Old sitcoms.... why did they use film for location shoots?

I watched the 1985 Only Fools and Horses episode 'To Hull and Back' over Christmas. This was a weird episode for two reasons, firstly it doesn't have a laugh track which is really noticeable for the first 5 minutes but soon becomes normal. The other oddity is that it is shot entirely on film. Again, this is noticeable for the first 5 minutes with a scene set in the familiar location of the pub but after that most of the episode is shot on location in London, Hull and Amsterdam so doesn't look that out of place. It becomes noticeable again when they return to the flat towards the end of the episode. In a way, apart from the lack of a widescreen picture it is like watching the film versions of On The Buses, Please Sir, Bless this House or any of the other sitcoms that were made in to films in the 70s/80s without a laugh track.

One thing that I notice when watching 70s sitcoms with location stuff shot on film is just how bad some of it looks. Some scenes have scratches all over the film but the video tape scenes look fine. Was this just how bad the film looked at the time or did the people/companies making the show just not look after it properly? How long would location scenes be stored on film? I'd guess that once they were edited on film they were then transferred to another format along with the video scenes ready to be played out. Did the film already look terrible at that stage?

When you compare sitcom film footage with feature films shot at the same time, the feature films tend to look much cleaner. Was this just a budget thing or am I just seeing the result of digital clean up when watching feature films?

I believe, although I could be wrong, it just depends on how well individual TV companies look after their archive, a lot of Doctor Who episodes that came back from Africa, for example, were in a bad state, particularly the film sections. I think film lasts longer but can be damaged easier than video tape, someone may be able to confirm that who knows more.

Would an episode of Doctor Who or other programmes of a similar vintage have been sent abroad as separate video tape and film ready for the foreign channel to broadcast both parts or would the whole lot (video+film sections) be edited together and supplied on video tape?

So the less expensive and practical alternative was to take a single 16mm film camera with a cameraman and assistant.

Watching "Small, Far Away" the Father Ted documentary last night, they used multi camera for the location stuff similar to that as they used in 2TLS in London. Quads with ISO 1, ISO 2, ISO 3 or MIX and MAIN, was this common practise in the 1990s. Remarkably, Channel 4 kept all the raw recordings from each camera and the quads.

ah, so that explains the drop in quality then. I had assumed they would have used 35mm film.... presumably a cost choice?

out of interest, just how sophisticated were the telecine machines of the day? were they really just a video camera filming a projection in a little box?

presumably these days, old fashioned telecine machines have been superseded by negative or film scanning so a high resolution working copy can be made and edited?

I only saw that on the caravan interiors, and surely those would have been shot in the studio? I assumed the reason the interviewee at that point talked about the audience seeing it on monitors was because the set was so small that the audience wouldn't be able to get a proper view with all the cameras and crew in the way.

It was nice to see those raw recordings, same as on that Two Ronnies special before Xmas.

David

I watched the 1985 Only Fools and Horses episode 'To Hull and Back' over Christmas. This was a weird episode for two reasons, firstly it doesn't have a laugh track which is really noticeable for the first 5 minutes but soon becomes normal. The other oddity is that it is shot entirely on film.

Even as a kid i noticed the difference in picture and the way it was lit compared to standard OFAH episodes. Plus i believe it was the only time in the entire shows history that you saw the fourth wall of the flat.

The Miami special was also shot entirely on film I believe. The first time i saw it was on a compilation VHS. The VHS has the episode before it which leads up to them leaving shot in a normal way with VT, edited together with the film. So as a kid i remember watching the episode and wondering why when they have a shot in the flat later on in the episode, the flat is suddenly on film and lit very differently.

No, they had to be more sophisticated than that, as film would play at 24fps, and the video would record at 50 interlaced half fields a second - so there had to be adjustments for "pull down" (I think its called) to prevent obvious judder.

I only saw that on the caravan interiors, and surely those would have been shot in the studio?

I assumed the reason the interviewee at that point talked about the audience seeing it on monitors was because the set was so small that the audience wouldn't be able to get a proper view with all the cameras and crew in the way.

Watching "Small, Far Away" the Father Ted documentary last night, they used multi camera for the location stuff similar to that as they used in 2TLS in London. Quads with ISO 1, ISO 2, ISO 3 or MIX and MAIN, was this common practise in the 1990s. Remarkably, Channel 4 kept all the raw recordings from each camera and the quads.