Sofia Miles Posted August 27, 2009 Share Posted August 27, 2009 (edited) Hello, I recently purchased a canon 814 autozoom super 8. As far as i can tell it appears to be in great condition, but my color film came back looking muddy --- the colors are dark, the highlights are very bright with an orange tint (a lot of contrast, but little detail.) Flesh tones also appear very orange or red. I was shooting in bright sunshine using Ektachrome 64T Color Reversal with no filter on the camera. When shooting in B&W using 7265 PXR464 Super 8 50' Eastman Plus-X Reversal film in the same conditions the quality seems fine (maybe a little dark, but fine otherwise. Is there any reason why my camera would be fine shooting black & white film, but not with the color? If anyone has advice or knows what I'm doing wrong I would really appreciate your suggestions. Thanks so much! SM Edited August 27, 2009 by Sofia Miles Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jose Rivas Posted August 27, 2009 Share Posted August 27, 2009 Hello, Sofia. I think you are discovering Ekta64T is a shame of emulsion. Try another chance to this stock: external filter 85 in daylight, manual exposure and maybe another lab. best regards. Jose Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Rakoczy Posted August 27, 2009 Share Posted August 27, 2009 Hello, I recently purchased a canon 814 autozoom super 8. As far as i can tell it appears to be in great condition, but my color film came back looking muddy --- the colors are dark, the highlights are very bright with an orange tint (a lot of contrast, but little detail.) Flesh tones also appear very orange or red. I was shooting in bright sunshine using Ektachrome 64T Color Reversal with no filter on the camera. When shooting in B&W using 7265 PXR464 Super 8 50' Eastman Plus-X Reversal film in the same conditions the quality seems fine (maybe a little dark, but fine otherwise. Is there any reason why my camera would be fine shooting black & white film, but not with the color? If anyone has advice or knows what I'm doing wrong I would really appreciate your suggestions. Thanks so much! SM ..a picture is worth a thousand words.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sofia Miles Posted August 27, 2009 Author Share Posted August 27, 2009 Thanks, Jose --- it just seems strange that the B&W footage came out fine, but for some reason the color film was not properly exposed (?) even though highlights were bright and shadows were dark... I will look into the filter you mentioned. Attached is still from the footage --- as you can see it's very dark and the highlights appear to be tinged with orange... This was shot in bright sunshine, clear blue skies... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Rakoczy Posted August 27, 2009 Share Posted August 27, 2009 Looks severely underexposed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alan Brown Posted August 27, 2009 Share Posted August 27, 2009 Ektachrome 64T is balanced for artificial lighting. As someone said, to use it in daylight you have to use an orange 85 filter to avoid a colour cast. Black and white is generally immune to this problem. Don't know about the muddy issues but from the look of your picture it looks like the light is shining generally towards the camera and forcing it to shoot at high F stops (small apertures). This will give a silouette effect with strong 'back' lighting, creating an image with extreme light and dark areas. It looks like the camera was exposing for the bright light and consequently underexposing darker areas of the image. Lenses also tend to lose resolution when filming at high F stops (f16 to F32) and the picture can look soft. This may explain the overall quality of the image. Better results for the next shoot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sofia Miles Posted August 27, 2009 Author Share Posted August 27, 2009 Thank you all very much for your help! Does anyone have a film preference for both color & b+w --- indoor and outdoor shooting? How is the Vision 3 500T Super 8 Color Negative Film 7219 --- is this a versatile film? Sorry, I'm obviously a beginner... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Rakoczy Posted August 27, 2009 Share Posted August 27, 2009 Sofia... you do not need to use an 85 when shooting Tungsten balanced Film in Daylight. You can add the 85 in Post. I highly recommend this for you: Film Lighting Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Kevin Thomas Posted August 27, 2009 Share Posted August 27, 2009 Looking at your still I am tempted to think lens flare is a probable cause. Shooting towards the sun without an adequate lens shade or flag to shade the lens is allowing extraneous light to hit the front element and causing flare. For the duration of the reel did you alter you position in regards to the angle of the sun? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Rakoczy Posted August 27, 2009 Share Posted August 27, 2009 That is not a flare.. a flare will wash out mids and blacks.... those grainy blue blacks and lack of any mid to low detail are an indication of sever under exposure. Sofia... get the book. It may very well be one of the most informative (on this subject) 6 hours you spend. ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sofia Miles Posted August 28, 2009 Author Share Posted August 28, 2009 Thanks again! I will definitely get the book you suggested asap! It's just strange, because my Elmo Super Macro shoots such beautiful color without me ever having to think of the settings, but the more expensive Canon is less than perfect. Grrr... SM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Phipps Posted August 28, 2009 Share Posted August 28, 2009 it just seems strange that the B&W footage came out fine, but for some reason the color film was not properly exposed Hi Sofia, I don’t have experience with that Canon, and I have never shot the 64T. So, I am just guessing here a little bit, and maybe I can learn something too. If you’re getting a satisfactory exposure with black-and-white, but not with the color 64T in similar compositions and shooting conditions, then I think Alan’s excellent idea about backlit auto-exposure is less likely. But you can only make a comparison between shots that are similar. Your camera might also have a backlight exposure compensation switch, and you could experiment with that. Is it possible that this is a cartridge notch issue? Honestly, I don’t know, because I haven’t kept up to date with 64T. But if your Canon were reading the 64T as 200D, for example, then you would consistently get this kind of under-exposure. From what I remember, not all cameras would read the 64T notch correctly, and your camera might be defaulting to another (higher) ASA. But, again, I haven’t kept up to date with this issue. If this is the case for you, then either manually meter, or if you have an exposure lock on your camera, you can try to use that as a workaround. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben Ericson Posted October 2, 2009 Share Posted October 2, 2009 (edited) edit. Edited October 2, 2009 by Ben Ericson Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Member Matthew W. Phillips Posted October 2, 2009 Premium Member Share Posted October 2, 2009 The 64t stock is not the problem. I have shot fantastic footage, both indoor and out, with 64t and I've seen many others do it as well. I think that screenshot looks very underexposed, like David said. Reversal is very picky about being within 1/3 stop of proper exposure or it will get ugly fast. I don't know about that particular camera but I know my Elmo reads 64t as 40t. Therefore, I take the auto reading and then manually adjust 1/3 stop down. This gives me the look that I like. Some people like to expose reversal spot on and some like to underexpose it by 1/3 stop. This is fine but don't go more than 1/3 stop underexposed on reversal. Likewise, negative stock can be overexposed for a richer look but since negative stock has greater latitude, you can over expose it up to a full stop in some cases...although 2/3 stop is conservative. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Emil Soderman Posted October 4, 2009 Share Posted October 4, 2009 Have you seen your footage in a Super 8 projector? Or only the telecine? Just thinking it might be a problem in the telecine, obviously from over compensating for the dark results of the film, to me the picture looks like its shot at night with only street lights illuminating the scene. I've underexposed E64 severely (In areas but always with a point somewhere close or at correct exposure) but the dark areas always come out.. just that, dark. Not with such a blue weird overcast, looks very much video to me. So how does it look run through a projector? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Jensen Posted October 4, 2009 Share Posted October 4, 2009 Looks severely underexposed. I'll second that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kent Kumpula Posted October 4, 2009 Share Posted October 4, 2009 (edited) you do not need to use an 85 when shooting Tungsten balanced Film in Daylight. You can add the 85 in Post. That is just plain wrong. Sure, you can "add the 85" in post, but the image quality/colors will not be as good as it would be if you used a daylight filter. Oh, and the film in this thread sure looks underexposed. Edited October 4, 2009 by Kent Kumpula Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Dunn Posted October 4, 2009 Share Posted October 4, 2009 I had assumed you were talking about projected film, but since you've submitted a still, that must be from telecine. You need to project the actual film or look at it on a viewer to be sure. You have serious underexposure. If you did indeed shoot without an 85, it looks like the TK has corrected for the blue cast. Looking at the still, if you were shooting near sunset, that would counteract some of it because the colour temperature is quite a bit nearer to that of tungsten light than noon sunlight. If you think about it, shooting unfiltered tungsten film in daylight means you're severely underexposing the red record, so even if the TK brings the red up, it will be very grainy. Conversely with the blue. Not ideal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Burke Posted October 4, 2009 Share Posted October 4, 2009 Thank you all very much for your help! Does anyone have a film preference for both color & b+w --- indoor and outdoor shooting? How is the Vision 3 500T Super 8 Color Negative Film 7219 --- is this a versatile film? Sorry, I'm obviously a beginner... yes, the 7219 in super 8 is very versitle. Overexpose by one full stop. use it outdoors in darker settings, bright sunny days you should use 7217 200T. in an outdoor setting, us an 85 for any tungsten balanced film. Indoors you don't need one if using tungsten light. feel free to ask any other questions. :rolleyes: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Kevin Thomas Posted October 4, 2009 Share Posted October 4, 2009 Just to add to my original post. Looking at the scene it is mainly dark suits against a background in shade. Even with some rim lighting I feel the overall darkness would be more likely to cause the camera to open up rather than close down. I still suspect that it is lens flare that has caused the camera to close down the lens and underexpose the film. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Member Matthew W. Phillips Posted October 4, 2009 Premium Member Share Posted October 4, 2009 Look, I don't know who said that the 85 filter had anything to do with this but it obviously doesn't. That frame is far too warm for it to not have used a filter if this was indeed outdoors. This is just underexposed coupled with telecine gain to enhance the light. Shoot it over again with more light and accurate exposure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Jensen Posted October 4, 2009 Share Posted October 4, 2009 I'm sorry, I just don't see a flare anywhere. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Kevin Thomas Posted October 4, 2009 Share Posted October 4, 2009 I'm sorry, I just don't see a flare anywhere. Hi Tom, you will not see it, I am talking of non-image forming flare not the sort that you might see for example by including a bright light source such as the sun in the frame. I have asked myself the question why in a scene that is generally dark did the lens close down rather than open up? If the shot was directly against the sun I would expect the lens to close down and Silhouettes. Given the darkness of the background this is not the case. The figure 2nd left gives a good indication of the position of the sun and assuming the collars on the shirts were white, a key tone for exposure and colour balance. My speculation is that if we accept that the camera closed down too much for the scene it was due to erroneous light entering the line which I call flare. For a demonstration of this hold a white card to the side of your lens and reflect light onto the front element. I might be right about this image, I might be wrong but the important point is that every lens should have a lens shade, I think the Canon 814 autozoom came without one, and I would add a UV filter to guard against dust and scratches. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Justin Lovell Posted October 4, 2009 Share Posted October 4, 2009 Looks underexposed to me. I've been transferring a lot of 64T with great results, even cross-processed 64T and it is all looking pretty interesting. Color correcting 64T shot without the 85 filter isn't that difficult, DEPENDING on the color temperature of the shot to begin with. IE. If the shot is in the shade, and shot without the 85 filter, it will be more difficult to get rid of the blue cast. If the footage was shot in bright warm sunlight, it will be easier to find a more neutral color balance in the telecine. The image also seems a little muddy from the Telecine, where was it done, do you know whether it was done on a typical film chain method- the lack of resolution and muddy image is a typical result of 3 bladed shutter transfers. Some samples of 64t transfers can be found here: http://framediscreet.blogspot.com/ all the best! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kent Kumpula Posted October 4, 2009 Share Posted October 4, 2009 Color correcting 64T shot without the 85 filter isn't that difficult, DEPENDING on the color temperature of the shot to begin with. I don´t remember anyone saying it was difficult... I just said it won´t look as good as it would look if the cameraman would have used a 85 filter in the camera. Planning a shoot without filtering because "Oh, I´ll just have it corrected in post..." is just plain wrong. If someone forgets to use a filter, well then that is what you have to work with, just make the best out of the situation. But don´t plan for "adding a 85 in post", use the 85 filter in your cameras people. Some of the best 64T I have transferred is the music video with Ellen of Sweden, you can find it here: http://www.uppsalabildteknik.com/english/?page=134 Sunlight makes magic for 64T, and proper exposure of course. I believe this is about the best results you can expect from 64T. Underexpose 64T and it looks crappy, with blueish grain all over the dark parts and everything... No fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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