Jump to content

Aapo Lettinen

Premium Member
  • Posts

    2,855
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Everything posted by Aapo Lettinen

  1. ps. after the flare shot you can see typical Krasnogorsk 2 scratches on the beach scene :mellow:
  2. "scene" . never seen the movie but if it used the Meteor 5-1 zoom lens you can spot it quite easily watching the bokeh which is 6corner star-shaped (resembling cookeS4 "star" bokeh a bit though different number of blades) when stopped down to normal shooting apertures. if flares are present the Meteor usually has purplish-blue or blue-colored very prominent and quite complicated flare with two or even three full circles visible if at widest zoom setting. some old travel shots combined to a short film where you can see the flare very clearly at 4:47 (boy that's lots of flares :lol: ) https://vimeo.com/17633094 (the story is really good but I never made English translations for it, should do a proper hd version someday with better scanning)
  3. Chemistry is full of this kind of stuff, it is scary sometimes how badly something could go wrong if just mixing seemingly harmless substances carelessly. In photography the ferricyanide is used for reducing negative density for example. A good basic principle is that if you don't know exactly what you're doing, don't do anything :unsure:
  4. do you mean rem jet removal? alkali bath + water jets is the usual way as I have understood. the stuff is quite sticky and falls off in flakes which you don't wanna stick to the emulsion side. some people have used toothbrush or similar mechanical way for small batches but it is highly unpractical. with chemicals you really have to know what you are dealing with, there is dozens or hundreds of different developer formulas in use and they can contain all kinds of potentially dangerous chemicals , for example formaldehyde (e6 kits etc) , metol with possibly hydroquinone added (standard b/w developers especially those sold in powdered form) , 4-aminophenol (some single use developers like Adonal, Rodinal, R9 oneshot, etc) , caustics like potassium hydroxide, etc... The chemistry also changes when it the solution is used or stored for long. And you also have to store and dispose the waste correctly to avoid environmental pollution and unwanted chemical reactions. you can accidentally make something more dangerous if you handle them without knowing what you're doing. Like accidentally making a chemical waste canister to explode because of wrong mixing causing pressure buildup, never a good idea :o that's why I recommended Coffenol for starters so you can start with the least hazardous chemicals available and then proceed to the other stuff when you are used to handle the chemicals safely. if you have a photographer friends with a darkroom they can teach you the basics and safe procedures :)
  5. Yeah it works but the photo lenses have so long focal lenghts for a 16mm format that you need to have normal and wide lenses from smaller format
  6. money and time are expendable, I would worry about the Health thing if cooking photographic chemicals at home depending on what stuff is used and how often and what the conditions are. Most of that stuff is at least somewhat harmful/poisonous, causes skin problems/damage and may also be carcinogenic. They are also dangerous to environment so care should be taken when handling that stuff and wash waters from the processes. It's a good idea to read the MSDS's first and search for safer alternatives before ordering anything
  7. if using Lomo tank, the UPB-1A is the way to go I think considering how rare the bigger ones are. the UPB-1 is smaller tank meant for double8 / super8 and only holds about 10m of 8mm or 16mm. with the 1A model you can develop 2 x 15m of 8mm or 16mm film at a time (two spirals on each other) or 15m of 35mm by rearranging it a little
  8. I recommend starting with a Bolex, Beaulieu or Krasnogorsk 3 and factory sealed 100ft daylight spools. Let a pro lab do the first batches so that you get used to the camera and stock and see how the stock should look like. After that you can start experimenting with developing chemicals if you like, start with b/w negative. I recommend Coffenol for starters, it is easy to obtain and the chemicals are least hazardous I know for film developing (smells like rotten fish / dog poo though :huh: ) just do a small batch at a time because it degrades quickly, you can use the solution only for couple of days, preferably the same day. Store the chemicals in dry form and remember that Vitamin C oxidises easily so protect it from air when possible. Factory made fixer is a great option, just buy a bottle of the concentrate, it is cheap and lasts for long
  9. with spiral tank you can cover it all at once with the before mentioned method of using separate open bucket for the chemical in a darkroom and submerging the spiral quickly to the bucket, shaking the air bubbles off the film at the same time. you have to do this in complete darkness and with proper safety gear like goggles+face shield+clothing+gloves+ventilation etc. Splashing may seriously damage your eyes and the chemicals may absorb through skin also (even if not they seriously irritate skin and depending on the chemical may cause dermatitis/sensitisation/allergy or with the more dangerous stuff you may also get poisoning from the skin contact) so not a fun job to do in total darkness. Coffenol is one of the least hazardous developers for film, it smells awful and the shelf life is very short (oxidises very quickly) but creates beautiful images
  10. if stock price is a big issue you can just shoot super8, it is much cheaper per minute that you can buy new film and concentrate on making a good movie. as the processing/telecine/scanning is usually more expensive than the raw stock anyway. if you'd like to concentrate on the chemistry and diy machining instead that's also fine but it will take so much time and money from your filmmaking that the end product suffers quite much and may delay for years as others said
  11. I shoot mostly 35mm short ends, recans and clearance film because it is readily available for good prices and the quality difference is very small because of the larger film format. especially 50D is very easy to get and cheap because large budget productions use it but indie films rarely do anything with it so it just piles up at the stock broker's inventory. the 5219 is extremely difficult to get in short end /recan or even clearance so I have to buy it new most of the time. 16mm film I actually usually buy fresh because I shoot lots of regular 16mm cropped to 16:9 so those old Fuji clearance stocks are usually too grainy. b/w I also usually buy new or clearance because it is very rarely shot by any kind of professional productions in any format so you are just very lucky if you can get a short end of those
  12. of course if you add some stuff to used fixing solution which captures --->releases the bromide ions in some gaseous form then it's another issue
  13. depends on what it is and how volatile it is if all. for example sodium thiosulfate solution (fixer purposes) is quite safe in this regard. the 4-aminophenol has low vapour pressure as well as potassium hydroxide (another dangerous component of the Rodinal/Adonal developer) . but you can use gas mask if huge ventilation system is not possible. not a big deal really. the real danger is if you swallow it or get it to your eyes, especially the concentrate
  14. yep I have had more even results by developing in a washing bucket in a darkroom. but it makes lots of scratches to the film and also wastes quite a lot of chemicals ( I used 10 litres per batch for that compared to 2 l in Lomo tank ) In Lomo tank you don't run the film back and forth, you just roll it to the spiral at an angle once. you also run the film through the scanner only once. I mainly check focus issues with this system so it's perfectly fine for that. I haven't tried mixing the Adonal batch directly in the tank from maybe 1:5 to 1:25 or 1:50, that might reduce unevenness quite a bit if done quickly. other way would be to use the Lomo spiral without the tank in a darkroom and use the chemicals in buckets so that the applying is very quick. that would create the best results but eats up more chemicals. the tank parts are also very fragile so it is not a good idea to mess with them too much in total darkness, one mistake costs 150 $ or more. it is also practical only with low cost developers like Rodinal/Adonal, Microdol X or Coffenol, would not try that with anything expensive and very air sensitive stuff like E6 developers or anything more poisonous than the 4-aminophenol /Methol developers already are <_<
  15. btw if you are really interested in making your own b/w film from the start, you can make silver bromide by yourself by using silver nitrate and potassium bromide. both are quite harmful chemicals and silver nitrate is also expensive. you can make it out of leftover silver using nitric acid (not expensive if you already have pure silver like bullions) but I would not try that in the States if you are a private person, it would probably attract NSA and FBI and/or DEA quite a lot :o it also creates poisonous gases and the acid itself is very dangerous stuff... you would still need to sensitise the silver bromide after that and work out the other aspects of the emulsion like the gelatine moulding and how to handle all the stages safely in reduced light or total darkness. There is however photographic emulsions which are sold in liquid form and can be used for example for painting on objects and textiles. maybe you should look on that first if you really want to make your own film stock for artistic purposes :)
  16. the orange mask also adds more noise to the blue channel which makes things even more complicated. and if using led lights it is quite difficult to find right colour temperature and good enough CRI lights for scanning purposes which fit the dimensions. you also need very good camera/capture device to be able to get usable contrast range from the negative with low enough noise and compression to be able to colour correct it to usable image. if you are shooting b/w exclusively you may benefit from a own scanning system in some situations because it is much easier to get usable image from it than out of reversal or colour negative. I made kind of a film scanner out of a Konvas camera a while ago but it only creates usable image with B/W neg and you have to post process the footage in After Effects to get rid of the led matrix http://aapolettinen.blogspot.fi/2015/05/making-film-scanner-out-of-konvas-camera.html . It also scratches film but for camera tests it is quite usable system if you develop the bw neg by yourself (otherwise not practical at all) samples (self developed in Lomo tank with Adonal) : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=paHQC762j3s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teuvaVQO42A
  17. as Tyler said I would save on processing and scanning and get the stock from a reputable seller. you will only save pennies by buying old ebay cans but you may ruin your entire film
  18. I'd be very careful with eBay short ends, they are usually very old and you never know what you'll got and especially how it is stored. the prices are not that good either considering the fact that the film may be completely unusable condition and may even have been x-rayed several times in the worst case. processing b/w negative by yourself is very cost effective, processing b/w reversal still is but not as much. Processing color negative is lots of work and may not be economical at all. and processing color reversal is not economical nowadays because the chemicals are so expensive and have very short shelf life
  19. I think it's practical only if you have to constantly change film mid-roll. otherwise you will be much happier with the K3. the magazine can be changed in daylight but it has to be loaded in total darkness
  20. I use the K2 quite a lot with current films without problems. the perforations and film dimensions are the same so why not. the cassette system is useful if you have lots of different stocks on same shoot and have to be able to switch them every 20 ft. or so. otherwise it is pain in the *** and causes dust/gate hair very easily especially if you handle it the wrong way. it is also more difficult to load the cartridges in darkroom than it ever is with the daylight spools. so, if you are using the camera for film stock testing then it is useful system but otherwise I would just use the K3
  21. the one way mirror is based on that the observer side has lot less or no light at all compared to the subject side. you will see through to the observer side as well if there is enough light on that side. same principle than how a normal glass window behaves at night but the partially reflective metal coating (just like in ordinary mirror except no protective lacquer on the surface) enhances the effect
  22. when I was child I was playing with normal mirrors by removing the back protective layer or them with solvent ( I think acetone worked for this) so that I got *kind of* one way mirror. The aluminum surface scratches very easily in the process but it may not matter if the scratches are out of focus. eats up lots of light though and changes colors. If there is a factory near you that manufactures mirrors they could probably sell you couple of coated mirrors without the protective layer. or you could also have one made in a optical company (may be expensive though)
  23. there is someone's test setup https://www.flickr.com/photos/dark_orange/sets/72157603226919391/
  24. I saw somewhere an example of this kind of stuff a while ago (maybe 10 years ago or so) . Of course you can get clear film (just get perforated base material so that you don't have to mechanically engineer a feasible perforating machine) and coat it by yourself. The coating process is actually the most difficult part, not the chemical compositions. And the gelatin is very difficult to get to stick to the film surface so that it would not peel away when it dries. probably it will cost a lot more than buying factory made film, but can be done if you have enough time, know how and equipment
×
×
  • Create New...