200ft scratch

Leigh Spencer · November 8, 2005

Aggghhhhhhh.......... poop happens for an amateur!

A few months back ...

I splashed out on 4 carts of KODAK Vision 2 500T from the Widescreen centre here in London

kept it refrigerated until i could rope some friends in

shot some footage for a Demo

had it processed/graded telecine to minidv by the same company

and what do I get back this week for my expense and efforts.

An ugly huge scratch runs like the river thames right across the central part of the frame - runs from start to finish and ruins some nice images i acheived (IMHO). I've shot a fair amount of super 8 reversal and understand the grainy/scratchy beauty of it but this idea is new to me.

A swift moaning call to the guy at the Widescreen centre then followed, he sounded a bit peeved about my complaint and pointed out that it had happened during processing which they outsource to a lab in germany, and definitely not by their telecine machine - only a small particle in the machine could have caused the scratch.

Because of the nature and volume of super 8 processing that goes on I have to accept my loss and move on - if i couldnt do this he suggested leaving S8 alone and stick with 16mm or higher - sounds like a shakey sales philosophy to me (maybe im too small fry). In the end to give them credit they did refund the cost of the processing (£51 out of total of £230 wasted)!!!!

should i think myself lucky i got some money back at all or am i right to be a bit annoyed??????? any feedback or similiar experiences would be appreciated - id be especially interested in finding out if anyone's any experience with Todd-AO, the only S8 neg lab in UK?

Erdwolf_TVL · November 8, 2005

Aggghhhhhhh.......... poop happens for an amateur!

A few months back ...

I splashed out on 4 carts of KODAK Vision 2 500T from the Widescreen centre here in London

kept it refrigerated until i could rope some friends in

shot some footage for a Demo

had it processed/graded telecine to minidv by the same company

and what do I get back this week for my expense and efforts.

An ugly huge scratch runs like the river thames right across the central part of the frame - runs from start to finish and ruins some nice images i acheived (IMHO). I've shot a fair amount of super 8 reversal and understand the grainy/scratchy beauty of it but this idea is new to me.

A swift moaning call to the guy at the Widescreen centre then followed, he sounded a bit peeved about my complaint and pointed out that it had happened during processing which they outsource to a lab in germany, and definitely not by their telecine machine - only a small particle in the machine could have caused the scratch.

Because of the nature and volume of super 8 processing that goes on I have to accept my loss and move on - if i couldnt do this he suggested leaving S8 alone and stick with 16mm or higher - sounds like a shakey sales philosophy to me (maybe im too small fry). In the end to give them credit they did refund the cost of the processing (£51 out of total of £230 wasted)!!!!

should i think myself lucky i got some money back at all or am i right to be a bit annoyed??????? any feedback or similiar experiences would be appreciated - id be especially interested in finding out if anyone's any experience with Todd-AO, the only S8 neg lab in UK?

Unfortunately, you can only increase your odds by going to a more expensive lab and a more experienced technician. You can never garuntee your results with film.

Have you considered that it may be a cartridge fault?

I personally have had no problems with the above shoppe and lab.

Gareth Munden · November 8, 2005

Hi , are you saying the scratch runs for 200ft ? . Thats 4 rolls of film , why would processing do that to all rolls ? I think it's from the Telecine myself , processors use rollers which I don't think would do this .

You sure it's not a camera problem ? .

This has opened my eyes , I was goin to use them for some Super-8 stuff . I'll try Todd-Ao