British Pathe Loads Up Huge Historic Picture Archives Online

In what is being called a world’s first, the British Pathe news archive has been brought to life on the net. More than 12 million historic photographs have been released as a new Internet service. Such was the immediate popularity and impact of the site that it almost instantly collapsed under the weight of more than half a million visitors trying to gain access.

The images, which date back to the turn of the 20th century, have been captured from the archives of the British Pathe newsreel, which many will remember as the cinema news and probably the world's most famous newsreel collection.

The collection of more than 12 million historic photographs, capturing scenes from the Boer War to the D-Day landings to the Beatles swinging sixties set for the movie "Help", has been published on the Internet.

They have re-scanned every inch of the archive’s more than 3,500 hours of 35mm film and created this truly unique, world’s first collection. It contains some of the most iconic images ever caught on camera. The entire archive has been remastered and fully digitised. A still image has been produced from every second of film of the existing film

Who were, or are British Pathe?

British Pathe is one of the oldest media companies in the world. Their roots lie in 1890’s Paris where their founder, Charles Pathe, pioneered the development of the moving image.

They later established in London in 1902, and by 1910 were producing their now famous bi-weekly newsreel, the Pathe Gazette. After the First World War, they began producing various Cinemagazines as well. By 1930, they were producing the Gazette, the Pathetone Weekly, the Pathe Pictorial and Eve's Film Review, covering entertainment, culture and women’s' issues.

The Daily Mail and General Trust Group currently own British Pathe. ITN Archive now manages British Pathe footage sales.

How much material is available on the web site?

By the time Pathe had finally stopped producing the cinema newsreel in 1970 they had accumulated over 3500 hours of filmed history. This represents over 90,000 individual items.

For the past 30 years this material has been used extensively around the world in television programs, home videos, advertising, corporate productions and, most recently, in web publishing.

How have they managed to do this?

Archivists and technicians created the images by re-scanning the newsreel's 3,500 hours of 35-millimetre film. The process of digitizing the images took about three years to complete and required a ratio of compression from 35mm film to low resolution “MPEG-4” computerised files of about 100,000:1. A still image has eventually been produced from every second of film, ranging from the earliest flickering monochrome pictures of the Boer War in 19th century Africa to Pathe's coverage of the London of the sixties.

How does the site work?

Images are displayed as a "storyboard" of thumbnail (small) images. Since the images were digitized from motion pictures, a full page of thumbnails represents about 50 seconds of material from a video clip. To enlarge an image, you simply click on its thumbnail. Images are displayed in pop-up windows, so if you're using a pop-up blocker you'll need to disable it to view images you select.

The site offers free search and preview storyboards for anyone to view. To save a preview image, simply right click it and save it to your hard drive. Preview files display a large copyright notice, but can be used for personal or educational purposes.

Enhanced high-resolution versions of the images are also available for web publishing and use in power point presentations for a fee.

With this much material, how do you find what you are looking for?

The site offers both basic search and advanced search capabilities. Advanced search offers a number of useful filters, including media characteristics (black and white or colour, sound or silent picture) production date, and so on.

Advanced search also offers text filters that scan the “metadata” or additional information that has been created and added for each clip. This text information includes a description, title, keywords and a summary, and is also displayed with the storyboard thumbnails of images in results.

What are some examples or samples of what people might find on the site?

Well, there are certainly some memorable images including John Lennon and Paul McCartney with their 1964 NME award. Then there is Britain's Queen Elizabeth seen at the annual Chelsea Flower Show in 1960 and the world's first supermodel, Twiggy, captured in Hamburg.

For those who are interested in the Second World War era there is the classic image of two unidentified soldiers after their rescue from Dunkirk in 1940, or perhaps Winston Churchill who is pictured enjoying a football match at London's Wembley Stadium at the height of World War II.

The movie buffs will love the classic images of actresses Audrey Hepburn, Brigitte Bardot and Marilyn Monroe. If they are really serious they can view silent movie star Charlie Chaplin, pictured in Venice in 1930.

Not to be outdone the Art lovers can view surrealist painter Salvador Dali pulling a bizarre pose in Paris as the highlight of Pathe's final newsreel in 1970.

Finally, if you still can’t make up your mind, there's a fun "lucky dip" button that randomly selects 20 items from the archive for preview.

Who will be most interested in this site?

There should just about be something here for almost anyone. Pathe certainly believe the pictures will add real depth and enjoyment to school history projects and other classroom work right across the world. The newsreel collection is freely available to the public for research and teaching.

The collection should provide a powerful learning aid and a trip down memory lane. By using the newsreel archives to create a huge collection of still images, people can gain access, free of charge, to printable pictures that will only further add to their enjoyment of history.

Chairwoman of the fund, Baroness Jill Pitkeathley, said: "The initiative has constructed a unique photograph resource in an innovative way, shining a light from the present on our past, helping to illuminate our understanding of 20th century history and make learning an enjoyable experience."

What is the cost?

British Pathe is offering free access to a digitized collection of more than 12 million historic photographs from its 20th century cinema newsreel archive.

Whereas all professional usages still require a licence fee Pathe offer free "preview" facilities on the site.

Arthur Hissey
Computer Research & Technology
www.crt.net.au