Additional lengths with Orwo film, any experiences?

[Simon Wyss]

Friends, I got an E-Mail answer from Filmotec, Germany, to my enquiry about the effective length of their portions. They state that no additional footage is given.

 

Now, did anyone measure an Orwo film load lately? I can hardly believe they sell 400 feet plus zero since a customer has right to the nominal footage, so a means must be there to thread up in the camera. In the beginning of the 16-mm. initiative black paper leader was glued to the stock but it was soon realized that the associated labour could be cut off by simply spooling on a few additional feet of film.

 

I have the booklet Eastman Motion Picture Films for Professional Use with supplement from 1942 but nothing is stated as to overlengths. Also no information can be found on today’s Eastman-Kodak website, nowhere.

 

The Carlsons* published detailed information on additional footage about Agfa-Gevaert, Eastman-Kodak, Fuji, and Ilford daylight and darkroom loads. Should we have reached the state that film manufacturers don’t know anymore how film works?

___________________

 

*Verne and Sylvia Carlson: Professional Cameraman’s Handbook, 1970 et seq.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

For 100' loads, I have heard everything from 103' to 112'. The most common I heard was 109'. If that is the case, I have never known of any 16mm camera that takes 9' to load. I have a CP16 and those have a pretty tricky pattern and they still only require about 2-3' if you want to make one or two revs around the takeup core for stability.

 

I am not sure that people are "entitled" to a nominal shooting length. That would be akin to hard drive manufacturers being required to offer the stated disk space AFTER considering the MBR (master boot record) and file maintenance tables.

[Brian Drysdale]

I don't think I've come across a 400 ft that us apparently longer. 100ft daylights have the extra to allow for fogging when loading the film, I'm sure it's factored into the price,

[Simon Wyss]

Thank you, fellows

 

Found the following passages:

 

“The first 6 feet of film itself serve for threading and as a light proof protective leader.” from Bell & Howell Filmo 70 manual

 

“For the standard daylight spool, allow a 5-foot leader to pass through the camera by operating the mechanism until

the footage dial registers 0.” from Bell & Howell Eyemo manual

 

“Looking directly into the lens socket, run the camera by pressing the exposure button. Stop the camera immediately when you see the perforations that are punched in the film at the end of the leader.” from Ciné-Kodak Special manual

Some consistency of 6' with the 109' of Eastman-Kodak when one considers that about 3' should keep the film attached to the supply spool for rewinding.

[Dirk DeJonghe]

The Kodak daylight 100ft spools hold 33 meters or 109 ft. Some clever people load their spools in a changing bag and can use all of it; 400ft reels hold 125 meters.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

The Kodak daylight 100ft spools hold 33 meters or 109 ft. Some clever people load their spools in a changing bag and can use all of it; 400ft reels hold 125 meters.

Sadly, I cannot do this with the CP16. For one, because the camera has so many loading quirks that there is no way possible you can thread it in the dark and do it optimally (maybe with night vision googles, you might.) For another, I doubt you would save much footage anyway because you are going to need at least 2 ft. beyond the gate to ensure stable attachment to the takeup core. I guess you can save the 6 inches coming out of the mag before the gate by not letting it get exposed while threading but that seems to be little consolation for undertaking such a diabolical task as threading this thing in the dark.