Marc Roessler

Why not lamp it with 230V/240V globes? Then you won't need a transformer. The lamps should be readily available, because 230V is a common voltage in Europe, and I've even seen some 240V globes.

Hi Bill, also check this thread, some info there: http://www.cinematography.com/index.php?showtopic=58576&page=2&do=findComment&comment=392347 Such a pity there's so much chaos and misinformation with this film stock.. don't rely on anybody, just test, test, test.. otherwise on the day of shooting you'll be f.. f.. f.. <_< (I'm speaking from experience..) Kind regards, Marc

Has anyone a manual or infos on how to use the ARRI MCL 4 Timecode Master Clock? Pinouts of the connects etc also welcome. It has a coax-like connector, a 2.5 mm mono connector and a 3 pin Fischer connector. Greetings, Marc

Are you sure it was 100R and not 100? Not sure about whether 100R is available in 100' rolls, but the Foma 100 neg film seems to be available in 100' rolls, here for example (German Shop): http://www.fotoimpex.de/shopen/films/fomapan-100-bulk-roll-135305-m.html This is no B&H perf of course, so probably won't work with professional 35mm motion picture cameras (may work with simple claw-based cameras?)

Let's just hope Kodak stays up and running for a long time. I need to be able to rely on the film stocks I use. The UN54 started jamming while we were doing a film stock and sound test with a three person crew under real life conditions in a moving tram (filming permit and all). I'm thankful for my gut feeling pushing me towards that test... for the actual shooting a month later we exclusively rented a tram including driver for half a day, the stock jamming there would have been a disaster!

Hi everyone, is there a place in Europe that does professional Super 8 negative scanning? With professional I mean that level of professional that you get from a company that would use an ARRISCAN.. i.e. no sharpening going on, Dmin to Dmax scanned, ultrasonic cleaning before the scan and delivery as logarithmic 2k DPX files. Greetings, Marc

Since my last post here I (and some other people) did various checks on the problematic UN54 that I used in my Aaton XTR Prod.. The results: What was sold to me (by Witter Cinetec) as 2994 negative pitch is actually 3000 print pitch, despite their claims that they do not sell 1R 3000 UN54. (The Aaton XTR is known to have trouble with print pitch stocks, since it seems it was designed optimized towards neg pitch). I sent my UN54 to them, they measured it and claim it is "within spec" - no info which spec (print or neg perf) that is, though... :rolleyes: So I asked them which spec (print or neg) they had checked it against - no reply. Since I've been in contact with them their webpage was changed to list all offered UN54 stocks as 3000 print pitch (just compared it to the old page version using http://web.archive.org/ ... just to be sure I did not misread this). Well.. Go figure.. So everyone who's using UN54 with professional cameras beware..

Hi Prashantt, I think careful definition here is necessary what a "print life" is. In principle, under "normal" circumstances (i.e. run in present-day normal movie theaters with so-so trained projectionists) a print often has scratches and dirt just after a few weeks. This is due to bad handling of the print. One could argue that after that time the print life cycle is over. If you're unlucky and the print falls into the hands of an incompetent projectionist, the print life may be over (quality wise) even before the first screening (I've seen it happen, with my own print no less). What accountants usually mean by "print life" is the economical print life. Most feature films stay in the cinema less than 7 weeks, so even if the print is still in pristine condition, what bookkeeping is concerned the "commercial life" of the print is over, so print value in the books is zero and most prints are trashed/recycled (because they cause storage cost). If you don't care about the print condition too much, a print can live 40 years and upwards when run in theaters. There are quite some archive prints which are original release prints from the 70s! But usually they are quite beat up. If you take really good care of a print, a print can have a very long life (even if you're VERY critical of print quality). This is one of my pet peeves. I've worked as a projectionist myself and I've been collecting 35mm projection equipment for some years, so I know where the bad things happen. Most projectionists let the leader touch the floor (where it picks up dirt, which migrates into the film), don't clean their work rooms and their projectors, thread sloppily with wrong loop sizes etc, don*t get their projectors setup/fixed properly etc... if all of this was done right, you could screen a film for years and years without any degradation in quality visible. Especially the Kinoton FP30 series is very gentle on film. I've run old brittle, shrunken prints from the 50s on these and never had any film breaks nor scratches! As an example for how long a print can stay in perfect condition, there are quite some 70mm prints from the 60s which look like new (ignoring color fading). Those 70mm prints were and still are very expensive, so every projectionist is super careful not to damage it (and also no unexperienced projectionists are allowed to run it). So the moral of the story is: when you own a print that's dear to your heart and you let someone screen it... go there with it, find out about their equipment etc, talk with the projectionist, possibly clean and adjust their equipment (if possible) etc, and if possible (i.e. in case they let you do it and you do know how to): build and thread it yourself. Greetings, Marc

I agree they look like that.. but it seems Ianiro/Quartzcolor built them like that, as I've seen this version several times. Also see http://www.ianiro.com/en/company/65-70_12.htm# ("read more") It's probably not the most ideal design.. but is there a trick for slightly tightening this thing?

I have a Ianiro Redhead here (the light version with the fibre body). It's mounted using a clamp with a sort of multi-ball-joint arm, like on this picture: http://s.sbito.it/images/63/6381375764.jpg The trouble is that the arm seems a bit too weak to support the full weight of the lamp when the arm is not 100% vertically positioned - the first ball joint next to the clamp (most leverage = most force) gives. Is there any trick for making those a bit tighter? Greetings, Marc

most definitely a projection lens, for 35mm projectors... quite an old one... don't expect too much image quality... sorry...

Unfortunately, with the UN54 I got there is no emulsion number, master roll number, slit number etc printed anywhere on the film or the can (it was UN54 re-spooled to a 100' dayligh reel, so no original can). I'm in contact with the company (quite well known in the business..) who sold it to me, in order to find out what's going on. Oh nice.. Edwin Schouten is a very nice guy. Onno, please send him greetings from me :) I'm going to collect some samples of UN54. If anyone has some that either ran flawlessly in the "more critical" (LTR, XTR, SR) cameras or made trouble, I'd be happy if you could mail short strips of the film to me along with any info you might have (where and when purchased, picture of the can, roll/emulsion number, camera used, climatic conditions of storage and during exposure etc...) For everyone who had issues with the UN54: does your stock have keykode numbers/foot numbers? Greetings, Marc

Indeed the roll I tested says "ORWO UN54"... I just compared the processed UN54 with the processed 7222. My UN54 definately has longer pitch than the 7222, visible even with a 15 cm long piece of film. Some quick calculation how are we are off and whether this could be explained by short pitch vs. long pitch: 2994 has 7.605 mm pitch, 3000 7.620mm. One perf hole has a height of 1.720 mm. This means that, aligning 2994 and 3000 at one perf, alignment will be off exactly one perf hole size (i.e. it will just "close" when aligning the films) after 115 perfs: (1.720 / (7.620 - 7.605)) = 114,666 The UN54 vs. 7222 is out of alignment for one perf after about 40 perfs!! There's definitely something fishy going on. Greetings, Marc

UN54 is a film that can be processed either as negative or as reversal. Now of course the big question is whether they use negative or print pitch... Can someone who has the appropriate equipment take a measurement? Right now there's claims for about any of the dimensions being off.. width, pitch, lubrication/rem jet and I've also heard thickness.. so seems we're back to step one: could be anything?

steve, why not go with a 100' roll first? The 16BL should be OK - same movement as the 16S, and this one basically runs any 16mm film stock. What Dirk writes sounds reasonable...

Indeed the frame grab posted above looks like some processing error. Haven't tried the N74 yet.. may give it a try some time soon. The loop isn't lost, so takeup tension is not the issue. The loop just skips position with relative to the transport claw. You have to re-center the loop by de- and re-attach the mag, then it works again (for another 10 seconds...) In the processed neg this is clearly visible... the claw "looses" one frame, visible as a 1 frame "hickup", but still has enough of a loop to continue running. After a few seconds a second frame slips and the loop is then gone, the claw pulling against the feed/takeup sprocket. Even if it didn't loose the loop: with UN54 my XTR is too noisy for sync sound filming inside closed rooms. Maybe the mag needs adjustment specifically for UN54. But then again, the camera works flawlessly with ALL other film stocks, b&w and color, from both Kodak and Fuji. I wish Orwo would just stick to that de facto standard. Greetings, Marc

I had planned to shoot a short on Orwo UN54 beginning of this year. Luckily, I tested the stock first... For my tests I shot some fresh from the factory UN54 and had it contact printed and 2K scanned (ARRISCAN).. Image wise this is a nice stock, if it only would go through the camera ... the stock ran noisily and the loop slipped every 10 to 20 seconds or so. This was on an Aaton XTR Prod that did not have any trouble with any other stock so far (Fuji, Kodak). Just to make sure it's not some funky b&w incompatibilty I tried some 7222 as a second test which went through the camera silently as usual and without any trouble. Some googling turned up that even (some?) ARRI SRs have problems with UN54. Seems to work on Arri 16S, Bolex etc. Not sure what it is.. I assume one of perf pitch, neg thickness, neg coating.. Really a pity, because this would be a nice somewhat-replacement for 7231 Plus-X. So, if you do plan to shoot UN54 or N74, by all means: test if it works with your camera! Greetings, Marc Roessler

As for buying S16 glass, prices definately have been falling A LOT for S16 glass during the last 2 years... since I bought my set of S16 super speeds.. :wacko: Not sure what the BMD will do for this, maybe prices will rise again...

Kodak just posted an interesting picture from the set of "September 11 1683" https://fbcdn-sphotos-a-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/3622_10151437890328558_1046078377_n.jpg (hope this link works for everyone) It's a very old school looking wooden slate with little (apparently) ring binder type drop-down wooden letters. Does anybody know why one would use such a slate? Is this available somewhere or was it custom made for that film? I have to admit it adds a very nice touch to the set of a historical film .. Greetings, Marc

In Germany this would be ARRI, Munich (of course) CinePostproduction/Geyer, Berlin ARRI Schwarzfilm, Berlin (afaik) TF Cinenova, Wiesbaden (previously ABC & Taunusfilm) Andec Film, Berlin Did I miss any?

Jose, great pictures! However Joel is right that with neg the perf holes would be black. Is this maybe scanned from an S8 contact print? Can you elaborate a bit on your post workflow? Which scanner, what file format used (DPX 2K log?), what kind of degraining/sharpening etc... Did you overexpose the 50D to tighten up the grain even more?

Thanks Richard! 4 g KMnO4 (potassium permanganate) dissolved in 1 Liter of distilled water 110g NaHSO4 (sodium bisulphate) dissolved in enough distilled water to form 1 Liter of solution The permanganate must given some time (with agitation) to fully dissolve. Then mix the two and filter (to remove any manganese dioxide). Should be prepared just before use. I'll try as part of a complete reversal process with some Fomapan 100R soon and let you know about the results. Greetings, Marc