As with roll end punches, a few different unofficial or just plain descriptive terms seem to float around for these artifacts:
The American Cinematographer Hand Book and Reference Guide (Sixth Edition, 1947) refers to them somewhat generically as “camera identification marks”, but I prefer the more playfully anthropomorphic term “camera signature”, which I’ve seen used here and there.
As you can see from the above two examples, these marks are not limited to appearing only on reversal film, but negative as well. Early eras of 16mm and 8mm cameras were designed to expose a small window of image in the perforation area, which would normally not contain exposed image. These little shaped windows were intended to inform the inspector what kind of camera had photographed the film in question. And thanks to the aforementioned American Cinematographer Hand Book and Reference Guide, this handy little document may help you make these identifications. Consulting the chart, it’s clear that the film strip illustrated here (which are pictures of the reversal and negative stocks present in the original for Stan Brakhage’s 1959 film Wedlock House: An Intercourse) were filmed on a Bell & Howell Filmo 70.
LIGHTSTRUCK 