Crappy K-3?

February 16, 2006

Hey all,

I just transfered some footage from one of my new K-3s and we noticed two major flaws.

There is a black image in the top left that looks like it could be a broken perf but I think it is actually something in the lense (it appears in all the footage shot over several days).

There are also odd scratches throughout. What makes them odds is the don't really move much and the don't scratch the whole image...it is if something kept hitting the film in the same spot each frame.

Luckily the aesthetic I was going for is crappy home movie footage so it works fine. But I would like to be able to avoid it in future. My S16 K-3 does not have the same problem.

Ed

Here's another pic.

Ed

Edited February 16, 2006 by 3ldfilms

Laurent Andrieux · February 16, 2006

I can't pronounce on the upper left black place, examine the neg. Is there a white mark, accordingly ?

Concerning the scratches, is your gate clean ? do you use nat'sil or any other kind of lubricating stuff ? It might help. If you can't afford nat'sil, pass your finger on your nose side or front and lubricate with that human grease, it works good !

Tim Carroll · February 16, 2006

This is one of the reasons to always do a scratch test. Could be anywhere along the film path, but I would guess if you are seeing intermittent scratching, it is in your gate area, or one or the other of your loops are hitting something (if they were too tight or too loose it might cause them to hit part of the inside of the camera).

-Tim

Laurent Andrieux · February 16, 2006

Yes, do a scratch test : load your camera, mark with a pen where the film exits from the feed spool, where it enters the gate, where it exists the gate and where it enters the take up spool, then run for half a meter and examine carefully your neg with a highlight and magnifying glass.

February 16, 2006

Yes, do a scratch test : load your camera, mark with a pen where the film exits from the feed spool, where it enters the gate, where it exists the gate and where it enters the take up spool, then run for half a meter and examine carefully your neg with a highlight and magnifying glass.

Do you still need to process it or are you just looking for surface scratches with the mag glass?

Laurent Andrieux · February 16, 2006

No, you don't process it. You just look at it right after you've passed it in the camera. The marks you've done with the pen will help you to deternmine where the scratches occure. Since they don't appear all the time, I would follow Tim's advice and suspect the stock could hit the camera body somewhere, if the loop is not correctly done and set.

Steve Larsen · February 17, 2006

There are also odd scratches throughout. What makes them odds is the don't really move much and the don't scratch the whole image...it is if something kept hitting the film in the same spot each frame.

have you removed the auto film loading mechanism from your camera ? It's quite easy to do and eliminates a lot of scratching potential.

Steve

Jaan Shenberger · February 17, 2006

have you removed the auto film loading mechanism from your camera ? It's quite easy to do and eliminates a lot of scratching potential.

i second that. a k3 with the stupid plastic "loop formers" is not dependable. take those things out, make marks inside the camera where the loops should extend to, then simply make the loops yourself when loading the film. those loop formers are the primary reason the k3 had developed a reputation as a bad camera. as a student i shot on k3s with and without the loop formers, and i sometimes got similar scratches on the loop former models. get those things out of there and you have a nice camera.

hope this helps,

jaan

February 17, 2006

Thanks to all. My Super16 K-3 does NOT have the loops so you are probably right that that is the culprit.

Is there a good set of instructions that you can reccomend for removing the loops myself?

Does anyone have any idea about the black shape in the top left corner though? I've never seen that on a K-3 before.

Steve Larsen · February 17, 2006

Thanks to all. My Super16 K-3 does NOT have the loops so you are probably right that that is the culprit.

Is there a good set of instructions that you can reccomend for removing the loops myself?

Does anyone have any idea about the black shape in the top left corner though? I've never seen that on a K-3 before.

This is the instructions for changing the gate but it also talk you through romoving the loop formers.

http://www.k3camera.com/k3/k3s16mm-install.stm

Trevor Greenfield · February 17, 2006

As a proud K3 owner and user myself (not s16), I have never seen anything like the black thing. It really does look like a perf though. Considering how simple the K3 is though, there really could only be two things - something obstructing the lens, or something obstructing the gate, both of which should be easy enough to spot. Now one thing that I can't imagine is that you were using double perf film and those are actually perfs where the soundtrack/picture side would be on singleperf... right? (EDIT just reread what you posted and this was not the s16 camera you used I see.. interesting, thats the only conclusion that I could come up with for this)

The scratches, I had only 1 roll of the 20+ Ive shot now come back with scratches on them. This was fortunately a test roll, and I didnt have it tc'd so I dont even remember much about it other than it was noticable. I attributed this to likely setting the loops incorrectly (I did the loop former mod). So for you the only thing you can really do is make sure you take out those loop formers (pretty easy actually) and check the gate and the path to make sure there are no burrs sticking out. Obviously those scratches are near the center of the film so especially check there. Then run some reversal through as a test and check it out. Once you remove those loop formers, set your loops to be just loose enough to not be tight and not so loose that theyre going to be floping around. This is easiest to check with some scrap film with the cover off... you'll figure out how to set it so you get the loops set right, the sprockets locked in the perfs and she'll run like a smooth well oiled... tank :)

Edited February 17, 2006 by Trevor Greenfield

Charles MacDonald · February 18, 2006

I can't pronounce on the upper left black place, examine the neg. Is there a white mark, accordingly ?

While that mark is "perf shaped" the edges are quite soft so it is not a real perf! If you were getting perfs on your image, I would expect to also see one in the lower part of the frame. If you can look at the negative, the frame line should be verticaly centered on the perfs. Perhaps the "shadow" apperas on the neg over a larger area than you had scanned, the shape of the part that does not show in the scan might give a clue.

The edges of your frame DO have a fair anount of dirt, (less than on my last roll, so perhaps I am noticing it more) perhaps the camera could use a cleaning, and some dirt is in the area beween the lens and the gate.

It almost looks like some part of the mechanism is out of place.

As far as the scratches, to have a mark repeat on part of several frames, the finger of blame is on the area of the camera where the flm stops and starts. elsewhere you would get a mark that would not correspond with the perfs. Size of Loop, lack of burrs on the presure plate and loop formers not touching the film would all be conditions to try for.....

Edited February 18, 2006 by Charles

Erdwolf_TVL · February 18, 2006

Hey all,

I just transfered some footage from one of my new K-3s and we noticed two major flaws.

There is a black image in the top left that looks like it could be a broken perf but I think it is actually something in the lense (it appears in all the footage shot over several days).

There are also odd scratches throughout. What makes them odds is the don't really move much and the don't scratch the whole image...it is if something kept hitting the film in the same spot each frame.

Luckily the aesthetic I was going for is crappy home movie footage so it works fine. But I would like to be able to avoid it in future. My S16 K-3 does not have the same problem.

Ed

Here's another pic.

Ed