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different stock different focus?


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I filmed on 3 different stocks, and spliced them together. (2 work prints and one reversal stock)

In projection, when a new stock begins, it is out of focus and I have to refocus.

Is it because of the slight thickness in film? Because of the precise cut of the splices? Or because of the tape holding the stocks together?

Is this normal and is there something I can do about this?

 

After summer, I will have a negative cut and proper prints made, guess that will solve it anyway. 

But for now, I learn a lot from splicing the work prints and showing them as a work in progress that can evolve every screening. 

 

 

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It's because prints are made from negatives emulsion facing emulsion, so while the emulsion on the camera negative and the reversal stock are on the same side (the side facing the incoming light from the lens), the print off of that negative has the emulsion on the opposite side. So when you splice a camera reversal original to a print, the focus will have to shift to compensate for the base on one of the two.

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If you can live with the mirror image, you can flip one of the two stocks so the emulsions are on the same side, assuming that the sprocket holes are on the correct side for the projector (i.e. you could only flip the strip if it has perfs on both sides.)

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Thanks for the tips David and Doug.

Someone wil need to focus during the screening then, as only one side has sprockets and I rather not go dimmer.

After years of reversal, I'm only started filming on negative stock this year. 

Happy it's not my splices that make it unsharp.

 

 

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