Feature movies on Super 8

[Jon O'Brien]

What is the potential for features shot on Super 8 in your opinion, including films for showing in cinemas? Regarding feature-length Super 8 films I've only ever heard of Steven Spielberg's first movie (which was shown at a local privately owned cinema) which I think was called 'Firelight'. With modern post improvement of Super 8, getting rid of jitter and weave, etc, and with top quality audio, I'm thinking that a feature in Super 8 could work. 16mm for feature movies doesn't have the clarity of 35mm, and it can come across looking like a soft, not so good version of 35mm. But Super 8 is so definitely low definition and grainy that it would be obvious to all that it wasn't trying to look like 35mm. It would be marketed as shot on Super 8. That's a name that has meaning for many. Does that make sense to anyone else? It does to me.

Obviously, it would only suit certain scripts.

Edited August 3, 2023 by Jon O'Brien

[Heikki Repo]

One super-8 feature is in post production currently and is going to be released later this year, "Dead community guild": 

 

[Dan Finlayson]

1 hour ago, Heikki Repo said:

One super-8 feature is in post production currently and is going to be released later this year, "Dead community guild":

Looks like this might have been shot on the Logmar camera? Only way I could imagine having registration that good

[Heikki Repo]

1 hour ago, Dan Finlayson said:

Looks like this might have been shot on the Logmar camera? Only way I could imagine having registration that good

No, they say it was shot on Canon 514XLS.

[Jon O'Brien]

Does anyone know if image stabilization of Super 8 in post production, getting rid of the vertical jitter etc, leaves behind tell-tale traces/artifacts such as blurring in the image? It would be great to do some tests of Super 8 footage and then view it in a movie theatre and see just exactly how it looks on the big screen.

Also, how does one get hold of a Logmar Super 8 camera? I wonder if they ever become available.

[Jon O'Brien]

That film looks watchable to me, Heikki. I'd buy a ticket and go and see it if it comes to a theatre near me.

[Heikki Repo]

1 hour ago, Jon O'Brien said:

Also, how does one get hold of a Logmar Super 8 camera? I wonder if they ever become available.

Apparently Logmar company is going to rent their brand new super-8 camera, see https://www.logmar.dk/

[Gautam Valluri]

Pin-registration issues aside, I don't see why anyone would shoot a feature on Super8 instead of just going for 16mm. The cost of buying stock, developing and scanning is almost the same...

Richard Linklater shot his first "feature" You can't learn to plough by reading books on Super8 but it feels like it was more of an experiment than a serious film effort.

Edited August 3, 2023 by Gautam Valluri
grammar

[Stewart McLain]

There was one a few years back called "I am Zozo".  

 

[Heikki Repo]

14 minutes ago, Gautam Valluri said:

Pin-registration issues aside, I don't see why anyone would shoot a feature on Super8 instead of just going for 16mm. The cost of buying stock, developing and scanning is almost the same...

Yes, I agree. Shooting on 16mm is financially a much better deal especially if one can use 400ft loads. Super-8 makes most sense if 1) no such camera is available for a low price and 2) the film is shot with a skeleton crew.

With super-8 less resources needs to be spent on pulling focus or loading film, allowing for a tighter shooting schedule. If it's all natural light and 50D in broad daylight in a sunny state and the script revolves around a small cast, I can well see how the strengths of the format can be utilized quite efficiently.

However, with the current reliability issues of S-8 cartridges it's not a good idea. When they are solved it might make sense again.

[Joerg Polzfusz]

Another feature film on Super8:

http://www.friendlyfirefilms.com/superduper8.html

[Joerg Polzfusz]

You might also want to talk with the forum-member Mr. Matthias Fleischer ?

Edited August 3, 2023 by Joerg Polzfusz

[Tyler Purcell]

6 hours ago, Jon O'Brien said:

Does anyone know if image stabilization of Super 8 in post production, getting rid of the vertical jitter etc, leaves behind tell-tale traces/artifacts such as blurring in the image? It would be great to do some tests of Super 8 footage and then view it in a movie theatre and see just exactly how it looks on the big screen.

Also, how does one get hold of a Logmar Super 8 camera? I wonder if they ever become available.

Post stabilizing is amazing today. I have gotten away with horrible camera shake issues, where my heart actually shakes the camera and it's not even noticeable on the final file. No issues what so ever. 

Logmar cameras are hard to get ahold of. May have to find a user willing to let you borrow one. 

 

[Tyler Purcell]

5 hours ago, Gautam Valluri said:

Pin-registration issues aside, I don't see why anyone would shoot a feature on Super8 instead of just going for 16mm. The cost of buying stock, developing and scanning is almost the same...

Yes super 8 at 24fps, is nearly identical in price per finished minute to 16mm. We're talking a few pennies more per finished minute on 16mm. There really isn't any benefit to super 8 unless you're looking for a particular look. We shoot quite a bit of super 8 because I'm doing a film about living in Los Angeles and I wanted to carry around a super 8 camera with me all the time, so we have a few small super 8 cameras, which are always loaded with film around for just that purpose. I would use a 16mm camera, but I haven't ever found one anywhere near the size of a super 8 camera with a built in meter and such. 

Otherwise, shoot 16 of course. 

[Dan Hasson]

Richard Linklater's first feature was shot on super 8.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8SZ6htuNB0

[Robin Phillips]

7 hours ago, Jon O'Brien said:

Does anyone know if image stabilization of Super 8 in post production, getting rid of the vertical jitter etc, leaves behind tell-tale traces/artifacts such as blurring in the image? It would be great to do some tests of Super 8 footage and then view it in a movie theatre and see just exactly how it looks on the big screen.

Also, how does one get hold of a Logmar Super 8 camera? I wonder if they ever become available.

if the camera registration is the problem, there will always be a little blur from that. but it was possible to manually stabilize s16mm overscans using the perfs 20 years ago, so Im sure its not a problem on s8. I think the main question is if you'd want just to do optical pin reg in the scanner, or if you'd want optical pin reg + a overscan so you can manipulate it more if need be

[Robin Phillips]

15 hours ago, Jon O'Brien said:

What is the potential for features shot on Super 8 in your opinion, including films for showing in cinemas? Regarding feature-length Super 8 films I've only ever heard of Steven Spielberg's first movie (which was shown at a local privately owned cinema) which I think was called 'Firelight'. With modern post improvement of Super 8, getting rid of jitter and weave, etc, and with top quality audio, I'm thinking that a feature in Super 8 could work. 16mm for feature movies doesn't have the clarity of 35mm, and it can come across looking like a soft, not so good version of 35mm. But Super 8 is so definitely low definition and grainy that it would be obvious to all that it wasn't trying to look like 35mm. It would be marketed as shot on Super 8. That's a name that has meaning for many. Does that make sense to anyone else? It does to me.

Obviously, it would only suit certain scripts.

I think you'd be surprised how far you can push S16 if it comes to it. I've convinced a few people some s16 work was 35 with a combination of a perfectly dialed in flange depth, ultra 16 lenses, and maximizing the crap out of Neat Video's denoiser (where you can deniose, sharpen, then mix back in with the original to bring back some grain). Mind you, I did that using two Radeon Duo cards in a mac pro (so 4 GPUs total) and it still wasnt running in real time, though I suspect if you ran a 4090 on windows or linux it'd go faster. I know Neat Video made a compatibility update with the apple chips, but I dont know if it can leverage the machine learning parts of it to accelerate things or not.

Personally I've recommended to people before that if they want a more lowfi look to consider shooting N16 with a 1.85 crop, since thats a pretty heavy crop and will get you more clearly intentional grain while still having the ability to get 400ft loads and lots of crystal sync camera options. If you go with some really old S mount lenses too, you'll reduce the line pair resolution compared to say ultra primes and that may help.

That being said, there are some crystal sync and crystal sync modified S8 cameras out there. Most I've seen seen to run crystal at 25fps. But I do think you'll find shooting s8 is basically gonna cost the same or slightly more than shooting 16, and you'll be blasting through cartridges vs having 10min runs on even an N16 body

[Tyler Purcell]

I did a little video a while ago that I forgot to post about Resolve post stabilization to demo how well it works. 

 

 

[Jon O'Brien]

I'm thinking about getting out of videography. There's too many people doing it, and not enough people seem to care if you shoot with a really nice video camera with huge dynamic range, and all that. Most people seem to only see 4K, 6K, 12K ... woo hoo ... all those K's, I'm blown away, dude ....

I'm wondering if I will go back to my original plan of only shooting film. Everything I've shot on digital for the past year I could have shot on film just as well, and what I've done would have generated more interest if I'd shot film.

Don't worry, I'm not down about it at all. I do other things in life and the digital idea was to try and make what I do more appealling to the average person out there but the fact is most people now either can't afford to hire a videographer or they want to hire the gear and figure out how to shoot movies themselves. And who can blame them, it's fun. Or they are utterly happy with their iPhone footage.

[Jon O'Brien]

The very success of video is sort of making it less appealling.

Very few people want to take a risk and get into real film. Plus, film takes time and effort to learn, and mistakes with it are costly. If you've got the film cameras you may as well specialise in them.

Edited August 3, 2023 by Jon O'Brien

[Tyler Purcell]

7 minutes ago, Jon O'Brien said:

Don't worry, I'm not down about it at all. I do other things in life and the digital idea was to try and make what I do more appealling to the average person out there but the fact is most people now either can't afford to hire a videographer or they want to hire the gear and figure out how to shoot movies themselves. And who can blame them, it's fun. Or they are utterly happy with their iPhone footage.

It's why I never invested in video gear. Makes no sense honestly. Unless you're renting to a big show for months on end, you'll never recoup the initial cost on new/top of the line gear like an Alexa 35. Smaller productions don't even care what you shoot on. I bet if I had an Alexa 35 I'd be busy shooting at least once a week, but would it pay more than my job? Probably not enough to pay bills AND the lease on the camera. So then you're talking about buying an older camera, which is less appealing. So sure you'll get SOME gigs, but not the same ones who want "the hot" new camera. 

So you're 100% right, most people will just buy a A7SIII or a Pocket 6k Pro and have at it. Very low entry fee and with programs like DaVinci Resolve, you can easily do beautiful finish coloring and mastering right at home FOR FREE. Why do you need a pro for anything really? 

[Jon O'Brien]

The other thing, and let me have just a small rant here, is that the average output of most videographers I've seen around the place is the utmost drivel I've ever laid eyes on. Hackneyed video kitsch, just about all of it. And that's what people want on their videos ? 

[Tyler Purcell]

3 minutes ago, Jon O'Brien said:

The other thing, and let me have just a small rant here, is that the average output of most videographers I've seen around the place is the utmost drivel I've ever laid eyes on. Hackneyed video kitsch, just about all of it. And that's what people want on their videos ? 

Bro tell me about it. 

I'm on a Facebook group for independent filmmakers. There are guys on there making 8 features a year who don't even understand the 180 degree rule and then argue with me about how making features is all they know how to do. I'm like bro, I shoot better home movies lol 

[Joerg Polzfusz]

BTW: HBO‘s TV series „Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty“ was completely shot on Super8, too.

[Heikki Repo]

1 hour ago, Joerg Polzfusz said:

BTW: HBO‘s TV series „Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty“ was completely shot on Super8, too.

It was shot on different film formats - not only super-8.