Alan Duckworth

I really wasn't trying to persuade you to shoot film - honest! I have shot film on 4 continents over the years, and you did what you had to - keep it cool, dark and dry and get it processed whenever/wherever. I always just assumed that it would turn out, and it always did. The power of positive thinking, I guess. Your plan to use an online backup is a good one. If you want one more piece of advice it would be "pack everything you need, and take nothing you don't". Alan

AMIA has posted this today: "Our thoughts are with our friends and colleagues on the East Coast as they cope with the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. A list of resources put together by Audiovisual Preservation Solutions, Spec Bros., Mick Newnham and other AMIA members can be found on the AMIA site, as well as guidelines for First Actions for Film, Tape and Discs, available in html as well as .pdf download." http://www.amianet.org/resources/resources-disaster.php I feel for you, hope you can salvage your negs, Alan

Nice feel - I really liked the title shot, but then I have something of a personal bias towards black & white! I assume that you are shooting now, so which cam did you end up using? Alan

I agree about the Bolex, that is the exact job they were built for. If you will be using an electronic camera of any kind, you need to give major consideration to batteries and chargers. As you travel you will encounter varying voltages, varying line frequencies, bad power and no power. Your chargers need to be the "world-wide" kind - or you will need adapters/transformers to make them so. That adds weight and bulk, and more to go wrong. There are some aftermarket solar chargers out there, as well as battery packs that use disposable cells - but you will need to make sure your camera can work with those. "Travel broadens the mind and lightens the wallet" - I don't know who said that, but it's true. All the best in your upcoming adventure. Alan

According to their website, www.adox.de , ADOX is all set to introduce a brand new Super8 stock next week at Photokina. Rated at 100 and claiming to be a replacement for Plus-X Reversal. I guess the best way to save film is to support the manufacturers willing to produce it.

Since 24fps is Sound Speed, you need to look for a Super8 projector that was built for sound movies. Not too hard to spot - even if the seller has no idea, the presence of volume/tone controls is the giveaway. Most of these are switchable 24/18fps, and most also have a speed trim control. Eumig, Elmo and Chinon/GAF are names to look for as they were the most active in this market, but not all models they made were sound capable.

Film Archivists use unprocessed film as slug and leaders. Any movie archive in your area would probably be glad of the donation.

My understanding as to why camera stocks are still mostly acetate base, is that if there is a malfunction or jam the perfs will blow out of acetate and/or the film itself snaps, whereas polyester would not do so and therefore likely damage the camera. You can easily test the film itself to see what the base is. Apply film cement or even just hardware store acetone to the film base - acetate will soften or dissolve, polyester will be unaffected. This is a destructive test, so use only an unimportant sample.

Good about the rewinds and splicer - sounds like you are well organized. Have you tried the 16mm reels on the rewinds? Not all 8mm rewinds can handle the larger 16mm reels, or even fit the hub keyway of the 16mm reel. The emulsion side is duller, the base side is shiny. In the case of Kodachrome, both sides are "shiny", but the emulsion side looks "etched" when you view it from the side. In the time frame of your movies, the filmstock would all be acetate base, so if you are using cement to splice them with then you need a leader that is also acetate base. A lot of leader is polyester base which must be spliced with tape, even to attach to acetate film. Make sure your supplier specifies the base material. Black leader is normally used only at the end of a reel [technically therefore it should be called "trailer" not "leader"!] to prevent a blast of white light from the projector. If you splice together some shorter lengths of film to fill up a larger reel, black leader is also used for that purpose for the same reason. White [or some other colour] leader is used at the beginning of the reel [called the "head"], primarily because it can be easily written on for identification purposes [use a fine point black Sharpie]. Just a note, people who archive film professionally often don't like to use leader at all because of its varying chemical composition, and prefer to simply use raw filmstock that matches the film as leader and trailer.

Running double-perf film through single-perf equipment is not normally a problem - the exception to this is with optical sound projectors, because the second set of perfs is located where the soundtrack would be on single-perf film. No actual damage to film or projector - just be sure to turn down the amplifier. However, running single-perf film through equipment built only for double-perf film will cause severe damage to the film, and potentially also to the equipment, as there is no second row of perforations for the second set of sprockets to engage into, thereby causing the film to jam. Wish I could help you with the Viewer manual, I use a Zeiss Moviscop viewer which is somewhat different. It appears from the photos that the film is laid in emulsion side down, and then the upper piece snaps down on it to hold it in place. The silver knobs are unlabelled, but I'll go with one as the focus knob, and the other as the on/off switch for the lamp [assuming there isn't one on the back of the unit]. The triangle-shaped piece of chrome will most likely be the frame marker [punches a small hole in the film to mark frames for editing purposes] - don't use this, as it damages the film. If you need to mark frames use a white or yellow china marker [available from art stores]. The other small chrome lever is likely to be the framer - or it could be the focus control, in which case a silver knob would be the framer! Your photo does not show if you have a set of rewinds to use with the viewer. If you have no idea what I am talking about, then I'll bet you don't have them. Google "film rewinds" for more info.

Be very sure that your viewer does not put any extra scratches on the films. The best way to test for this is to use black leader, splice up into a loop and run it through several times. Look for scratches by shining a light at an angle to the surface of the film - and check both sides! Black leader can hopefully still be bought, but you can make your own by light-fogging some black & white 16mm film and then processing out. I am very glad to see that you resisted the temptation to view the films by projecting them - an almost guarantee of scratches and damage if not done correctly on well-maintained equipment. One more point - I am assuming from the age of these films that they are most likely to be double-perf [that is, have perforations on both sides], but the later ones [after about 1955] may be single-perf. The issue here is that if you buy any older equipment [viewer, splicer, projector] that was built when only double-perf 16mm film was made, you will not be able to use it with the single-perf films. Good luck with this project, preserving home movies for future generations is extremely important. Alan Duckworth

Condolences to John's family, may he rest in peace.

John, we need your learned and thoughtful guidance, Get well soon!

First off, depth of field and depth of focus are two different things. Depth of focus occurs behind the lens and is an issue with things like lens mounts - depth of focus problems usually need a technician to diagnose and fix. Depth of field occurs in front of the lens and is a way of expressing just how much of the image will appear to be in focus on the screen. A shallow depth of field will have only a small portion of the image, say a face, actually in focus and everything else will become progressively "fuzzier". A deep depth of field (also called "deep focus", somewhat confusingly) will have virtually everything in the image frame appear to be sharp. As the the hole in the iris becomes smaller (that is, moves towards f22) the depth of field becomes deeper. As the hole in the iris becomes larger (that is, moves towards f5.6 or f2.8) the depth of field becomes shallower. This statement applies for ANY format. Now, to your basic question - as the format size increases (eg 65mm) the depth of field becomes shallower at any given f-stop, and the opposite is true. This is due to something called "circles of confusion" [i did not make that up!], which is essentially about how the lens projects its image onto the film plane - as the film plane gets bigger, the circles of confusion get bigger because the distance from the lens to the film plane also gets bigger. It's also why wide-angle lenses appear to have more depth of field than telephoto lenses - telephoto lenses are optically further away from the film plane [but not necessarily physically further away]. That's a bit of a simplistic summary of the science, and in practical terms, this means that in the larger formats the focus must be placed very critically, as at even something like f8 the focus fall-off to "fuzzy" happens very quickly. But, most cinematographers like to work with a shallow depth of field as it isolates the subject from the background. Hence the need for focus pullers, because as your subject moves it needs to be kept in focus. The small formats (including most video cameras - the chips are small in all except the new Genesis style) have enormous depth of field at f8 and up, and still have lots of depth at even f2.8 or so. This makes them great for consumer use where critical focussing is rarely done, but hard to work with if you need the isolation. So, yes Super 8 can often be "point and shoot" [within reason], as it is in most consumer single chip video cams. The "autofocus" in those consumer cams doesn't have a whole lot of work to do! There was a thread on this (in I believe "First Time Filmakers") a few weeks back, well worth looking up. Sorry if I have been a bit long-winded, but I wanted to touch all the bases for clarification. (I was typing this as Christopher's post came in, so a little repetition)

Nice work Scott! I liked the white border, "framing" is everything. For more accurate results, as in when you need to have the original movie reproduced exactly as it is, try projecting onto a piece of white art board. The dead matt surface is better for that, and you can control contrast by bleeding some white light onto the projected image. It sounds too easy, but you can even use the regular room light on a dimmer - quite effective. And you are correct, manual exposure and manual setting of the shutter speed are key. Depending on the projector, other shutter speeds might be used - trial and error testing will be needed.

Captain: just wanted to wish you luck. I produce low-budget educational video materials (since the days of slide/tape!), and do everything in-house - including funding. Advice? - if you can't physically or financially do something, then don't. If hi-tech is too expensive or impractical, then be creative with the lo-tech stuff. For example, I use stop-motion and titles shot on FILM (16 or 8 depending on the look I want) for "enrichment". Interestingly, in recent times the viewers tend to assume that this is some kind of hi-tech CG work!!!

You're confusing me slightly with the word "convert". I own 5 H16's of various vintages, and they can all be hand cranked just as they are. But you do need to obtain the physical "hand crank" which fits onto the drive shaft. These literally look like a "crank", and are quite small - cost around 40 dollars new, or try eBay. But....there are two different sizes of fittings on the drive shaft depending on the age of the camera, and the crank must fit precisely. The drive shaft is just above the lever labelled "I" and "T". Also, older H16's have a drive shaft ratio of 8 : 1, so you get a lot of frames for very little cranking - newer models are 1 : 1, more control, but more cranking. And, you must switch the motor off before hand cranking - the lever labelled "MOT" and "0" must be set to "0". Set your framing rate to whatever your highest desired rate is - the governor will not let you crank beyond whatever it is set at. Hope this helps,

Very nice! I liked the widescreen look, giving the subject someplace to run into. The sound is simple but effective - and came through very well on my somewhat better than normal computer audio setup [not bragging - just stating a fact, you can't judge sound quality on most bundled computer speakers]. The final frames seemed to freeze in mid-fade [i assume this to be a download/software glitch]. Replace the cathedral notice with a can of soft drink/beer and you could probably sell it as a commercial!

I enjoyed the teaser more, got to the point and set up the characters. The silent insert subtitles worked very well for me, and I liked the "one-third up" placement. No problem with the language - I know people who make these guys seem like choirboys [probably a sad reflection on me...]. Overall, made me want to see the show. Good Luck with it.

They did - the exact phrase quoted by the French press in 1839 was "from today, painting is dead!".

Alessandro - I was simply referencing back, no disrespect intended. I was trying to come at it from another angle, and in fact I have quite enjoyed reading all the various submissions here - their diversity illustrates the reason why the question was asked in the first place.

Can't disagree - decent studio strobes are about $1000 a head. I remember much agonizing when I bought my first ones - but no regrets. And I have been around photography long enough to have shot with Kodachrome at 12 ASA! And those slides and films look as good today as they did the day they were shot.

You probably shouldn't use a Super 8 cam as a spot meter for other cameras, because the meter in most [if not all] of them has been compensated for that individual model to deal with the loss of light due to the beam-splitter used for reflex viewing. [and the opposite is also true for most Super 8's - you shouldn't use the reading from a handheld meter to set a Super 8 cam unless you know by prior testing exactly what that loss is]. To deal with the original question: the subject is reflecting light, and therefore its surface luminance remains constant - hence the exposure for that surface does not change, regardless of camera distance. However, as the distance increases usually other subject matter enters the field of view, and this starts to complicate matters, as other subject matter will likely be over or under exposed in relation to the original subject, and this introduces the contrast issues and creative decisions that must then be made [following a zillion new light readings!]. The other complication is that anything in the frame that is a light source [eg streetlights, stars, headlights etc] will obey the inverse square law of propagation of radiation. In english, that means that the light intensity falls off twice as fast as you think it is going to! If you double the distance, you don't halve the the intensity, you quarter it. The inverse square law is why you always need more lights than you thought you could get away with, and is also why most lights used photographically for illumination have parabolic reflectors and/or fresnel lenses - these are valiant attemts to defy the laws of physics. BTW, nobody ever said that exposure was easy. It can take a while to really get a handle on understanding it.

Filip, you'll be better off with a good pair of studio-style strobes. The built-in modelling lights will give you continuous light for setups, without the heat and energy use of the "hotlights". And, you'll probably have somewhere around the equivalent of 5k per head - I can easily shoot still-lifes at f22 on 100 speed film with mine. BTW, I don't disagree at all with your film choice, slow speed film has a "look" that goes beyond simple lack of grain. But I am puzzelled that you find the medium format camera harder to focus than a 35. What are you using? And strobes work great for stop-motion animation too!

Didn't realize you were in Alaska - and I thought I lived "up North"!!! Exposure meters are supposedly calibrated with the assumption that the "typical" subject reflects about 18% of the light or so [i've seen other figures quoted down as low as 13%] - hence "18% grey cards". Snow reflects up to 90% of the light falling on it, so it does create exposure issues if you have "normal" subjects in the frame with snow. If you expose for the snow, the snow turns greyish [and often bluish with colour film], and your subject is underexposed. If you expose for your subject, the snow blows out and loses detail. If your subject is important I would suggest minimizing the amount of snow in the frame [what lame advice to give to an Alaskan!]. If snow is your subject, try an incident reading - essentially a "grey card" - and then give about one stop overexposure. But this will vary according to your film stock and the "look" that you are after. Check out the opening footage of "Where Eagles Dare" [MGM 1968] for some beautiful snow - and it is grey/blue. It may also have been shot as "Day for Night" and some of the blue is filtration - but not the grey! Shooting slide film is always an exposure learning experience. I teach some still photography classes, and I "force" my students to shoot slides to learn about exposure.