Dom Jaeger

It's possible that some stray light within the mirror cavity is reflecting off a shiny surface back onto the film. If it came from the side you would see a shadow line along the edge of the frame - the shadow from the edge wall of the gate aperture. If you look through the lens port with the mirror out of the way, check there are no shiny metal surfaces visible around the gate, particularly on the right side. If there are, you can easily touch them up with some very matte black paint.

Hi Ed, in their current state the Ultrascope set we have aren't as sharp as properly calibrated Lomos. I think they need some tweaking to get the anamorphic elements exactly aligned, but I've never had the time to do it. Currently they're fine stopped down about 3 stops. But from projecting them they look like with a bit of work they would come up as well if not better than Lomos. They seem to have better contrast wide open, and no edge drop off. They are a bit smaller and lighter than Lomos, and about as fast (f2 on the 40 and 50mm, f2.8 on the 85, f4 on the 135). Because they are square front (front focusing anamorphic) they get the mumps, like square front Lomos (ie the squeeze factor alters slightly depending on the focus distance). That also means they would get strong anamorphic flaring. I'm actually quite curious as to how good they could be. They have the Zeiss build quality, which is superior to Lomo of course.

Zeiss made Standard mount anamorphics for the Arri 2C back in the 50s under the name Ultrascope. We have a set at the rental house I work for - they're quite nice really. Sadly they never get used. I believe both Joe Dunton Cameras and Technovision made anamorphics utilising Cookes, some of which might be in Std mount. The Dunton ones were called Crystal Express.

Keep the EL! As beautiful as the Arri S cameras are, they are not good candidates for conversion, if you try you will have all sorts of problems. The EL can be converted to Super16, or Ultra if you must. With the Arri the image quality will be dependent on the lenses available, namely Standard mounts - most of which by now won't be in great shape and the really good ones, like Cooke Kinetals, are hard to come by. And they generally won't cover a wider frame. If you get a later model Arri SB with a Bayonet mount your lens options open up somewhat, but with adapters the Bolex EL can take PL mount primes, as well as the excellent C-mount Kern Switars (which will be handy for the wide end, as they were designed for the Bolex prism). Despite not being pin registered, a well serviced Bolex can be very steady. Both cameras are MOS so if you're serious about 16mm filmmaking you should probably consider selling the Arri S and investing in a synch-sound camera instead. Arri SR2s are going pretty cheap these days. My 2 cents, to be taken with a grain of salt and a shot of tequila. B)

Never got my hands on one, but I have a manual here somewhere. Temporarily misplaced it. From memory they were polarised, used 2 Kern Yvar lenses, with a projector attachment and a parallax adjusting mechanism. It was recommended to use a special high luminance screen for projection, which Bolex also sold. I don't think it took off, so not many were made. Consequently rather rare.

Hi Paul, it certainly would be very interesting to see a high quality scan of double 8 footage. As Brian pointed out, 16mm film won't work in a d8 camera, but unslit d8 will run through a 16mm camera or projector. The projected 16mm image will show 4 x 8mm frames, with the 2 on the right upside down and running in reverse. So I would imagine it's possible to scan d8 as 16mm, with each 4k scan capturing 4 frames. If you can digitally split that in half, presumably you can split it into quarters? The only issue I can think of is if the camera alignment of claw pulldown to gate aperture is off, and the exposed 8mm frame is not centred between perfs. Then when viewed as a 16mm image the 2 left 8mm frames will be higher or lower than the 2 right frames, and possibly exceed the scanned area. But that can be adjusted fairly simply in most d8 cameras.

Yes you're correct, if the ground glass frame marking is not offset it will be for S35. I'm not sure you'll even find a N35 ground glass with spherical 2.35:1 markings. The options are generally a scope g.g. in N35 using anamorphic lenses or a S35 g.g. with 2.35 markings for spherical lenses. Cropping a N35 frame to 2.35 will cost you more than half of your neg. Renting a set of Lomo anamorphics shouldn't break the bank. Otherwise, how important is a widescreen aspect ratio to the story? If you don't even have a budget for lenses, it seems a little silly to pay for 35mm quality and then throw half of it away.

I just serviced a set of Canon K35s (hadn't encountered them before) and I must say I was incredibly impressed. Very nice glass, at least as sharp and almost as fast as Zeiss Super Speeds but I found on projection they held up better wide open. The 14mm seems to be a rehoused stills lens, but the rest are all designed as cine lenses as far as I can tell. Very good build quality, lovely iris. They're BNCR mount, as most of them seem to be from the little research I've done, which explains why they tend to be used primarily by animation and effects outfits these days - one of the few places you still find a working Mitchell. I imagine part of the reason the set I worked on is in such good condition is because it rarely leaves the confines of a studio. I was curious if anyone knew some features that have used these lenses, or a little more about their history?

Any PL mount lens will have its back focus set to 52.00 mm. The ffd (flange focal depth or distance) refers to the distance from lens mount to film plane on a camera. This is usually set fractionally under 52.00 mm on most film cameras that I'm familiar with, except high speed SRs, which have a different pressure plate, and are set at exactly 52.00 mm. PL mounted digital cameras like REDs or Alexa also have their sensors set at 52.00 mm behind the mount. So any PL mount lens designed for digital use should work fine on a PL mount film camera. The one thing to watch out for is how far the rear element protrudes. As far as I know, RED primes are OK (I haven't tested them), but Angenieux's digital Optimo zooms for example protrude far enough back to foul on the mirror/shutter of a film camera. Apart from the lack of wide angle options as Rob mentioned, the other issue with using 35mm lenses on 16mm cameras is the possibility of stray light from the oversized image circle bouncing around the mirror cavity and hitting the film. As far as image quality goes, I know a very successful wildlife documentary cinematographer who only ever rents the old 16mm Standard Speed Zeiss lenses for his work. According to him nothing beats them. Matter of taste, I guess. If your only criterion is perceived sharpness, more modern lenses will probably suit you better.

Also the Cinemagic Revolution and, best of the lot, the Optex Excellence.

A bit late to the party here, but I recently watched Lake Mungo, screened for the first time on Australian free-to-air TV, and wanted to congratulate John and all involved on a fantastic film. For my money it's one of the best 'documentary' style supernatural mysteries I've seen. Why dismal trash like Paranormal Activity can get so much publicity while gems like this are overlooked is an aspect of the industry that is as disheartening as it is predictable. I'd highly recommend it to anyone who likes their ghost stories plausible, atmospheric and chilly as opposed to gore-filled and effects heavy. As much a meditation on loss as it is a mystery, I also thought it made excellent use of just about every format imaginable to reconstruct the story. I particularly liked the occasional interludes of beautifully shot 35mm to punctuate a mood. There's a detailed description of the film and its making on John's blog where among other things he talks about some of the 40(!) different cameras he used: http://johnbrawley.wordpress.com/2011/04/01/lake-mungo-a-picture-never-lies/ Great stuff John!

Hi Karl, by DR8 do you mean double run 8? What's the camera? Do you not know the shutter speed?

In their day the Zeiss Super Speeds were top of the line and used on countless features, TVCs, docos etc, but lens design has come a long way in 30 years. The modern Zeiss cine lenses are cooler, sharper, less prone to flare, breath less and have higher contrast, especially at wider apertures. But that's a comparison with some of the best lenses currently on the planet.. As with anything to do with art, what's 'good' is often subjective. Some people prefer the look of older lenses to newer ones, sometimes it suits the mood required. Ultra Primes are actually slower, if speed is a requirement. As far as build quality goes, the newer lenses are probably more robust, and heavier (especially Master Primes) but just as accurate in their scaling. Given the age of Super Speeds though, there can be quite a difference lens to lens. Coating damage or element scratches, thread wear, shiny iris blades etc can impact on an individual lens's performance. Also certain lenses, such as the 12mm, were never that great to begin with. The T* marked lenses had what was then a newly developed technology: multi-coated elements that reduced flare and increased contrast, speed and colour fidelity. Much like the stars on detergent packets that say "new and improved". Not sure about the 26.. serial no lens. East German Zeiss lenses were always branded Zeiss Jena as far as I'm aware. It might be an old lens that was rehoused?

During the software upgrade I believe each mag needs to be fitted to the camera. It sounds like this mag may have been missed. The upgrade needs to be redone with that mag attached. Our LT and mags had already been upgraded when we received them, so I haven't done this personally. I'm just recalling what I read about the software upgrade procedure. Best to call Arri and be properly informed.

To completely isolate the zoom elements from the front and rear groups you would tape the zoom at the wide end and the focus at minimum. But the reverse is generally safe too (ie zoom at long end, focus at infinity), the benefit being the heavy focus group is fully engaged in the threads. I'd avoid shipping with the zoom at the wide end and focus at infinity, since the front element of the zoom group and rear element of the focus group are very close in that combination. Also avoid leaving either zoom or focus somewhere in the middle of their range, as a knock could cause a bump in the travel mechanisms.

Thanks for taking the time to find that out, Jean-Louis. Very interesting.

Hi Jean-Louis, I thought that might be the case, but then how do you know when the aperture limitation kicks in? Does the maximum aperture slowly move from f2 to f2.8 through the focal range, or does it only begin as you approach telephoto? I imagine it's a condition of the lens having a long (15 x) zoom range, so maybe only the very long end is affected?

You can remove the viewing screen by loosening the 2 screws that hold the retainer and sliding the retainer up. Using a piece of masking tape you can then hold the bottom of the screen and slide it out. On earlier models there was a spring clip instead of a retainer, which could be unlatched on the right side and swung clockwise out of the way. The screen can be cleaned with alcohol and a cotton swab. I'm not sure if you'll find one without the TV safe markings. The front barrel on Angenieux zooms often stated the maximum geometric aperture (f-stop), while the iris ring was marked in photometric stops (T). So the 10-150 is T2.3 but f2. I don't know why it reads 2 - 2.8 though.

Buster Keaton's The General. A masterpiece of the silent era, and after 85 years still more entertaining than just about every modern blockbuster.

Unlike a film camera, which can be mechanically checked very precisely with a depth gauge, digital cameras need to be checked optically. A collimator or chart test (or diagonal newspaper test) are some of the methods available to check flange depth, but they all rely on the lens used being spot on. You can do multiple checks with different lenses, or check the test lens on a collimator first, but the simplest way is to use what Arri themselves use, a Denz Flange Depth Controller (FDC). It's basically a mini collimator housed in a lens, which gets fitted to the camera mount. The camera is connected to a monitor, and by adjusting the FDC barrel a simple bar graphic shows exactly when the flange depth is correct. A scale on the FDC barrel then tells you how many hundredths of a mm you need to add or remove from the mount shimming. Very simple and portable. I believe other companies now also make versions of the same idea. Because of the robust build quality and design of Arri cameras generally, once the flange depth is set it rarely needs adjustment. But it's one of the checks a rental house does regularly.

If you've got a reflex model, don't forget you need to compensate for light loss in the beam splitting prism. If you move the turret out of the way (or remove the taking lens) you can see it behind the filter holder. The prism sits between the lens and the film plane and diverts about 1/4 of the light to the viewfinder, allowing you to see through the lens even when filming. The first reflexes still had the 144 degree shutter angle, giving about 1/60 sec exposure time at 24 fps as you calculated, but taking into account the prism light loss the 'adapted' exposure time is about 1/75 sec, not far off the 1/80 sec 'adapted' exposure time of later reflex models. If you look through the archives of cinematography.com in the Bolex forum you'll find plenty of discussions about how people work out their exposures for reflex Bolexes. Some use the 'adapted' exposure time, some prefer to offset the ISO setting on their meter, others just open the lens 2/3 of a stop more than their meter indicates (using a meter with frame rates and an assumed shutter angle of 180 degrees). None of this explains your problem though. Given that you calculated for 1/48 sec exposure time, your footage should be about 2/3 of a stop underexposed, not over. Even if your camera was running extremely slow, say 18 fps when the speed dial indicated 24, the footage would still not be overexposed. Did you check the iris of the lens as Bernie suggested? Or your meter? Could you have made a mistake with the film stock speed?

The exposure time varies depending on what kind of H16 Bolex you have. On early cameras (below serial no 100401) the shutter angle is 192 degrees, so at 24fps the exposure time will be 1/45 sec. Later non-reflex cameras have a shutter angle of 144 degrees, giving an exposure time of 1/60 sec at 24 fps. The reflex models (except the EBM and EL) have a shutter angle of 133 degrees, but also lose about a quarter of the light due to the prism, so the 'adapted' exposure time (taking into account the prism loss) is 1/80 sec at 24fps. If your footage is overexposed, it sounds like you may have an early model with a 192 degree shutter, although the difference between 1/48 sec (which you say you calculated) and 1/45 sec should be negligible. The later cameras would actually give you underexposed footage if you measured for a 180 degree shutter. The most likely explanation is that your camera is running slow, and giving you longer exposure times than you are calculating for. Have you used the camera with other lenses?

It's a little hard to see exactly, but the claw looks a bit odd. I'm wondering if perhaps the front plate was removed at some point and the two claws (forward and reverse) were mixed up and positioned incorrectly when the front was refitted. Looking from above with the turret forward, the longer claw should be to the left and the smaller reverse claw to the right. They both attach at the same pivot. With a very small screwdriver you can undo the two screws holding the plate that covers the claw pivot, remove the plate and have a closer look.

I guess the Mutar expands the image circle well beyond what the lens was designed for, and anything outside the 16mm diameter limit doesn't intersect at the iris. It's interesting that the image still projects sharply to the edges even over that limit when the iris is opened up. Maybe an optical engineer could explain it! Yes, same one. I don't know. It's the only one I'm aware of. Your lens is actually an Arri bayonet mount, different to Arri STD (Standard) mount, which was an earlier design. Standard mount lenses will fit in a bayonet mount camera but not the reverse.

It can't hurt to call up some rental houses that deal in film gear and ask if you can come in and familiarise yourself with the equipment. All the rental houses I've worked for have always been happy to let assistants do that, especially if you've already read all the handbooks. After all, it's in their interests that the people using their gear are familiar with it.