What if Red Dwarf's early location shoots were filmed on 16 mm rather than video

[Jawscvmcdia]

Bearing in mind that most BBC shows in the 1980s filmed exterior shots using 16 mm film, rather than videotape, Red Dwarf was unusual in that regard for shooting on videotape outdoors instead before many other shows would follow suit. How would have filming using 16 mm affected the quality of those early shows?

Topic

[Ben Paddon]

Well, the Series II Blurays would look a bit better, for starters.

That’s basically it.

[Pete Part Three]

/thread

[Warbodog]

Bump.

[Me Own Stunts]

Rhyl beach would have looked like paradise.

[Flap Jack]

Might have given an interesting effect to shoot all the in-game parts of Better Than Life on film, contrasting with the rest of the scenes.

Really I can only think of 2 significant consequences for Red Dwarf shooting locations on film:

1. Shooting would have been overall more expensive, maybe forcing the production to save money elsewhere.
2. The Remastered project would have only ruined the look of 90% of the scenes, rather than 100%.

[Toxteth O-Grady]

What if the Jim Reaper DivaDroid message was filmed on video, rather than using 16 mm?

Bearing in mind that most Red Dwarf scenes in the 1980s filmed using videotape, rather than 16 mm film, the Jim Reaper DivaDroid message was unusual in that regard for shooting on 16 mm indoors instead before all other scenes would follow suit (and indeed proceed it). How would have filming using videotape affected the quality of that one message?

[Ben Saunders]

War it unusual to shoot location stuff on video by the time of a Red Dwarf? I thought Doctor Who switched to video not only to save money but also because it was the standard by then

[Jawscvmcdia]

>War it unusual to shoot location stuff on video by the time of a Red Dwarf? I thought Doctor Who switched to video not only to save money but also because it was the standard by then

It was a weird point in time when the industry was gradually transitioning to video, but that many shows were still being made on 16 mm. Although mobile videotape technology was sufficient in providing news gathering teams the opportunity to record in remote places and relay their pictures back, videotape quality as a whole was at this point still deemed to be insufficient, especially when compared to film. Dramas in particular carried on using film for this reason right until the mid-1990s, and many American sitcoms were still recorded on 35 mm until the 2000s.

[Mr-Stabby]

I seem to recall Only Fools and Horses were using film for exteriors right until the end. Yet on the flip side you’d see shows like Doctor Who using videotape for exteriors all the way back in 1974.

[Ben Saunders]

The videotape exteriors for Doctor Who looked better in 1974 than when they officialy switched in the 80s, I don’t know what the fuck happened. A couple episodes they shot on video on location so that they could do blue screen effects

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