Tom Chabbat

I've worked on some occasions with Color City. They're great if you're short on time, because it's the closest lab there is in Paris, and if you're sweet enough with them they can be really quick to process. Their prices are ok for processing, but expensive for scan. If you have more time, and less money, processing and scanning from Andec in Berlin is a cheaper option.

We really should focus on keeping those little marvels running instead of introducing new useless junk. But capitalist/industrialist societies have to make us believe we always need new things to make profits. They made us all believe newer always equals better.

Love your homemade work ;) but it doesn't look like it was milled but filed, am I wrong ? Right now I'm wondering about purchasing a milling attachement to my Unimat 3 to get the job done, I think that should do the trick... Has anyone modified himself a NPR, be it in S or U16 ? There's a LOT of screw around the gate and I wonder which are the ones I need to get off to put just the gate away. Still on the NPR, does the U16 modified units got a new ground glass with proper marking or do you just put a frame mask on the slot just before the ground glass ? (And how did you get the ground glass/make the frame mask ?)

I'm curious, how did you do it ? Do you have your own lathe or mill ? Or did you go to some workshop ? Which one of these formats you use the most in the end ?

Hi all, I was curious to know, is there anyone here shooting in the ultra16 format in Europe ? And if so, how do you get your conversion, film processing and transfer ? From the few information I succeed to gather it seems the only U16 friendly facilities are all based in the U.S. The most recent post of european filmmakers I found here comes back to more than four years ago, so I'd be curious to know if things evolved since, as I'm seriously considering adopting it. I'd very much like to see this format stepping a little more into the light.

You got my attention there... Do you have footage you shot at this frame rate ? I'd really be curious to see it. I don't think I ever saw something shot at 12 fps. I only suspect some shots of the 1977 japanese film "Hausu" (House) to have this frame rate, but can't confirm. Anyway I'm glad I'm not the only one terrified about going under 24... I just wish we could have more choice for the screenings, DCP standards. I mean, it's all about the possibility of going slower. I'm not saying everyone should use les than 24 fps but it would be great if those who actually want could.

I agree 16 fps may be too low, but a lot of people were quite pleased with 18 fps. But that's not my point. Of course with higher frame rates you'll have higher temporal resolution. But while we can always go higher, do we really need to do so ? Do we really need 30, 48 or 60 fps ? When people see a movie, do they think "aah, this was shot at 48 fps, it really made the film great" ? I think this trend to always go higher will cost us much in the long term. There's no valable reason to me to use higher frame rates than 24 fps. But I think going lower could help a little... Well, per second, 4 frames is not much. But over a whole feature film, it begins to be much. And over a lot of movies, well... 4 frames less is equal to 16% savings on everything. So when people are accustomed to something, we can't change it ? A generation ago we were all well accustomed to slower frame rates, and yet we changed it. So why can't we change it back ? I'm sure I'm not the only one thinking television's smooth pictures look crappy...

In this 1975 issue of American Cinematographer, page 1290, there's a good case for filming at 18 fps while recording sound for Super 8 shooters. To summarize quickly, it mentions that when movies with sync sound came, standard frame rate was changed from 16 fps to 24 fps because higher speed permitted better quality in the optical audio track. But with the advent of magnetic sound recording, good audio quality was possible at lower frame rates so one could make his Super 8 sound films at 18 fps. While reading it, I wondered : with today's digital workflow, audio quality being totally independent of projected frame rate, why not going back to "roots" and shoot 16 or 18 fps ? Why not pushing for a new, slower sync sound standard ? I'm thinking of this because the reduced frame rates would equal money and energy savings. Cameras would require less power, we would need less storage capacity, less CPU requirements for manipulating the workflow (not to mention time savings in calculations), and so on. For celluloid fans like me, benefits would be huge too as it would directly reduce the price per minute of the whole chain, film stock, processing, printing and/or scanning. In today's context with film prices always going up, a little disount would me more than welcome ! And for sound engineers, running at a lower speed would made the cameras quieter. The only problem I can see has to deal with HMI lightings. Unless you use some expensive flicker free ballast, being able to shoot at 16 or 18 fps with 50 or 60 Hz HMI would require some pretty weird shutter openings to get 1/50th and 1/60th exact speeds. To solve this, I thought adopting a 20 fps standard would be a good compromise. With this frame rate, you can use 50 and 60Hz HMIs with 144° and 120° shutter openings respectively. Being more than 16% slower than 24 fps it would mean at least 16% savings in film stock, which is quite important for most productions. I'm beginning to like the idea of 20 fps, it's round, decimal and it's right in the middle between 16 and 24 fps... The cost of adopting this kind of new standard would be negligible. A little firmware update for most digital cameras. MagicLantern's firmware already makes it possible. Modern 35mm and 16mm cameras can readily shoot this way, as their quartz regulation works at all speeds (only older designs prior to the 1990's may need some adaptation, but nothing too expensive I think). And at last an update for DCP standards. All we need to do is to join forces to push the whole cinema community towards it. It could really benefit to anyone. I'm aware I'm going here against recent trends in our trade to do always more. Trends pushed by Cameron or Jackson to shoot 48 fps. To use 4K, soon 8K resolutions. And a little 3D on top of it, just to double everything in case we haven't enough yet. And please use the biggest sensor possible of course ! The industry is so pleased we need always more new products... While I'm not sure these trends really make a better cinema, I'm sure slowing down would at least help the world to go a little better. In a context of environmental and energy crisis, isn't time for us too cinematographers to push for slower, more eco friendly standards ? I know standards are created by people. This could only work if a good part of us, including the most influent ones, goes for it. So tell me, would you consider shooting slower ?

Well I don't want to do this debate again, but from the footage we've all seen online, Logmar's results aren't sharper than other beautiful examples found here, and that should speak for itself. What I sense here is always a will to "bash" super 8, wether from guys like Tyler who thinks it's not professional enough, or by Logmar advocates implying Kodak's engineers would market a flawed system. Reality is, Super 8 was a popular format. But to some here, "popular" is a bad word, as bad as "amateur" or "enthusiast". Because it's cheap, it must be ugly. Because it was intended for everyone, it can't be used for anything worth the attention, for real, serious, beautiful work. I'm glad most artists don't listen to them, don't wait for someone to tell them what is a professional camera or not to use them, aren't afraid to use the same means most people have to tell stories for the people.

Carl, I don't know if you remember the debate, but people here, including the guys from Logmar, believed it would not only improve registration but the whole image quality ! They were all certain that the combined pressure plate and registration pin would deliver a better sharpness to their image. In my opinion it partly explains Logmar's demise, as people were expecting too much for a camera, forgetting, as I said, that image quality is a function of the lens and film stock combination only.

Mirror shutter has been available on super 8 camera since the very beginning with the Beaulieu S2008 in 1965. Same thing with "independent" gate as you call it, since Fuji Single 8 system was too introduced shortly after Super 8 in 1965 (and Pathé made Double Super 8 cameras in the same period). Crystal motor lock came as early as 1971 when the folks of Super 8 Sound began adding crystal modules to existing cameras. You can read their story there. This document is very interesting because it shows how even in the 70's there was a push to make Super 8 more "serious".

That's a point I was trying to make when the Logmar guys were still developing their camera. Some guys here thought adding registration pin and an more traditional pressure plate would somewhat magically improve the image quality. Of course when first sample shot was released, all could see it looks the same as the best super 8 videos we've already seen. Because the quality of a film motion picture all comes down to filmstock and lens. What really is the super 8 look ? An ultra cropped 35mm film with a 1960-70's zoom lens. I think the picture instability we observe in super 8 does not come from the films sprocket holes or cameras but from our digital era. Films always looked to me rock steady when projected the "old way", via a film projector, but it's when we transfer it digitally that problems show. As explained above, They ARE the same format. Only the cartridge design differs.

You nailed it Carl, Super 8 is for film nerds ;) Tyler, being mean won't prove your point. Artists and nerds having fun are to me much more enjoyable than "pros" doing commercial stuff.

I don't understand why most people here are so attached to the "professional" word. As if what you make only counts if you get paid for it. I don't mind using an "amateur" format or "amateur" cameras. If they can get me cool pictures, that's all I'm asking for. Is there a lot of people here getting paid for their super 8 footage ? The extremely rare times I do get paid for super 8, it's never for having sync sound dialogues with ultra clean and steady pictures. It's for having THE super 8 look, this amateur look I find so terribly cool. I'm not afraid to say that most times I use super 8, it's for myself. I don't care getting paid or not for it. I do it just because I like it. Humans made art before they invented money, so we don't need money to make art.

I wonder if Kodak will succeed making more than 50 camera ;) I think consumerist logics don't apply in the graveyard of consumerism Super 8 is. In such a community, what we need to keep it alive is not new cameras with always more electronic crappy stuff packed inside, but more people to repair the old ones. We have to stop producing things we don't need and take care of what we already have. And if we really need a new camera, we should think in the long term, how to make it durable, easy to maintain and repair for every owner, make it open source so information won't be lost. To me a LCD viewfinder is nothing but future proof... I really don't want be in Logmar owner's place in 50 years when all its electronics will be impossible to replace, while I'm sure some B&H 2709 will still crank !