“For those of us who see film as an anthropological artefact (ha!), this
application of filmic “qualities” is a very interesting trend. … Even though
it’s commonly recognized that visual images can be manipulated, the look of
a home movie, classroom film or “roll the clip” sports report film is still
something that communicates authenticity to audiences.I know that in the preservation of 16mm film, many question why we worship
”
grain and all of those quaint qualities that accompany the gauge. The
answer is simply that we are not just preserving the information being
profered in the film, but the nature of its production.
— Elena Rossi-Snook, on film grain and its removal (or addition!) in archival (or “archival”!) works [AMIA-L] (the rest of her post is worth reading)