Wooda McNiven

Congratulations to Mono No Aware for achieving (and exceeding) its Kickstarter goal. I was more than happy to contribute and I look forward to its future motion picture lab in Brooklyn NY. I wish them success and will urge those young artists I know in and around Brooklyn to go ahead and work on a project, big or small, that uses Super 8mm and/or 16mm film!

I have to say I think Mono No Aware is a terrific initiative. I agree with Perry's assessment and he should know... I have used Gamma Ray Digital's services (Perry's company) and they are top notch. I will be using them again. As someone who attended NYU film school back in the late 70's / early 80's, I remember when I could drop off a roll of B/W reversal film to a local lab in the morning and have it back in the afternoon. We had at least half-a-dozen labs to choose from back then in Manhattan. To the best of my knowledge, there are no remaining film labs in the greater New York City metropolitan era. I couldn't find any for a recent project of mine so I had to use Cinelab in the Boston area (still in business, thank goodness) and Alpha Cine in Seattle, which sadly is no longer in business. This is a sad thing indeed given the thousands of talented young artists living in the NYC area, particularly in Brooklyn, which is a thriving hub of young artists of all types, many of which would jump at the chance to undertake projects using Super 8mm and/or 16mm film if resources were readily available and reasonably priced. I have helped fund movie and multimedia projects (all digital based) for a few Brooklyn-based artists and some of them have expressed a real interest in doing something using film. I wish Mono No Aware the best of luck and they are in the perfect place and time to make this happen. Wooda

Guess I've been away a while. Thank you Jay. Matt Stevens gave me a lot of great advice recently including a suggestion that I get Howard's Keep made into a Blu Ray format. So that's my goal for this year. I will call up Perry at Gamma Ray Digital and see about getting this done.

Thank you everyone for the kind comments about my movie. I'm just a hobbyist but I learned a lot making this and also received a lot of great advice here at cinematography.com while I was in production. As some of you may already know, Kodak is holding a Super 8mm challenge. Unfortunately the time limitation for entries is five minutes. This is dissappointing as I would love to have entered "Howard's Keep" but it is ten minutes in length. Oh well, dems da breaks! Wooda

It took a couple of years but my film "Howard's Keep" is ready in time for the Halloween season. Shot all on Super 8 Tri-X, (Canon 1014 XLS and 1014E) it's a ten minute dark fantasy. Make sure to watch it in HD mode and headphones are best but at minimum, turn up the volume... my sound guy did an awesome job. I finished principal photography not long before Alpha Cine stopped processing film, so it was the lab I used. The HD transfers were done by Perry at Gamma Ray Digital in Boston. And finally, I've asked for a lot of advice on this forum over the years and so much of it was helpful (thank you) so I had to give cinematography.com a credit at the end. It's only right! Hope you enjoy. Wooda H. McNiven https://vimeo.com/143762163

I once faced a similar situation... if I understand your situation correctly. We just used cheap old women's hairspray. It cut down on the specular reflection of various surfaces. It also was used to fog up windows so the background (through the windows) did not create a distraction for the viewer.

In the NY Metropolitan area there is another service (in Brooklyn) called DijiFi. I have been meaning to give them a try but have not yet. They use MovieStuff equipment and seem reasonably priced.

I sent in my last three rolls of Super 8 on December 28. On January 31, I finally received shipping notice from Dwaynes. Should be in my mailbox by week's end. They must have had one huge backlog of Kodachrome (all types). In the past, I usually got Super 8 and 35mm rolls back in a week.

When I was in high school and college in the late 70's, early 80's, I worked at a camera shop just outside New York City. For Kodachrome and Ektachrome processing by Kodak (there was another less expensive lab we used for our price conscious customers), normal turnaround time was 48 to 72 hours. However, we had a rush bag, which usually resulted in a 24 hour turnaround. I think the Kodak lab was in Cherry Hill NJ. Needless to say, I always put my own personal films into the rush bag. Those were the days!

I sent my last three rolls USPS Priority mail on Tuesday, December 29th. According to the online tracker, my film made it on December 30 with only an hour or two to spare to deadline. A week later, on January 6, I finally received my PayPal notification. I think Dwaynes is working through a very large backlog this week for all Kodachrome that made it under the deadline.

I agree completely with Friedemann. In addition, get as familiar as you can with the camera before principal photography. Read the instruction manual. Little things, like correctly setting the eyepiece diopter (to the camera operator) can make a big difference in the quality of your results. If you can shoot a test roll (highly recommended) try and do it under similar conditions to what the real shooting will be like.

Just set the camera's aperture to the reading indicated on your light meter. I recently conducted a series of lighting and exposure tests using a Sekonic L-398M, Tri-X, and a Canon 1014XLS. The shots were outdoor at night using various lighting set ups and differing footcandle measurements on a human subject (that needed to be properly exposed). My primary concern was T-Stops. But I found that the best exposure was in fact the one indicated by the Sekonic. This held true up to a 30mm focal length. As I didn't use a focal length longer than 30mm during these tests, I did not find out if a T-Stop adjustment was needed in the 30 to 60mm range. As you are using negative film, which has much more exposure latitude than reversal, you should be just fine setting the camera to the f-stop indicated on your external light meter.

Use it or lose it is right. On the plus side, I sent to Dwayne's 5 rolls of K40 on 10/12 and received them all back on 10/18, less than a week. Nice turnaround time. I plan to shoot my remaining rolls of K40 all within the next month.

What about a Digital SLR that can shoot video (Nikon, Canon)? I've seen some impressive video footage from these cameras. I haven't gone down this path yet but I do intend to give it a whirl soon.

Chris, any recommendations on labs? Also, please explain 'flat pass transfer' (to date, I'm just a reversal shooter). Thanks!