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The same TV commercials in color and in B&W..

M

mleach

Today I was checking out www.archive.org and noticed that in a few ads were shot in both color and in black & white. For example I saw an ad for a cigarette ( Spring Menthol Filters ) that showed a woman getting a pack of smokes from a cigarette machine. One ad was in B&W, while the other, the very same ad was shot in color.

Come to think of it some time ago I can remember seeing an old ad from the 60's for Dr. Pepper that was shot in B&W..yet another copy of the same ad, yepper done in COLOR.

What was the purpose of this? Wouldn't it had been more simpler just to shoot just one ad in color instead of two different prints? Afterall a color ad would still appear as B&W on a station that couldn't yet do the color thing.

On a similar note..The Flintstones and those Winston ads with Fred & Barney. Those were shot ( it appears to be ) in black & white while the show was done, in course in color. Back in the day were the rates different say for a commercial to be aired in color than those in black & white? Reason I ask in the past I have seen online episodes of the Hollywood Palace. complete with the original ads. However despite the show itself being in color some of the ads while they were in color..others were in B&W. Did ABC ( or the other networks ) charge less for airing those ads in black & white?
 
To add, some ads started out life in B&W and got converted to color. a great example is the "Faygo Kid Root Beer" ad. that ad was first shot in B&W in 1953 and was converted to Color in 1958 (with an edited version of the 1958 ad airing in 1980).

The Flintstones didn't air in Color until 1962 (in spite of the fact the shows was made in color). the ads in B&W would have made sense (even if the show ended up on stations that was primary NBC/secondary ABC and had color transmission as well). ABC had no color programs until the Jetsons in 1962.
 
I remember long ago, in the days before home video, you could order 16mm. prints of shows and movies from
distributors. You usually had the option to choose either a color or B&W print, the advantage being the B&W
was generally cheaper. I am guessing that for some local stations that were not doing much if anything in
color the B&W prints might have made sense.
 
As Freddy alluded, it's probable that the "B/W" versions of those commercials were sourced from 16mm kinescope films - often in black & white. Those went to stations that either delayed broadcast and didn't have VTR equipment, or they were stations airing programs from a secondary network (often ABC).

--Russell
 
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