INK & FLICKER — COLLECTION / RIGHTS AND RELEASE NOTES
Checked: 2026-10-01
Research territory: United States ONLY
Release scope: U.S.-restricted historical excerpts and frame extracts. Written history and original mascot animation are available worldwide. This record does not claim worldwide rights in the historical films.

PROJECT BOUNDARY
This independent illustrated theater uses its own working identity. Character names identify specific historical appearances, not a studio affiliation. No merchandise is offered. Mickey Mouse is not part of the selected collection. Ink & Flicker is presented as an independent Guiles Works concept, with no studio affiliation or sponsorship.

LEGAL RESEARCH BASIS
U.S. Copyright Office Circular 15A explains the maximum 95-year term for these older works and the role of publication/registration. The original U.S. works from 1930 have reached the end of that term. Duke's 2026 research explicitly includes Dizzy Dishes and Fiddlesticks. This does not automatically approve every later edition, soundtrack, restoration or character depiction.
https://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ15a.pdf
https://cspd.law.duke.edu/publicdomainday/2026
Research procedure / limitations:
https://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ22.pdf

1. DIZZY DISHES / 1930
Studio: Fleischer Studios. Director: Dave Fleischer.
Exact version: Internet Archive H.264 derivative of Dizzy Dishes (1930).mkv.
Source page: https://archive.org/details/dizzy-dishes-1930
Exact source file: https://archive.org/download/dizzy-dishes-1930/Dizzy%20Dishes%20%281930%29.mp4
Source bytes: 35,910,880. Source MD5: d890cb4ac4a49976b50648c271dcc927.
The title card identifies the work and MCMXXX. Sampled the film visually and reviewed the selected restaurant sequence.
Permitted prototype selection: original picture sequence 168–208 seconds, audio REMOVED; frame extract at 200 seconds, encoded to WebP without creative retouching.
Appearance: early dog-eared Betty and Bimbo. No later character artwork is included.
Basis: original 1930 images, expired U.S. term; named in Duke's 2026 list. No modern image insertion, watermark or colorization was observed in the selected scene. Internet Archive's public-domain label is not the legal evidence by itself.
Intended use: U.S.-restricted website picture screening and illustrated historical discussion.
Credit: studio/director, title/year, source and rights record shown on the site. No contractual attribution condition is being relied on.
Supplementary publication record: https://www.loc.gov/item/s2945m01792/ (search metadata found; page returned 403, so this is NOT the sole authority).
Open questions: full soundtrack, complete other editions, new creative restoration additions, international territory controls.

2. FIDDLESTICKS / 1930
Creator: Ub Iwerks. Production company: Celebrity Productions.
Exact version: Internet Archive H.264 IA derivative of fiddlesticks_1930.mp4.
Source page: https://archive.org/details/fiddlesticks_1930
Exact source file: https://archive.org/download/fiddlesticks_1930/fiddlesticks_1930.ia.mp4
Source bytes: 36,144,236. Source MD5: eed1de82ccdf74fbabc40f3aac0d6710.
The title card identifies the work and MCMXXX. The selected woodland performance, including dancing and a thread climb, corresponds to the historical film. The frame at 166 seconds shows Flip hanging on the thread.
Permitted prototype selection: original stage sequence 138–178 seconds, audio REMOVED; frame extract at 166 seconds, encoded to WebP without creative retouching.
Appearance: Flip the Frog on the woodland stage. Later comic/animation appearances are not cleared.
Basis: original 1930 images, expired U.S. term; named in Duke's 2026 list. AFI documents release on 16 August 1930, Harriscolor two-color photography and Cinephone recording. No modern image insertion or watermark was observed in the selected sequence.
AFI: https://catalog.afi.com/Film/68142-FIDDLESTICKS
Date discrepancy retained: AFI lists a 1931 registration as well as the 1930 release. The earlier publication is the duration starting point under Circular 15A; no assertion of non-renewal is needed.
Intended use: U.S.-restricted website picture screening and illustrated historical discussion.
Credit: creator/company, title/year, source and rights record shown on the site.
Open questions: full soundtrack, complete edition, modern restoration additions and international territory controls.

AUDIO / ACCESSIBILITY
No soundtrack, added score, dubbing or standalone recording is distributed by this prototype. Clips contain only a video stream. Original written visual notes are included as optional WebVTT descriptions, explicitly NOT dialogue transcripts. Each screening also has a readable visual summary. Original full films are research-only and are blocked by the preview server's file allow-list.

ORIGINAL ASSETS
assets/ushers.webp: AI-generated original anthropomorphic projector and admission-ticket mascots, created for this project, 2026. No period character was requested or used as a reference. Labeled as AI-assisted decorative artwork on the page. Human review shows theater-object mascots, not the historical characters in the collection. Generation is not legal clearance, and no claim of exclusive copyright is made. Full prompt: ART-PROMPT.txt.
Clapper mark, CSS curtains, paper patterns, film-frame design, button effects and comic panels: original project code. No copied stock artwork, third-party fonts, animation-library assets or background music.
Animation rig version 2, reviewed 2026-10-02: twelve transparent WebP parts (assets/projector-*.webp and assets/ticket-*.webp), generated from our original mascot reference, not historical character art. Source sheets preserved in research/projector-rig-sheet.png and research/ticket-rig-sheet.png. prepare-rigs.cjs performs mechanical cropping, trimming and compression. Individual provenance records appear in collection.js; prompts and generated-file paths appear in ART-PROMPT.txt. Same decorative-only restrictions and unresolved identity review apply.
assets/*-notes.vtt: original project-written visual descriptions of the selected clips.
research/asset-integrity.json: output bytes and SHA-256 for every served media asset. Original downloads retained separately; MD5 compared to source metadata.
Metadata sources: https://archive.org/metadata/dizzy-dishes-1930 and https://archive.org/metadata/fiddlesticks_1930.

HELD / NOT IN PLAYABLE COLLECTION
Barnacle Bill, Accordion Joe, Mysterious Mose: exact files and editions not yet reviewed.
Popeye and Olive Oyl: exact 1929–1930 newspaper/comic editions not yet checked. Later animated shorts not cleared by this candidate.
Oswald: exact early shorts, editions and any replacement scores not yet checked.
No uncertain candidate artwork or video is displayed as an approved asset.

RELEASE CONTROLS — 2026-10-02
The historical MP4 excerpts, frame extracts and visual-note tracks are served only when Cloudflare identifies the incoming request country as US. Unknown and other countries are blocked. Visitor-supplied headers are not used to authorize access. These responses and region-specific HTML are private/no-store so shared caches cannot bypass the restriction. Full source films and private research files are not included in the release.

The exact six reviewed excerpt, still and track files are checked against the existing SHA-256 integrity record during packaging. Full films and soundtracks are not part of this release.

The user approved updating the public sample on 2026-10-02. The release includes the v9 original mascot performance, both reviewed excerpts, history, character notes and this source information.

CORRECTIONS
Independent creator: Jesse Guiles / Guiles Works.
contact@jesseguiles.com — please identify work, edition and evidence for any correction.