Has anyone ever shot Kodak Vision super-8mm film stock and gotten severe under or overexposure when shooting automatic exposure?

Alessandro Machi · June 9, 2013

Newcomers tend to ask if a certain film stock will over or underexpose in a specific camera they have just purchased when shooting in the automatic exposure mode.

Has anyone actually gotten negative footage that was either too over-exposed or too under-exposed when shooting in the automatic mode, and of course assuming there was adequate light with which to shoot?

David Cunningham · June 9, 2013

I have not actually experienced it. But. I guru tee you would severely over expose 200 and higher stocks, especially 250D and 500T if you shot them at auto exposure in Kodachrome 40 only cameras or the kodak type G XL series from the 70s. The lenses in those cameras are terrible anyhow so not sure why you'd bother anyway. But still certain it would be an issue. I doubt you could ever noticeably under expose anything except maybe 50D in a type g 160 only camera.

Joerg Polzfusz · June 10, 2013

Using both the 200T and the 500T outside on a sunny day requires a camera that can close its iris more than f/16. And there are many cameras that can't (or where f/22 is the limit).
A lot of cameras don't know higher speeds than 160T or 250T. Hence they'll heavily overexpose the 500T.
...

In other words:

Most cameras shouldn't have any problems with the 50D and 200T (especially when you solve the "too much sun-light"-problem with an ND-filter).
Many cameras will have problems with the 500T.

Edited June 10, 2013 by Joerg Polzfusz

Will Montgomery · June 11, 2013

Could you have accidentally set the exposure manually and left it open? The Canon 814 AutoZoom would allow this pretty easily...

Joerg Polzfusz · June 12, 2013

Could you have accidentally set the exposure manually and left it open? The Canon 814 AutoZoom would allow this pretty easily...

Good point - there are several cameras where you can switch to fully manual exposure or where you've got at least a knob to adjust the automatic exposure by a couple of f/stops (in both directions). There are also cameras where you'll have manually set the film's ASA value as the camera will ignore the cartridge's notches...