Jump to content

Question regarding Super 8 film print/transfer


Recommended Posts

Hello everyone, I own a motion design studio and for a long time I've wanted to put a 100% digitally-produced piece (motion graphics) onto a super 8 reel to be viewed with a toy film viewer.

 

I got everything figured out, except who to go to in order to transfer this .mov file onto S8 film.

 

All the research I have done only leads to transferring from Super 8 to digital, not all the way around (for obvious reasons, nobody needs to do that, except me, I guess).

 

Any guidance provided by you, oh bright ones, will be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks!

 

Leo

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

You could use an Elmo 1012s-xl camera to capture frames off of a display since it has frame by frame capability. This would take a real long time to do manually but some have done it. Not sure how you would automate the process since I know of no one who does Super 8 film outs these days.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

Hello everyone, I own a motion design studio and for a long time I've wanted to put a 100% digitally-produced piece (motion graphics) onto a super 8 reel to be viewed with a toy film viewer.

 

The folks at Niagara will do this to 16mm!

http://www.niagaracustomlab.com/digitaltofilm.html

 

and B&W film factory will do Super 8 but in Black and white.

 

http://www.blackandwhitefilmfactory.com/Kinescope%20Super%208%20transfer.htm

 

Sugest talking to both of them to see if they have ideas.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You could use an Elmo 1012s-xl camera to capture frames off of a display since it has frame by frame capability. This would take a real long time to do manually but some have done it. Not sure how you would automate the process since I know of no one who does Super 8 film outs these days.

 

Matthew,

Thanks for that! Using the screen-filming technique is something I have considered, but I figured the quality would only be as good as my monitor's output and camera intake, almost like a copy of a copy (correct me if I'm wrong). Ultimately that might be the solution, but I was thinking more in terms of direct transfer like it's done for feature films. Long shot, I know, but someone must still have the equipment to do this and willing to give it a shot.

 

Here's what I'd like the output to be used for:

 

 

Putting a 60-second motion graphics reel onto 8mm film to be viewed by a toy film viewer, distributed as promotional materials at trade shows, etc.

Edited by Leo de Leon
Link to comment
Share on other sites

you can give these folks a call http://www.blackandwhitefilmfactory.com/, I have never used them and know little about them. You could also shoot off of a high resolution flat panel monitor. I have done this with stuff shot on an canon xl1 and it looked rather good.

 

Wow... these guys seem to do exactly what I need (except in b&w)... I'll definitely give them a call and find out whether they do color super 8. Thanks so much for the resource!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The folks at Niagara will do this to 16mm!

http://www.niagaracustomlab.com/digitaltofilm.html

 

and B&W film factory will do Super 8 but in Black and white.

 

http://www.blackandwhitefilmfactory.com/Kinescope%20Super%208%20transfer.htm

 

Sugest talking to both of them to see if they have ideas.

 

Thanks for the info, Charles!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

keep in mind that your only choice for stock is the 100d which isn't so bad at all, but if you wanted another print stock you will have to contact Andec. Even at that, I am not sure they do what you want. But it is all worth a call.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

While it is the case that these days a normal proceedure for making 35mm master negatives is to 'write' digital files directly onto film using lasers (as in the Aari devices), there is no equipment made to do this onto 16mm, let alone super 8. The laser writing approach is of course relatively new. In the days of mass printing onto 16mm and super 8, there was no such laser writing technology. The masters for such prints if not made on the same guage were made by an optical reduction process using optical printers. The Kinescope - which is the technology black and white film factory uses - is the more traditional way of getting video images onto film. It was basically a cathode ray tube and movie camera combination - basically pointing a camera at a screen.

You will be able to achieve what you want to achieve, however I doubt you will find a commercial service for it. If you do, it will be of the kinescope variety. But these days, with computer screen technology, it isn't hard to get video images onto film yourself (it was much harder in the days of cathode ray tubes as you had to contend with the slow scanning rate).

Here is what I suggest you do:

 

for loading film in those little cartridges, you really are better off with polyester based prints rather than working with acetate. The poly is much tougher, and also thinner. Acetate seems to have many more problems in looping situations.

 

 

The computer screen you film off is effectively 'daylight balanced'. That means it is best to shoot on a daylight stock, or if shooting on tungsten balanced stock you will need to use an 85 filter.

There is one lab in the world that is able to offer colour prints from colour negative super 8. That is Andec in Germany. These prints are polyester based, so ideal for your purpose. Andec will be able to make several copies of your original quite easily. The stock they use is in fact the only colour print stock available for super 8 (Karl in Germany do perforate orwo bw print for super 8). There is no colour reversal print stock available for super 8 any more.

 

So I suggest you shoot directly off the computer monitor at 24 fps (this works with no flicker). Either film on Vision 200t with an 85 filter on the lens, or better still use PRO8 250d stock (which is daylight balanced). The 250d will give you more chance of having enough light.

 

Then send to Andec for printing.

 

Its quite easy. Do it yourself. You don't need to bother with frame by frame shooting these days.

 

good luck,

richard

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

Hi Leo,

At Cinelicious we just successfully did a calibrated Super 8mm film print test from an HD video source for a major studio with respect to a recent release. They were very pleased with the results. I cannot speak on a public forum about the details but will message you privately.

 

-Paul

Link to comment
Share on other sites

.....

 

Its quite easy. Do it yourself. You don't need to bother with frame by frame shooting these days.

 

good luck,

richard

 

Richard,

Wow... thanks for all that info. It's very enlightening. My own personal computer is a 27" iMac which I think has a screen that's about as good as it gets. I will run a couple of tests and see if ultimately this is the best solution for what I'm trying to accomplish.

 

The way you describe it sounds like I'd save a ton of heartache (and money) by just doing it myself this way and then duping the film at a pro studio. It definitely needs to be color and if captured correctly, I hope the quality is about as good as it can be.

 

Thanks a million!

 

** goes off to ebay to buy a super 8 camera **

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi Leo,

At Cinelicious we just successfully did a calibrated Super 8mm film print test from an HD video source for a major studio with respect to a recent release. They were very pleased with the results. I cannot speak on a public forum about the details but will message you privately.

 

-Paul

 

Paul,

Got your message... VERY impressive, my friend! I will PM you with some questions I wanna ask you.

 

Thanks again!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Some further thoughts:

your little viewer will run at more or less 18 fps, so you better shoot at 18. Also, when I have done this I found it necessary to increase the brightness of the monitor as far as possible.

enjoy,

rt

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Here's what I'd like the output to be used for:

 

 

 

Putting a 60-second motion graphics reel onto 8mm film to be viewed by a toy film viewer, distributed as promotional materials at trade shows, etc.

 

Read more: http://www.cinematography.com/index.php?app=forums&module=post&section=post&do=reply_post&f=9&t=52216#ixzz1QJyCOX2J

 

I did this myself a couple of times years back! the hardest part was getting the new film in to the little plastic toy mag, it's like trying to thread a needle whilst wearing boxing gloves!

 

The transfer itself was surprisingly easy; I just shot frame by frame off my laptop screen with a cheap Sankyo camera (automatic exposure :rolleyes:) loaded with Plus-x, it worked like a charm! I also did some colour experiments using the old Ektachrome160 but the results were really blueish with the other colours drowned out; a 812 warming filter probably would have helped here!

 

Apparently Retro8 in tokyo has an old Sony device that makes super8/single8 prints from a video source; maybe drop them a line and see what they say! Good luck!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I did this myself a couple of times years back! the hardest part was getting the new film in to the little plastic toy mag, it's like trying to thread a needle whilst wearing boxing gloves!

 

The transfer itself was surprisingly easy; I just shot frame by frame off my laptop screen with a cheap Sankyo camera (automatic exposure :rolleyes:) loaded with Plus-x, it worked like a charm! I also did some colour experiments using the old Ektachrome160 but the results were really blueish with the other colours drowned out; a 812 warming filter probably would have helped here!

 

Apparently Retro8 in tokyo has an old Sony device that makes super8/single8 prints from a video source; maybe drop them a line and see what they say! Good luck!

 

Awesome! Thanks for your reply, I'll definitely check out Retro8 and see how we can this project going. I'd really hate to have to settle for B&W.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

Also, it is probably still possible to film the monitor screen using FujiChrome Single-8 R25 which is Daylight balanced and then the film is polyester based to start with. Since this is color reversal stock, once you have shot your test and tweaked settings to your liking, you can just reshoot the monitor and make as many as you need. The filmstock is still floating around out there and processing is still available as well.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

If anyone's still interested I think I've pretty much got this licked:

 

It's not perfect by any means, It was shot frame by frame from a LED monitor and there's quite a pronounced flicker, when I was last doing this (about 5 years ago with black and white reversal film) I was able to get flicker free results using a laptops LCD screen.

The next thing to try will be a CRT running at 85hz.

 

Anyhoo, I shot the same 30 seconds of footage six times at different exposures and with a variety of different filters, I also shot a few frames of colour charts before each take; I can post these if anyone is interested.

 

P.S. Please excuse the crappy animation! I made this for a friends birthday and only had a couple of days to put it all together!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's supposed to take around 8.3feet/ 30 seconds at 18fps. However, I found it really difficult to fit the full amount in and the mechanism would jam quite often due to the film not being able to move freely inside the magazine. I made a second version with only 4feet which seems to run a lot more smoothly.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...