Pet peeve: New AHU film not wound tightly enough?

[Gautam Valluri]

I recently shot my film on about 14 rolls of the new AHU stock and another 7 rolls of older Remjet stock I had in storage. I loaded and unloaded half of these rolls myself in and out of an SR3.

I felt the AHU rolls were not wound tightly enough. Almost all the AHU rolls had "ridges" on them where the negative was popping up or down a bit in the middle of a roll. No big deal, just a bit annoying to handle inside a changing bag. A thing that happened often was when I pressed down on the core holder of the SR3 mag, only the central part of the negative went down and the external part still stayed up. 

The older remjet rolls were uniformly wound throughout and was a pleasure to load and unload. What could be the issue? Has anyone else noticed this? Is it just my batch?

Also, what happened to the black plastic boxes that the stock was being shipped in back in 2023? The new cans are shorter in height, for optimising storage space I reckon, but I had to double check that the light proof bag is tightly folded over the negative before closing the lid and gaffing it. Yes the older Fuji cans were also this thin but they were also rounded squares, which was easier to get the bagged negative back into.

Any thoughts?

[Simon Wyss]

A wave of physical film problems is rolling over us. I suspect Kodak has made changes to the overcoat gelatine(s), (a) very thin empty gelatine layer as mechanical protector of the photographic layers. This overcoat should be hardened, gelatine can be hardened like skin to leather. If not or too little, it’s prone to become sticky at higher air relative humidity.

Now I’m under the impression that Kodakers have gotten notice of what they’ve done with the Vision-3 line of stocks, but instead of going back to a more strongly hardened overcoat they chose to lubricate the films. I’m thinking of a very light mist of a Carnauba wax solution applied. That would explain convolutions slip up along the axis of rotation. Again, my presumption, I don’t have any evidence to present.

It is wise to give the stocks air by letting them vent out of the bag in a magazine or a changing tent. The wax can solidify a little, the gelatines get somewhat dryer. Temperature is not the issue, relative air humidity is, actually the dew point (and air pressure).

Less problems with cameras that have anodised aluminium gates or raised surfaces. Less problems with short gates. The Arriflex 16 SRs have rather long gates.

We are rapidly losing 130 years of experience with motion-picture film materials. I see it with carbide insert film cleavers, cold and hot joiners, film cements, printing techniques, projectionists’ skills, how cameras are treated. We must tell the film manufacturers what’s going on.

[Tyler Purcell]

I've loaded plenty of AHU, never had a loose wind yet, but it happened all the time with remjet. Sometimes just a humidity change can cause it. Like if the film was stored freezing and then brought into a warm and humid environment right away. It will loosen up on its own. 

Kodak uses multiple vendors for bags and housings. The plastic ones were a stopgap when their metal can provider couldn't deliver enough quantities. They now have metal cans back but sometimes switch to plastic when they have a delayed shipment. 

I haven't noticed the current can's being any different in size to the old ones, they do seem a bit thinner walled for sure. I will measure them and check! 😛

 

[Aristeidis Tyropolis]

12 hours ago, Gautam Valluri said:

I recently shot my film on about 14 rolls of the new AHU stock and another 7 rolls of older Remjet stock I had in storage. I loaded and unloaded half of these rolls myself in and out of an SR3.

Any issues with the footage itself?

[Gautam Valluri]

11 hours ago, Aristeidis Tyropolis said:

Any issues with the footage itself?

None whatsoever. The AHU stock and the remjet stock cut perfectly together without any difference whatsoever.

[Aristeidis Tyropolis]

3 hours ago, Gautam Valluri said:

None whatsoever. The AHU stock and the remjet stock cut perfectly together without any difference whatsoever.

Thanks so much for the update, I am in the process to shoot some mixed material as well.

[Tyler Purcell]

19 hours ago, Aristeidis Tyropolis said:

Any issues with the footage itself?

Outside of constant scratches we see on lots of projects we scan, no there is no difference in the color science. 

[Aristeidis Tyropolis]

1 hour ago, Tyler Purcell said:

Outside of constant scratches we see on lots of projects we scan, no there is no difference in the color science. 

My question was not directed at you, nor was it specific about differences in look in color science. 

[Jon O'Brien]

Gautam said no differences whatsoever. I think he would have mentioned scratches if they'd been a problem. Gautam, did you have a problem with scratches, with the AHU stock? If so, were they worse than the remjet stock?

[Aristeidis Tyropolis]

He (as claimed) shot what? fourteen 400' rolls, so that's 154 minutes of footage with no issues.

While I surely believe there might be some people with issues, I highly doubt it is everyone and at all times. But I will report as well if any.

[Jon O'Brien]

I'm finally filming on the AHU stock in about a month or less, in a Bolex Rex 5. Will report back.

I first have to film my last roll of remjet 16mm.

After the Bolex AHU shoot, all going well, I will test the AHU stock in my SR.

I've washed the dust of digital from my feet. Never going back to videography. Even if film goes kaput, no more videography for me. Unless I have to rent a camera for a day, for my own music videos. But planning to do my own music videos on film. Definitely no more sitting around trying to get video gigs. Goodbye video! Nice knowin ya.

Edited Wednesday at 10:31 PM by Jon O'Brien

[Gautam Valluri]

13 hours ago, Jon O'Brien said:

Gautam, did you have a problem with scratches, with the AHU stock?

No scratches on my negative. I prepped it myself for scan and compiled the rolls into larger 366m rolls for the scan. The SR3 works fine with the AHU stock in my experience. There was only one roll with tiny gate hair issue on the top and bottom but I'm not to worried about it.  I'm picking up another 8 rolls from the second half of my shoot tomorrow from the lab, I'll report back if there are any issues.

I also shot about 6x 30m AHU rolls on a Bolex EL and a Bolex RX5. They came out fine as well. No issues.

[Gautam Valluri]

13 hours ago, Aristeidis Tyropolis said:

He (as claimed) shot what? fourteen 400' rolls, so that's 154 minutes of footage with no issues.

While I surely believe there might be some people with issues, I highly doubt it is everyone and at all times. But I will report as well if any.

Yes the 164 minutes of rushes from the first half of my shoot have no issues. I have another 8 or so rolls coming in tomorrow, will inspect them and report back if any scratches.

I did ask the lab (Transperfect) if they've had any issues with the AHU stock and they did say that there was one or two reports of scratches but the majority of their development orders have had no issues. They run the same machine for the Remjet and the AHU stock. I'm assuming the AHU stock goes through the remjet removal step unaffected? 

@Tyler Purcell I remember you saying that the Aaton cameras were scratching the back of the AHU layer? Is it still the case?

[Aristeidis Tyropolis]

51 minutes ago, Gautam Valluri said:

I did ask the lab (Transperfect) if they've had any issues with the AHU stock and they did say that there was one or two reports of scratches but the majority of their development orders have had no issues. They run the same machine for the Remjet and the AHU stock. I'm assuming the AHU stock goes through the remjet removal step unaffected? 

Thanks, I asked a few labs (two different ones) myself and they report no particular difference.

[Tyler Purcell]

6 hours ago, Gautam Valluri said:

I remember you saying that the Aaton cameras were scratching the back of the AHU layer? Is it still the case?

Just because most of the commercial cameras I service are Aatons, I see more problems. But scratching issues with AHU is way more of a problem with SR's (specially ones that have been updated to S16) than ANY of the Aaton's. 

[Jon O'Brien]

It just so happens that I have an SR modified to S16. So it's going to have WAY more of a problem than ANY of the Aatons, is it, when I film with AHU stock. O no.

That's not true ... that's im POSS ible.

You KNOW it to be true

JOIN me, and together we can rule the bloggoverse as camera and AHU

AAAAAgghhhhh .... (the SR falls down a massive, vertical shaft, with little lights all along its interior walls, complete with orchestra soundtrack ...)

It's okay, though, Lando and Princess Leia rock up in the Millenium Falcon and save the day.

And now, back to your regular programming .....

 

[Jon O'Brien]

Did you not just read that Gautam said he used an SR3?

That's a very similar (long) gate area to the (modified) SR gate.

You previously said, about a year or so ago, that SRs modified to S16 cause scratching to the film in a lot of cases (this is with remjet stock). My SR didn't scratch the film one bit, last time I used it. Dom responded to your claim, saying that SRs modified to S16 are, in his experience, fine, and have been used on many professional productions without any problems.

I will test the SR soon, with AHU. I've been advised by Memorylab in Melbourne that I will have no problems with AHU, in any camera.

[Jon O'Brien]

How did you learn professional motion picture camera repair? Genuinely curious. How many SRs modified to S16 have you taken apart and repaired? Twenty? How many? How many years solid experience as a repairer/technician of Arriflex SR series cameras do you have?