Hey guys,
This may be an amateur question because I've never really had to do any serious archival digging or citation for research before. I'm looking for some extensive and uncut historical footage from the late 19th century until 1945. Country of origin is irrelevant. I'm particularly interested in ww1 and ww2 and related European history - but am open to all kinds of historical footage!
My main gripe is this - I've watched nearly every ww1 and ww2 documentary on the internet, and ordered lots of DVDs of those that are not readily available for streaming. However, the footage is always extremely edited. I know for a fact that the cameramen did not turn off their cameras after 3 seconds of filming. But, no matter what the event, the cameraman, the country of origin, or the time period -- all these documentaries feature little 3 second blips. I understand this is effective for condensing extensive material into hour long pieces suited for auidences.... but I'm developing a more hardcore need for historical footage! I'm willing to sit through boring passages of Germans walking through snow -- I just want to experience as much of this film as I possibly can!
Another gripe... I was watching a ww1 documentary that had great footage of a Hapsburg party, where Franz Josef and the Archduke and many other prominent members of European Royalty were partying. Franz Josef gave the Archduke a smirk and walked away, you could see the archduke was a little brushed off and slightly irritated by this. But it's only like 15 seconds of footage. And when I try and google "Franz Ferdinand video" of course I'm only going to get 2 minute videos giving a BS synopsis of his assassination. If I look up "ww2 uncut footage" I get some video with that painfully ubiquitous requiem for a dream song and random blips and bloops of machine gun and artillery fire -- not real uncut footage! Even the stuff that looks like it's raw from a cameraman of Iwo Jima features very stop and go filming. It's just impossible to find footage with any real length through basic searches... I think I really need to look at museum archives, national archives, privately owned foootage.... stuff like that. But of course, if there's a simple website or uploader somewhere that's even better.
I understand -- time has killed the original footage. so has editing. so has censorship. so has carelessness, human error, and adulteration. not to mention stuff that's just plain gone forever.
Is there an archival site where I can dig into some real uncut historical footage? Even if it's a shipyard, or a Krupp factory, or a boring march... even it's not related to military history.... even if it's a Japanese street in 1936 or a Polish restaurant in 1928... I just want to be able to look through the microscope (telescope? kaleidoscope?) of history and immerse myself in a moment that was captured but has since long passed.... I really want to dig into some historical footage!
