Frank Wylie

Very interesting camera. Apropos of nothing; I once owned an Art Reeves Reflex from 1944/45. It was a beam-splitter/pellicule 35mm camera that was developed for filming on the B29 Super fortress bomber. Reeves was unable to generate interest in the camera after WWII and only a few survived the scrap heap when the bombers were junked post-conflict. Wish I had never sold that camera...

There are many software plugins that simulate lens flare, so it could be natural to the lens or added artistically with a plugin. Here's an old article about Knoll Light Factory and some of the available effects. https://www.provideocoalition.com/review-red-giant-vfx-suite/

God I hated that "developing fluid", which was basically powdered iron suspended in a Carbon tet, Perchloroethylene or some other nasty, carcinogenic suspension. You had to paint it on the edge of the Quad tape and the iron particles would align with the recorded sine wave of the control track. I that manner, you could make a cut on each tape segment that would (sometimes) not cause a complete image roll when you spliced it back together again, but I was never great at it. The very first job I got in TV involved transferring the entire Hammer Film and API Film libraries from quad to 3/4 U-Matic (what a waste of time; the quad looked better!) for a late night "spook show" at midnight. The General Manager bought the quad for pennies on the dollar because no one else wanted to deal with the quad and the 1 inch C format library was about 5X the cost. Quad could actually give you quite a nice image when everything was lined up proper and nice.

OK, I stand corrected. Sorry about that; I don't deal a lot with that format lately... As Dom suggests, perhaps the projector is at fault. Have you tried another projector?

The projector you show is Super 8mm. The film strip you show is Regular 8mm. You have Double Regular 8mm.

I do not know of any safe way to preview unslit Double Super 8mm film. Paying someone to slit it and put it on spools (maybe even clean it ultrasonically) so you can use a typical Super 8mm editor/viewer is probably the least costly option, but do get a decent viewer like a Goko or an Elmo and CLEAN and TEST it before you run your film through the thing! Don't get a crappy Baia or other plastic monstrosity; you will regret it!

Double Super 8mm is exactly the same as Super 8mm once it has been slit in two; it should play back fine on a typical Super 8mm projector after being slit . Are you sure you aren't trying to project Double Regular 8mm film that has been slit? If the sprocket hole is the same size as a 16mm, you have Standard Regular 8mm or Slit Double Regular 8mm (same thing)...

Lower gamma is essentially pulling the film; processing it less/faster in the developer, which means you have to expose a bit more to get the same target density. This also affects the slope of the characteristic curve and flattens it out a bit. We typically maintain 3 gammas for dupe negative stocks: .50, .60 and .70 gamma. What we do is done to overcome the inherent contrast build-up that results from copying an element to another element; i.e., an inter positive to a dupe negative or a print to a dupe negative. What Mr. Müller did was give himself more meat in the negative without dramatically pushing the shadows into the mud. 0.05 gamma is not a huge reduction in "normal" gamma, which is 0.65 for camera original b&w negative, but it is enough to push the highlights down from the top of the shoulder toward the toe and improve highlight detail.

As Charles suggests, Toland's skill as a cinematographer, in conjunction with a good film lab, gifted set designers, grips, gaffers and even the Director, was the "secret sauce" that made Kane look so good. A good book on the subject is here: https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520205673/the-making-of-citizen-kane-revised-edition Although, I have to interject that author Carringer does a good job exploring the complex circumstances that created Kane, like most film historians, the technical details are pretty superficial and treated like a dead mouse; to be examined and disposed of as soon as possible. Too bad Film Historians as a general rule have no working or practical knowledge of the technology that produced the very media they propose to study. Kind of like an expert who designs race tracks who has never driven a car... I would suggest a better avenue to gain insights on how to obtain the lighting effects in Kane would be to study the classic, "Painting with Light" by John Alton. https://www.amazon.com/Painting-Light-John-Alton/dp/0520275845 I was lucky enough to stumble across an original hardback copy at a used book store, but the reprint is good too.

Actually, there WERE VHS splicing tape kits sold by Leader in the USA. It was aluminized mylar tape and had a splicing block that looked like a 1/4 inch audio tape block. Forget about a seamless splice as far as a coherent image goes. You will get a control track glitch and image roll. Use a mylar tape, demagnetize a pair of scissors (or use aluminum ones) and lay the tape across itself where the splice is supposed to be. Cut both tape ends simultaneously without losing alignment (or buy a splicing block). Let the outgoing edge of the splice slightly overlap the incoming bit of video tape. The overlap MUST be in the direct that the heads spin; you should get the concept. If you do this NEVER reverse the splice over the spinning heads; i.e., don't scan or search over the splice but hit rewind and let the tape fully retract into the case before rewinding. Also, never leave a gap with the adhesive peeking through; you will be sorry. This splice is intended for a ONE TIME transfer of the tape, not an archival fix. https://www.ebay.com/itm/174510297798?hash=item28a19fd2c6:g:ZroAAOSwOgdgAHhe Oh yeah... CLEAN your VHS deck after you run this tape. Oxide will undoubtedly be loaded up in the heads...

Ugh. MP4. Not a good file format at all for editing; barely good for viewing. If that's all you can get, transcode it to DNxHR SQ or Apple Pro Res before you try to edit. The files will be larger but you won't encounter all the weird issues with on-the-fly decompression your computer has to do during the edit. Well, it doesn't mean that the transfer/conversion is OK; just that you should expect a few artifacts. I would show it to them and see if you can get a better transfer. It could be that you have frame cadence, field-order and interlace issues IF they used a hardware encoder and didn't set it up right. You wouldn't believe just how complex a simple transfer can become and all the things that go wrong! Here's an FAQ from the source listed above on frame cadence: https://www.insync.tv/information-learning/faqs/ The second link is from Chris and Trish Meyer; the stone cold gurus of Adobe After Effects. It might deal with After effects settings, but the article is a great tutorial on problems that might occur with a bad field order. Good luck.

Let me get this straight: it is a S-VHS tape that was digitized to... what? What was the file format you received? No scanning was involved; only a standards conversion. Your S-VHS tape was recorded at an INTERLACED 29.97 fps, so if you had it converted to a 24 or 30 fps file, there has to be some frame duplication/elimination and consolidation to make it work UNLESS you throw it in DaVinci Resolve and use Optical Flow to re-time the footage. Here's an explanation of frame rates from silent film to NTSC that should help understand the problem.

I would lean more toward the late 1940's over the late 1950's. That woman peeking out from the curtain behind the counter in the second photo... looks like a hostage situation...

Spectra Cine Professional light meters (the old ones) are relatively cheap on the used market and they have direct foot candle readout. Of course, this is the cat's meow: http://www.spectracine.com/product_2.html

Shoot in full white light with a chromakey colored "print" square in tray. In post, corner pin match track the photo, pull a luma key to get the water ripples, drop in your image and slowly cross dissolve from a full white matte patch to the image. Grade entire image to orange/red with primaries. No method of shooting was stated; film or digital or film to digital. Makes a difference...

Not enough information to give advice...

Good. It's an incredibly complex software package, I can't imagine trying to fix all the bugs!

The best place to get information/support for DaVinci Resolve is at their Forum Board: https://forum.blackmagicdesign.com/ Please read the FAQ before posting; it saves a lot of time and you get an answer much quicker if you follow their instructions. https://forum.blackmagicdesign.com/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=90190&sid=2a720aa7eff4b1ab0a7561a0772c33a7

You could probably rig up a good lens support with off the shelf matt box rods and brackets made by SmallRig and others. No need to reinvent the wheel!

Bruce, I'd agree if you are going to utilize the control surface on an ongoing and regular basis (i.e. professional). However, in my opinion, the cost simply does not justify itself for casual use or even learning the fundamentals. It all depends on how serious the user is about color grading and how much of a budget you have to pursue the craft. If you can't afford the panel, it shouldn't stop you from learning with a mouse and keyboard. If I had to prioritize, a good monitor would come before the panel. I don't have a panel on my home system, but then again, I don't grade outside of work for my living. YMMV. Again, it all depends on your circumstances...

You can use smartphone footage, as long as you can apply the proper image transform to translate it to the color gamut of the intended finished product. Don't take this wrong but, first of all "standard" smartphone footage has absolutely no meaning. You'll need to investigate your footage from the smart phone and determine exactly what codec was used to encode the video in order to use it properly when mixing it with other codec types (even of the same resolution). Some smartphones have variable frame rates that cause huge problems if not recognized and addressed during post production. Simply calling something "crap" without knowing why it won't work in the context you would like it to work, is a failure to do the hard work required to understand the limitations of your source footage. The color calibration chip chart auto white balance routine in Resolve only addresses attempting to get the light in the scene to somewhere close to neutral color balance. It does nothing to adjust frame rate or how the actual colors are going to react within the timeline if you are using the wrong color space. Resolve is a complex, very versatile tool that can do wonders If you take the time to learn how to use it right. This takes much time, effort and a desire to learn/retain. If you put in the time, learn actually what is going on "under the hood", you will automatically know what you can and cannot do with mixed footage from various devices. This doesn't mean that you have to sell all your possessions and enter a monastery for a decade to study the problem, but it does mean you need to dedicate the time and effort to understanding what the problem is at hand and to devote the time and effort to learn how to address those specific issues to arrive at a good product. If you continue to do this as a matter of routine (assuming this is what you want to actually do for a living), then it will become automatic and your comfort and abilities with many forms of moving images and color spaces will grow with your experience and become a valuable tool.

You can use a standard keyboard and mouse just fine. The big issue is having a graphics card with enough meat to do the top resolution you wish to export,a lot of very fast disk space and a good calibrated monitor at a bare minimum. The sofware maybe be free or cheap, but the hardware is NOT...

Sometimes for secrecy, sometimes because creative types can't make up their mind until the last second and probably a few more I can't think of at the moment...

I have seen the turret removed and a solid plate installed in it's place with a single lens port. The turret lock plug should work for all but the largest lenses, and if it is that large, you should look into a cradle that bolts to the bottom of the camera and provides an adjustable lens support...

Here is a totally free, but very intense, training program for DaVinci Resolve that will answer all your questions within the context of operating Resolve. While it is program specific, the concepts of color management are pretty universal for all grading programs. https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/training Scroll down to training books and download the book and video clips. You can even be certified by Blackmagic for free. I took it when version 16 was in effect and it was very good. However, the basic strategy is to choose a wide color gamut (like DaVinci Wide Color Gamut or Rec 2020) that will easily encompass all your source color spaces, regardless of origination (log, Raw, Rec. 709 etc.) and use image transforms to translate these divergent color spaces to a "universal" color map. Once you have transformed and normalized your shots to a neutral, balanced timeline, THEN grade for the look by applying your style and/or using creative LUTS to a finished look. When locked, then your finished job can be exported and mapped to the target color space to preserve the "look" over a wide variety of target, end color gamuts. This way you can do HDR, Rec 709 and other end products while preserving your artistic intent. It's a bit more involved than this attempt at a simplified explanation, but that is it in a nutshell.