Problems with Orwo UN54 in Aaton XTR

[Marc Roessler]

Hey everyone,

 

today I had a test shoot on Orwo UN54. It really gave me some trouble.

The camera was a well-maintained XTR Prod that happily ran any Kodak and Fuji material so far no matter how old it was (shrinkage). Loops are set perfectly, double checked all of this.

 

I used fresh UN54 material, ordered 3 weeks ago. The camera runs quite loud right from the start. After running for about 10 to 15 seconds, the camera looses the loop (clearly audible) at which point I switch it off of course. After taking off the mag, re-centering the loop and reattaching the mag the camera is good for another 10 to 15 seconds.

 

After some googling I found this thread (German, use google translate for a translation):

http://www.am-neudeck.de/forum/messages/1/373.html?1281891954

 

Apparently others had this problem as well, with XTR, Minima and SR. Konvas 2M, Arri 16S, K3 and Filmo seemingly work fine. Can this be a problem with perforation tolerances being off? I know the Aaton claw slides in with a wedge shaped move, so could it be this mechanism relies on tight tolerances more than other (older) cameras?

 

This really sucks, I thought UN54 might be usable as a Plus-X replacement, but now I will probably have to go with Double-X I guess..

 

Any ideas what might have gone wrong here?

 

Greetings,

Marc

[Robert Houllahan]

I had this same problem with my Aaton and I had the Orwo factory send some test film to JP at Aaton and he measured the stock and perf pitch, etc. Unfortunatley Orwo has decided to set their perforations to a slightly different pitch than the perf size and pitch the Kodak uses and it causes problems when going through high precision cameras like the LTR/XTR and with Pin-Reg cameras like Panavision and Arri 35mm. I think some kind of group effort needs to be made to urge the Orwo factory to set it's perf size and pitch to be compatible with standard Kodak perfs and thus all of the 16mm and 35mm cameras worldwide which operate on the Kodak standard.

 

_Rob-

[Marc Roessler]

Bummer.. how in the world can they get away with this??

[Adrian Sierkowski]

And word, Rob, on how well it'll work on an SR series camera (SR3) ? I had been toying with the notion of shooting some B/W Sequences for an upcoming project and wanted to test out the Orwo for it. Else I suppose I'll roll some '13 and push.

 

Also no idea how/why they'd do that? seems very silly.

[Robert Houllahan]

I am not sure about the SR3 but it does give me some concern, I have talked to Rob Todd at Emerson about shooting some in a SR3 to test and I have talked to the US reps and the Orwo factory about this, if it were me I would want to make the film as compatible to all of the world's 16mm and 35mm cameras as possible.

 

-Rob-

[Kip Kubin]

I've had no issues with the N74 on my XTR. Is that the same perf dementions? Was I just lucky?

[dan kessler]

No personal experience with Orwo film, but very interested in this thread.

Looking through the link-referenced material and at Orwo's published specs,

I frankly don't see any deviations from standard pitch. Any more info on this?

[Robert Houllahan]

I was able to get a roll of N74 to go through my LTR fine and it looked great, I will be putting up a 2K data scan from Cinelab's new scanner this weekend. The Orwo stock is really beautiful and I think it is a small adjustment that the Orwo factory has to make to insure compatibility.

 

-Rob-

[Marc Roessler]

Robert, looking forward to that!

I think the N74 might be to grainy for me in S16 though (target format is 2K DCP).

 

I've sent mail to Orwo and I hope they can give me some more information on what's going on.

 

On a side note, for that film project I'm searching for two to three well stored 400' rolls of Plus-X as a replacement for the misbehaving UN54. If someone in Europe reading this has some for sale, let me know!

 

Greetings,

Marc

[Robert Houllahan]

 

Here is a 2K scan of some Orwo-74 I shot for a Music Video project, this was scanned on our new 4K DCS-Xena scanner at Cinelab and I put a very light grade on it and no noise reduction and compressed it for Vimeo as a 2048x1256 file.

 

 

-Rob-

[David Cunningham]

https://vimeo.com/56444616

 

Here is a 2K scan of some Orwo-74 I shot for a Music Video project, this was scanned on our new 4K DCS-Xena scanner at Cinelab and I put a very light grade on it and no noise reduction and compressed it for Vimeo as a 2048x1256 file.

 

 

-Rob-

 

 

Rob!

 

Looks great! Can't wait for this to be publicly available! Do you have pricing yet?

 

Dave

[Robert Houllahan]

We will have pricing on the Cinelab web site next week, both for direct to DPX sequences and for DPX and graded (quicktime, etc.) output. The Scanner is still in Alpha and the company has not yet announced it yet but there are now three placed. It is fully modular and allows for switching out the Camera-Link based imager for newer one's as they become available. The current setup is a 4K CCD and we are planning to upgrade that to a 29Mp 6.6K CCD when it becomes available. We are under a NDA agreement so I can't show photos of the machine yet and we are expecting a new gate/transport module in the next month or two plus some other transport refinements. Ultra-16mm will be supported sometime this month at up to 3K.

 

-Rob-

[Robert Houllahan]

Here is a roll of Orwo-54 developed as Reversal and scanned on the new scanner, the unsteadiness is in camera as the scanner has two registration pins for 16mm....

 

 

-Rob-

[David Cunningham]

Here is a roll of Orwo-54 developed as Reversal and scanned on the new scanner, the unsteadiness is in camera as the scanner has two registration pins for 16mm....

 

https://vimeo.com/56452101

 

-Rob-

 

Hi Rob,

 

Do you do this processing of Orwo-54 as reversal at Cinelab? I might have to try it once I'm out of Tri-X and Plus-X

[Robert Houllahan]

Yes we ran that as Reversal and have had a quite a few Orwo rolls come in to develop as both negative and as reversal. We are happy to support Orwo and Foma products at Cinelab and we hope whatever perf issues that Orwo is having will be fixed soon. Both stocks seem to run fine in cameras like my B&H Film 70DR and Bolex's but there are some problems with Aaton's and maybe the SR series.

 

-Rob-

[David Cunningham]

Yes we ran that as Reversal and have had a quite a few Orwo rolls come in to develop as both negative and as reversal. We are happy to support Orwo and Foma products at Cinelab and we hope whatever perf issues that Orwo is having will be fixed soon. Both stocks seem to run fine in cameras like my B&H Film 70DR and Bolex's but there are some problems with Aaton's and maybe the SR series.

 

-Rob-

 

 

How about this Rob:

 

http://www.foto-r3.com/argenti-pan-x-100-byn-negativo-super-8-15-metros.html

 

I've heard it can be processed as D-96 or D-76 with good results. I had emailed some with Brad Chandler at your office, and he said it should be possible, but never really confirmed that it can be done.

 

I'd be happy to be a guinea pig.

 

Dave

[Robert Houllahan]

Send it in and we will figure out how to run it!

 

-Rob-

[David Cunningham]

Send it in and we will figure out how to run it!

 

-Rob-

 

Sweet! That's what I like to hear. :)

[Robert Lewis]

How about this Rob:

 

http://www.foto-r3.c...-15-metros.html

 

I've heard it can be processed as D-96 or D-76 with good results. I had emailed some with Brad Chandler at your office, and he said it should be possible, but never really confirmed that it can be done.

 

I'd be happy to be a guinea pig.

 

Dave

 

How does this relate to either Aaton or Orwo?

[David Cunningham]

How does this relate to either Aaton or Orwo?

 

Sorry... was off topic. I got there because the thread kinda became about alternative B&W negative stocks. But, really not.

[Robert Lewis]

Sorry... was off topic. I got there because the thread kinda became about alternative B&W negative stocks. But, really not.

 

It was intended to be a gentle "take us back to the topic" message, and I hope you were not offended.

 

Actually, the topic is most interesting. I have just got some ORWO UN54 and am intending to use some in my Aaton LTR54. However, having come across this topic, I am following it carefully before doing so.

 

I am wondering whether there is any significant difference between the Aaton XTR and LTR54 models which would impact on the issue which has been raised - whether one camera is more able to cope than the other.....? I know that on some cameras it is possible to adjust the pitch, but I believe it is not possible to do this on either the XTR or the LTR54. It does seem a little strange, however, that apparently one camera will take the stock without any problem, but another will not. I am wondering whether it could be that servicing of the camera has anything to do with it.

 

On first receiving the UN54, I tried it in a Bolex SBM, and there was no problem with it at all. Having had the film processed I have to say that it is a very nice stock indeed!

[David Cunningham]

It was intended to be a gentle "take us back to the topic" message, and I hope you were not offended.

 

Actually, the topic is most interesting. I have just got some ORWO UN54 and am intending to use some in my Aaton LTR54. However, having come across this topic, I am following it carefully before doing so.

 

I am wondering whether there is any significant difference between the Aaton XTR and LTR54 models which would impact on the issue which has been raised - whether one camera is more able to cope than the other.....? I know that on some cameras it is possible to adjust the pitch, but I believe it is not possible to do this on either the XTR or the LTR54. It does seem a little strange, however, that apparently one camera will take the stock without any problem, but another will not. I am wondering whether it could be that servicing of the camera has anything to do with it.

 

On first receiving the UN54, I tried it in a Bolex SBM, and there was no problem with it at all. Having had the film processed I have to say that it is a very nice stock indeed!

 

Nope... not offended... very gentle. :) On topic, any reported issues with older Bolex like my Rex1 ? Even if no "issues" while shooting, is the result stable/registered correctly?

[Marc Roessler]

Since my last post here I (and some other people) did various checks on the problematic UN54 that I used in my Aaton XTR Prod..

 

The results:

What was sold to me (by Witter Cinetec) as 2994 negative pitch is actually 3000 print pitch, despite their claims that they do not sell 1R 3000 UN54. (The Aaton XTR is known to have trouble with print pitch stocks, since it seems it was designed optimized towards neg pitch). I sent my UN54 to them, they measured it and claim it is "within spec" - no info which spec (print or neg perf) that is, though... :rolleyes: So I asked them which spec (print or neg) they had checked it against - no reply. Since I've been in contact with them their webpage was changed to list all offered UN54 stocks as 3000 print pitch (just compared it to the old page version using http://web.archive.org/ ... just to be sure I did not misread this).

Well.. Go figure..

 

So everyone who's using UN54 with professional cameras beware..

Edited August 3, 2013 by Marc Roessler

[Simon Wyss]

I hope it won’t be Ferrania that will teach them Germans to start understanding motion-picture film technology. An other issue with FilmoTec, note that Orwo is a product brand, not the enterprise’s, is that they cut, say, a 400-ft. portion at exactly 400 feet. No additional lenghts, no leader

[Marc Roessler]

Let's just hope Kodak stays up and running for a long time.

 

I need to be able to rely on the film stocks I use. The UN54 started jamming while we were doing a film stock and sound test with a three person crew under real life conditions in a moving tram (filming permit and all). I'm thankful for my gut feeling pushing me towards that test... for the actual shooting a month later we exclusively rented a tram including driver for half a day, the stock jamming there would have been a disaster!