Ralph Tabith

thanks Ralph for the info.

actually thanks to Nick really, I gleaned it all from him. and thanks for the info on the timelapse aswell nick. i actually had been shooting with 0.3 + and it should have been 0.3 - minus, oh dear. will it make that much of a difference if i get a graded telecine?

also theres a place in calcutta i can get maybe half of my film developed, or do you think that i should just take it all to mumbai at the end of my trip....will the film be ok for a few months undeveloped? thanks agian

that being said you've got the camera in front of you and if your intuition says do that ... then do it - the running it to 95' in the meantime 'solution' sounds good - its not a show stopper and if it works until you can get it looked at then good on ya ;)

 

If you are going through New Zealand in your travels pop over for a beer and we'll load up some dummy film - there is also a proper Bolex trained tech here (lucky buggers we are)

thanks Nick, that beer sounds a good idea if i ever get to that part of the world, i think i have sorted it out, like you say trust your intuition,

i dont think these guys in india have seen one of those spools before, actually i am sure they have but anything goes out here,

hell who knows it might even come out looking all kooked up, which is partly the idea i had in mind!

How hot did it get? My ex-wife, the Anthropologist, shot a lot of 16mm on 100' spools in Rajasthan and had problems with the emulsion sticking to the back side of the film in the Rajasthan heat. The solution was to use an Igloo cooler. Of course the other problem was finding refrigeration in village India to keep the film cool overnight. :(

its getting to about 36 degrees tops in the day where we were, but we have moved and going north so I am guessing it will be around 20 - 30, maybe in the middle, i was looking at some of the emulsion and i dont, think or rather hope it willl be ok,,,

actually what i think is happenning when the guys at the lab respooled the film onto 100ft they taped the film to the spool, so when it gets to a certain point it just jams up up....any suggestions please?

i think when i load the camera i will pull the film as tight as possible to make sure that the tension is evenish throughout the whole spool and then when it gets to about 95 ft in the counter just cut the film there....

i dont like the idea of the masking tape going through the gate, i assume thats a no-no?

thanks

r

A perfect camera will jam up if you put in a bent/pinched daylight take-up spool ...

 

Without seeing it thats my guess.

 

As for your film, take a look at how the daylight spool works - it uses the film itself to mask the rest of the film with a small tolerance so as to let the film actually spool (which is why sitting on it will bend it and make this tolerance zero or negative ie. catch the film and cause a jack-in-the-box party streamer effect when you open the camera) - the daylight load spool needs a few good turns of film preferably with some 'overlap' to make it light tight, or the edges will fog from direct light and a bit of internal reflection on the film base - which if you are shooting reg16 isn't so much of an issue, with super16 which wasn't a spec in mind with the original designers you will have issues with edge fog...

 

So I cant answer your question, but hopefully have given you some clues as how to ascertain the answer for yourself - good luck!

thanks for the info! filming again today and towards the end it did the same thing, just stopped but when i opened it up it had nearly finished anyway, v.strange. does it take much for the spool to become damaged? i think the spools are pretty much ok.

maybe winding the the bolex up fully is a problem? maybe it pulls it too hard or something, do you think i should wind it in shorter bursts? i am shooting reg 16, i am going to get it processed with adlabs in calcutta so fingers crossed...i will have to "wing it" as we british say/

ok so i am in india, bought my film had it respooled to 100ft daylight spools and was filming and my rex 5 jammed!? cant understand it, lost alot of nice footage- what could be the cause it seems to loop up fine and run nice when i changed the film, i am carrying it in a small bag do you think that could effect it? i am trying to be as careful as possible - my heart sank alittle as to get to this point has been so much work already....mabe its something to do with the heat, any advice on the best way to store the camera, i have been doing so on its side,\

also with daylight spools if something goes wrong with one, does light ruin the whole film or just the part exposed,

thanks for your help i think wish me luck because i ll need it! thanks

r

i have to second whats been said, it looks beautiful. Especially the part it looks cracked like dry earth!

Hot wet or hot dry?

 

If it's hot dry, no worries.

 

If it's hot wet, I would at least toss some dessicant packets in the case. Otherwise the film emulsion may become sticky and do odd things. Might even peel off the base if it's hot enough and wet enough for a long enough time, I'm not entirely sure.

im actually going to south side of india up to nepal, but it isnt rainy season there at this time, so i think i might get one of those moisture sachets things - thanks

i am applying for a bursary for a short i want to make and it states that I have to include a "treatment."

I was wondering for treatments is it 'allowed' for a more descriptive style in tone?/ written like a short story with lots of embellishment say - "the neons lights hummed washing the streets with peculiar iridescence,"

or should it be more formal than that, more succinct?

Thanks any other/general tips would be great!

i am going to be wandering around a hot country with my 16mm film in my peli case, maybe at a stretch of a couple of months at a time while shooting...should i be worried about any deterioration in this time scale? thanks

i just wanted to ask anybody else if they find the 6080 focusing tricky through the viewfinder on the macro settings...? i was reading in the instructions that to set it to the red lettered "macro," you adjust the focus by using the auto focus button on top, and you set the ring to the white lettered "macro," to manually adjust focus in the macro setting.

I remember reading somewhere that if you set the ring to the red dot, and then the focusing ring to the red 15 or 4 ft/m it has a set distance for macro? is this correct?

has anybody got any advice for the macro settings with the 6080? filming tomorrow, and thanks!

I could possible make it. Unless you're all planning on getting pickled.

 

 

I hate alcohol. Sugarless Cola, Milk, Bottled Water, or Tea.

an aversion to alcohol i can understand but tea?!? i wouldnt be able to live without tea.

Maybe this is a really basic question for those in the know about physics, but I was wondering when a light source stops, say shining a torch into a box then closing it up, where have the photons gone? Are they still inside there or do they die out?

yip - the 135 deg is separate (and more important) than the prism loss

Would this be the same if i were using a tcs time lapse motor as well?/ thanks for the "definitive figures" !

R

It took me a small bit of reverse engineered math to get to it - I'm interested, how did you come by the 0.3 ?

You told me ! :D Should I dial in 135 degree as well as the additional increment? Thanks

I am planning my trip to asia soon and bringing my newly acquired rex 5. I am going to shoot tests at the weekend but maybe not in time...

I was wondering whether the following was correct: i have my sekonic 508 cine and have programmed it for 130/135 shutter angle. I have also programmed it with an increment of 0.3 + for light loss.

Thanks, hopefully I can take some nice shots

Take the lens off and look through the turret hole. Either hand crank or single frame the camera and you should be able to see the degree of shutter opening.

thanks for the quick response, will get to it!

hi, i am having troubling with the black marker in my bolex viewfinder, apparently when i have the variable shutter fully open, the black triangle stays in position! help! does that mean its not fully open? I havent had the chance to shoot tests so tomorrow i will try but if anybody has any thoughts please advise, thanks

Clive is concentrating on his new 16mm Telecine devices at the moment, with no apparent plans to keep up the bolex, arri etc.. motors - I personally think there are enough 2nd hand floating around eBay etc... to keep up with the demand so it was a wise decision on his behalf.

 

He announced it here in the forums a while back - do a search ;)

Thanks Nick, a friend is buying one from Clive via ebay as we speak!

Does anyone know if crystal sync motors are being made for bolex's anymore, i contacted duall but they said that the one I was after is not being manufactured anymore....?

" The other major problem created by fluorescent light is the flicker you often get as a result of fluorescent being a pulsating source. If it?s frequency of its power supply isn?t compatible with the camera speed, then the light will fluctuate on the filmed image. Also, if it?s not compatible with the shutter angle of the camera, the same thing will occur. The best combinations of frequency, film speed and shutter opening are as follows for film cameras:

*

50 kHz.?25fps with any shutter opening

*

50 kHz ?24fps with a shutter opening of 170?175 degree opening

*

60 kHz--24fps with a shutter angle of 144 or 180 degrees.

Don?t use fluorescent sources for creating slow motion effects by shooting at 48fps or higher. You will not be able to get rid of the pulsation of the light -- at least that?s my unfortunate experience.

Fluorescent lighting is a common source of light on locations. In documentary, you encounter it constantly. Student films frequently are plagued with poor handling of fluorescent light. If you take into consideration its properties, you can work with it and integrate it into the look of your scene. If you're working on tape, you?ll immediately see it?s effect on your scene if you have a broadcast and calibrated monitor on location. When shooting on tape, it?s always good to make a camera report noting that fluorescent light was used to alert the editor of the need to correct color. " quoted from here

Ok, this might be a simplification but its seems to correlate to what I have read in this thread. I only have a Bolex rex 5 and an ebm at my disposal so I will go and find a crystal motor. any other advice always appreciated thank you.

You have to be shooting crystal-sync at a "safe" camera/shutter speed. There are charts for this.

 

Obviously the numbers are different for 50Hz countries.

 

There are "flicker-free" ballasts made for fluorescents, aka high-frequency ballasts, which are pretty much safe at any speed. Kinos use those.

Thanks for all the info, you could earn a fortune if you charge by the hour!:)

The flickering problem with 60hz AC discharge lamps is a separate issue than flicker you see with your own eyes. That has to do with capturing a different amount of the light's sine waves in each frame, creating a pulsing on film that wouldn't have seen with your own eyes on the set.

Is there anyway to compensate for this? By the way, I am in the UK so it would be 50hz..

I find that for Cool Whites I need to use tungsten stock if I want that strong cyan look. Cool Whites are basically around 4800K to 5000K with green in them, so if you use a daylight stock (5500K), there is no blue at all, just the green spike, so they look more sickly green-yellow, not deep blue-green.

 

Also, the cheapest Cool White bulbs from the hardware store have the worst CRI rating, and thus give you the most green.

 

As far as stock, remember that "Fallen Angels" was shot in 35mm; I assume you're shooting in 16mm because of the subforum. Of course, the DVD of the movie is not a very good transfer and makes it look like a 16mm movie...

Would you advise me buying a temperature meter in order to see what the bulbs are running at (By finding the temperature, does that tell you what kind of fluorescent it is?) So tungsten balanced film would bring out those lovely colours. Would you suggest push processing the film?

I walked around the location today and could clearly see that one of the bulbs was flickering, i didnt have time to see what make the bulbs were. Is filming at under 1/48 the rule of thumb for a non "flickery" image?

I definitely want to emulate that tone in your image./ thanks Robert and David