Shooting film upside down

[Graham Ellard]

This may sound like a daft idea but we want to shoot a series of scenes, on 16mm film, using a Bolex RX5, upside down.

It's important that we don't rotate the image in postproduction, we want to have the inverted image on negative as ultimately we will be printing out to film.

We can see two approaches - we invert the camera, which would not be impossible but would need a complicated tripod head. Or, we use a lens that will invert the image.

We'd welcome any suggestions and/or advice.

Thanks.

[Mark Dunn]

I'm sure there used to be amateur trick prisms for inverting the image but I'd be surprised if you could find one to cover a lens of any size.

It shouldn't be too difficult to rig an upside-down camera. The Bolex isn't that heavy so you might even be able to make something up out of angle brackets, or a rental house may have some ideas. I would certainly be in the garage with some nuts and bolts and bits from Screwfix or Toolstation if I had to do this.

A tripod with a reversible centre column might work- put the head upside down. My amateur Velbon can do this. The camera would be much lower than usual.

Edited October 4, 2024 by Mark Dunn

[Mark Dunn]

I'm professionally ashamed of how crappy this image looks, but taking pix on an Iphone is much too easy and there's a size limit on the forum. You get the idea though.

You may need a shorter camera operator lol.

 

Edited October 4, 2024 by Mark Dunn

[Graham Ellard]

Thanks for the suggestion. With a drive motor, 400ft mag. and winding motor, the Bolex does become pretty heavy, so hung below rather cantilevered outwards is probably the best solution.

But as you say, it could be very hard to get to the eye piece!

[David Mullen ASC]

Something like a SkaterScope could rotate the image though it seems overkill and I don’t know how you’d mount it to a Bolex! If you have a dolly you could use a riser and an offset arm and then mount the tripod head upside down. I mean you could do that with a tripod using those parts from a dolly but the dolly is heavy enough to take the offset weight, otherwise you could use sandbags on the tripod.

[Jeff Bernstein]

[Kamran Pakseresht]

3 hours ago, Graham Ellard said:

It's important that we don't rotate the image in postproduction, we want to have the inverted image on negative as ultimately we will be printing out to film.

I am curious about this - as I thought almost all film productions these days are scanned, edited digitally and then printed back out to film. Are you going to be using a flatbed editor?

[Mark Dunn]

3 hours ago, Graham Ellard said:

Thanks for the suggestion. With a drive motor, 400ft mag. and winding motor, the Bolex does become pretty heavy, so hung below rather cantilevered outwards is probably the best solution.

But as you say, it could be very hard to get to the eye piece!

For your inverted material you could just use a 100ft. load.

[Robin Phillips]

I dont think theres any good way to do it with a 400ft load, though I suppose you could always build a really big cage. 

you might want to consider an arri SR camera instead. they're easier to mount in weird ways and will run while upside down. the SR3 advanced has two mounting holes on the top you could thread into. regular SR3 has one, but if you got one with an after market steadicam top mount you'd have a few more spots to attach to

[alexandre favre]

You could use a Bolfix top plate if you were not using the 400 feet magazine.

https://bolfix.ch/

An interesting fact is that Amateur filmmakers were shooting in the N16mm 2-perf format with their cameras upside down to create reverse motion. They achieved this effect by physically flipping the film during the editing process.

 

Edited October 4, 2024 by alexandre favre

[Patrick Cooper]

Over here in Australia, we shoot film upside down all the time (in the land down under.) This is the norm here. 

[Graham Ellard]

On 10/4/2024 at 9:01 PM, alexandre favre said:

You could use a Bolfix top plate if you were not using the 400 feet magazine.

https://bolfix.ch/

An interesting fact is that Amateur filmmakers were shooting in the N16mm 2-perf format with their cameras upside down to create reverse motion. They achieved this effect by physically flipping the film during the editing process.

 

Thanks Alexandre, this is very interesting. You're thinking we could use the top plate to attach the inverted camera to the tripod plate?

We did know about the reverse motion effect, in fact a friend shot reverse action, then inverted the filmstrip for an upside down image - but using 2 perf, which we won't be.

Thanks again!

[Graham Ellard]

Thanks Robin, we're wedded to the Bolex, but from other suggestions we are getting closer to a solution that could work for us.

[Graham Ellard]

Thanks Robin, we're wedded to the Bolex, but from other suggestions we are getting closer to a solution that could work for us.

[Graham Ellard]

On 10/4/2024 at 1:57 PM, Kamran Pakseresht said:

I am curious about this - as I thought almost all film productions these days are scanned, edited digitally and then printed back out to film. Are you going to be using a flatbed editor?

Hi Kamram,

Some, but in Europe among artists working with 16mm, certainly not all. We don't use work prints, we edit in FCP or Premier, then have have a neg cut from the EDL to make a AB reels, for printing out to 16mm.

Are there labs you know of that can create 16mm prints or internegs from digital files?

Thanks.

[Gautam Valluri]

2 hours ago, Graham Ellard said:

Are there labs you know of that can create 16mm prints or internegs from digital files?

Andec (Cinegrell) does it in Berlin.

Dirk Dejonghe's lab also does it.

[Graham Ellard]

Thanks Gautam, Dejonghe we know and have used, but not Andec - have you had prints made yourself?

[Gautam Valluri]

Not yet. I am currently collecting price quotes to pass on to the organisation providing the funding. I only have a minute or so to print to film. So far, these are the only two labs that said they can do it on 16mm. Most other labs said they only do Digital to 35mm to Digital.

Edited October 10, 2024 by Gautam Valluri
precision of film gauge