Archiving and preservation refer to the saving of master elements or unique copies of motion pictures by storing them under environmental conditions that prevent deterioration and provide extended life to the materials. Unfortunately, both are far down the list of what’s important to most filmmakers and studio executives. I’ve always found that strange. After all the effort and expense that go into creating a motion picture, why leave its continued survival to chance? And contrary to what many believe, digital technology is not future-proof. Anything stored on a drive will inevitably become subject to calamity. The issue is not if the asset will be damaged or lost, but when it will be.
Nonetheless, a genuine future-proof solution is at hand. ASC Associate Members Rob Hummel and Dan Rosen have spent the past decade developing the Digital Optical Technology System – DOTS™, for short. All the requirements for long-term preservation are built-in: it has a more than one-hundred-year life expectancy, is not subject to deterioration, is easier to store and protect than film, offers ready accessibility, shows a lossless quality of reproduction and is cheaper overall.
DOTS™ records data, visible text and images visually at microscopic density on the same media – a patented phase-change metal alloy tape. It’s non-magnetic, chemically inert and immune to electromagnetic fields (including Electro Magnetic Pulses). The temperature range of its storage is 16˚F to 150˚F, it’s tamper proof, cannot be erased and supports external compression and data encryption, making it a secure and robust archival technology. Best of all, it’s designed to ensure the saved information will be available and recoverable for as long as cameras and imaging devices are on hand, whatever their form. Finally, we’re back to where we started with film – a universally interoperable system that will be available to everyone. And a note to the bean counters: another advantage of DOTS™ is that it eliminates the need for migrating digital assets to fresh drives every three to five years. The cost savings alone will make this system irresistible to even the most threadbare of productions.
This film offers a helpful explanation:
For more information on DOTS™, go to www.Group47.com.
And, as mentioned in the video, here’s a link to the Deep Dive Discussion regarding Vint Cerf’s warning about a Digital Dark Age, DOTS and Iron Mountain’s Smart Vault with Google Cloud: https://youtu.be/nbU01sItCkkMAny