 17650:2022, A framework for digital preservation of cinematographic works - The Cinema Preservation Package
- CEN/TR 17862:2022, Guideline for the implementation of the Cinema Preservation Package (CPP) in EN 17650
In addition, a reference software was prepared that is publicly availabe hiere: https://gitlab.com/cen-pt457/cenpackager
ISO - OAIS
OAIS (Open Archive Information System) — ISO 14721:2012
http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_catalogue/catalogue_ics/catalogue_detail_ics.htm?csnumber=57284
DIN
DIN is evaluating a revision of DIN SPEC 15587:2019 Guidelines for digitization of cinematographic film due to the latest developments in the digitization of film in Germany. The document gives guidelines for the digitalization to make a digital preservation possible.
The publication of EN 17650 and CEN/TR 17862 will be taken into account for the decision as well.
CST/Fraunhofer
CST/Fraunhofer started a new "Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers" (SMPTE) activity for a mezzanine file format of digitised movies based on the interoperable master format (IMF) which can be extended to a preservation format of digital films
ITU
ITU-T Study Group 16 on multimedia services and applications. Developed with ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC29/WG1 Recommendation T.802 (Motion JPEG-2000) that is used for digital cinema. Additionally, SG16 is developing studies on cultural heritage under its Question 21/16 “Multimedia framework, applications and services”.
Resolution ITU-R 60 (Reduction of energy consumption for environmental protection and mitigating climate change by use of ICT/radiocommunication technologies and systems) resolves “that ITU-R Study Groups should develop Recommendations, Reports or Handbooks on best practices in place to reduce energy consumption within ICT systems, equipment or applications operating in a radiocommunication service” and “possible development and use of radio systems or applications which can support reduction of energy consumption in non-radiocommunication sectors”. ITU-R Study Groups have produced several outputs on climate change, but there is not much literature within ITU-R Study Groups regarding the environmental impact of ICT itself.
ITU-R Study Group 6 had approved Report ITU-R BT.2385 on “Reducing the environmental impact of terrestrial broadcasting systems”. Like all industries, the broadcasting sector has a responsibility to improve its environmental performance. The main environmental impacts of the broadcasting industry are greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, energy use, raw material consumption and electronic waste. This Report presents analyses of several case studies.
In addition, Question ITU-R 147/6 on “Energy Aware Broadcasting Systems” was approved by ITU-R SG6 in May 2022.
Other ITU-R publications include:
- Question ITU-R 143-2/6 on “Advanced Immersive Sensory Media Systems for Programme Production, Exchange and Presentation for Broadcasting”
- Recommendation ITU-R BT.2137 on “Technologies applicable to Internet Protocol (IP) interfaces for programme production”
- Report ITU-R BT.2386 on “Digital terrestrial broadcasting: Design and implementation of single frequency networks (SFN)”
- Report ITU-R BT.2446 provides methods for conversion of high dynamic range content to standard dynamic range content and vice-versa