Ralph Tabith Posted November 27, 2007 Share Posted November 27, 2007 ok so i am in india, bought my film had it respooled to 100ft daylight spools and was filming and my rex 5 jammed!? cant understand it, lost alot of nice footage- what could be the cause it seems to loop up fine and run nice when i changed the film, i am carrying it in a small bag do you think that could effect it? i am trying to be as careful as possible - my heart sank alittle as to get to this point has been so much work already....mabe its something to do with the heat, any advice on the best way to store the camera, i have been doing so on its side,\ also with daylight spools if something goes wrong with one, does light ruin the whole film or just the part exposed, thanks for your help i think wish me luck because i ll need it! thanks r Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Mulder Posted November 27, 2007 Share Posted November 27, 2007 A perfect camera will jam up if you put in a bent/pinched daylight take-up spool ... Without seeing it thats my guess. As for your film, take a look at how the daylight spool works - it uses the film itself to mask the rest of the film with a small tolerance so as to let the film actually spool (which is why sitting on it will bend it and make this tolerance zero or negative ie. catch the film and cause a jack-in-the-box party streamer effect when you open the camera) - the daylight load spool needs a few good turns of film preferably with some 'overlap' to make it light tight, or the edges will fog from direct light and a bit of internal reflection on the film base - which if you are shooting reg16 isn't so much of an issue, with super16 which wasn't a spec in mind with the original designers you will have issues with edge fog... So I cant answer your question, but hopefully have given you some clues as how to ascertain the answer for yourself - good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph Tabith Posted November 28, 2007 Author Share Posted November 28, 2007 A perfect camera will jam up if you put in a bent/pinched daylight take-up spool ... Without seeing it thats my guess. As for your film, take a look at how the daylight spool works - it uses the film itself to mask the rest of the film with a small tolerance so as to let the film actually spool (which is why sitting on it will bend it and make this tolerance zero or negative ie. catch the film and cause a jack-in-the-box party streamer effect when you open the camera) - the daylight load spool needs a few good turns of film preferably with some 'overlap' to make it light tight, or the edges will fog from direct light and a bit of internal reflection on the film base - which if you are shooting reg16 isn't so much of an issue, with super16 which wasn't a spec in mind with the original designers you will have issues with edge fog... So I cant answer your question, but hopefully have given you some clues as how to ascertain the answer for yourself - good luck! thanks for the info! filming again today and towards the end it did the same thing, just stopped but when i opened it up it had nearly finished anyway, v.strange. does it take much for the spool to become damaged? i think the spools are pretty much ok. maybe winding the the bolex up fully is a problem? maybe it pulls it too hard or something, do you think i should wind it in shorter bursts? i am shooting reg 16, i am going to get it processed with adlabs in calcutta so fingers crossed...i will have to "wing it" as we british say/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph Tabith Posted November 30, 2007 Author Share Posted November 30, 2007 actually what i think is happenning when the guys at the lab respooled the film onto 100ft they taped the film to the spool, so when it gets to a certain point it just jams up up....any suggestions please? i think when i load the camera i will pull the film as tight as possible to make sure that the tension is evenish throughout the whole spool and then when it gets to about 95 ft in the counter just cut the film there.... i dont like the idea of the masking tape going through the gate, i assume thats a no-no? thanks r Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Member Hal Smith Posted November 30, 2007 Premium Member Share Posted November 30, 2007 ok so i am in india, bought my film had it respooled to 100ft daylight spools and was filming and my rex 5 jammed!? cant understand it, lost alot of nice footage-........... How hot did it get? My ex-wife, the Anthropologist, shot a lot of 16mm on 100' spools in Rajasthan and had problems with the emulsion sticking to the back side of the film in the Rajasthan heat. The solution was to use an Igloo cooler. Of course the other problem was finding refrigeration in village India to keep the film cool overnight. :( Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Mulder Posted November 30, 2007 Share Posted November 30, 2007 actually what i think is happenning when the guys at the lab respooled the film onto 100ft they taped the film to the spool, so when it gets to a certain point it just jams up up....any suggestions please? i think when i load the camera i will pull the film as tight as possible to make sure that the tension is evenish throughout the whole spool and then when it gets to about 95 ft in the counter just cut the film there.... i dont like the idea of the masking tape going through the gate, i assume thats a no-no? thanks r well - yeh - its bad ... the pressure plate applies pressure and if tape is going through there its just like someone putting their jammy finger on it to 'stick it down' so depending on which side the stickiness is it will pull on the pressure plate or stick to the gate, either way the claw could be ripping sprockets - there is no reason they should be using tape unless they have fingers to large to get into a day light load - less than %1 of the population I'm guessing, and in which case they still shouldn't do it... I'm not sure what is going wrong without seeing it - a great diagnostic tool would be a dummy load of leader or ruined film you could load and run through while watching - I dont think using shorter winds will solve it and you'll just be restricted to shorter takes anyway, that being said you've got the camera in front of you and if your intuition says do that ... then do it - the running it to 95' in the meantime 'solution' sounds good - its not a show stopper and if it works until you can get it looked at then good on ya ;) If you are going through New Zealand in your travels pop over for a beer and we'll load up some dummy film - there is also a proper Bolex trained tech here (lucky buggers we are) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph Tabith Posted December 3, 2007 Author Share Posted December 3, 2007 How hot did it get? My ex-wife, the Anthropologist, shot a lot of 16mm on 100' spools in Rajasthan and had problems with the emulsion sticking to the back side of the film in the Rajasthan heat. The solution was to use an Igloo cooler. Of course the other problem was finding refrigeration in village India to keep the film cool overnight. :( its getting to about 36 degrees tops in the day where we were, but we have moved and going north so I am guessing it will be around 20 - 30, maybe in the middle, i was looking at some of the emulsion and i dont, think or rather hope it willl be ok,,, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph Tabith Posted December 3, 2007 Author Share Posted December 3, 2007 (edited) that being said you've got the camera in front of you and if your intuition says do that ... then do it - the running it to 95' in the meantime 'solution' sounds good - its not a show stopper and if it works until you can get it looked at then good on ya ;) If you are going through New Zealand in your travels pop over for a beer and we'll load up some dummy film - there is also a proper Bolex trained tech here (lucky buggers we are) thanks Nick, that beer sounds a good idea if i ever get to that part of the world, i think i have sorted it out, like you say trust your intuition, i dont think these guys in india have seen one of those spools before, actually i am sure they have but anything goes out here, hell who knows it might even come out looking all kooked up, which is partly the idea i had in mind! Edited December 3, 2007 by Ralph Tabith Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph Tabith Posted December 3, 2007 Author Share Posted December 3, 2007 also theres a place in calcutta i can get maybe half of my film developed, or do you think that i should just take it all to mumbai at the end of my trip....will the film be ok for a few months undeveloped? thanks agian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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