Leo Anthony Vale

The Ultra T Primes are made by Kowa. They came out at about the same time as the first series of Zeiss bayonet mt. High Speeds. Thus prior to the intrduction of PL mt. and standardization of 80mm front. They have either a 52mm or 58mm filter thread. probably 52mm, with the Zeiss being 58mm. ---LV

Trying for quality only gets in the way of being prolific. You have to churn 'em out fast. William Beaudine Sr. has 299 directing credits from 1915-1976, 10 for 1950 alone in IMDB.com. Samuel Neufeld AKA Sam Newfield has 271 from 1926-1964. Cut off after 1952 and it's still 258. 16 in 1943! Shooting a 60-70 minute povery row picture in the 30s and 40s would be like shooting a one hour TV episode today. The one hour TV show has more care put in it than was put into the old cheapies. ---LV

---It would have an orange cast. B/W printed on color with normal printer lights will come out with an orange cast. Some labs will add an orange filter pack to the printer to get a normal looking B/W iamage. I suppose they'd do this for 7299. I wonder what 7299 would look like with a bleach bypass. Obviusly desaturated, but how much? ---LV

---I received the January AC yesterday. The 'New World' article mentions that 65mm was used when some charecters are having 'heightened' sequences. But nothing is mentioned about D/I or how the 65mm footage was integrated with the 35mm. Even the box at the end of article which lists equipment and stocks makes no mention of any D/I. 'The New World' is still a mystery. ---LV

---No, it was made in 35mm anamorphic. If the UK version is a bootleg, it could be transfered from a 16mm print. I just looked it up on eBay, and the UK versions' covers appear to be bootlegs. There is a 9 disc boxed set of the entire 'Lone wolf and Cub' sries which would very probably be transfered from 35mm. ---LV

---Since the two movies it was edited from were made in 1972, it would be on eastman 5254, 100T, the only Kodak color negative availiable at the time. Unless it's Fuji, but more likely Kodak. It was filmed in TohoScope. So it could be any anamorphic lenses. When Toho introduced TohoScope in 1957 or 1956, they had an attachment which had nice specs; but it wouldn't be used with zooms and long lenses. By 1972 they'd be using newer lenses. I've never seen the DVD, so I don't know what you mean by stretched out. My first guess is that the top and bottom of the image is cropped to hide splices. If the stretch is only on close ups, it could be 'anamorphic mumps' due to using older anamorphics. I'm inclined to doubt that. Else a bad transfer. Cameras are probably Mitchells, NC, Mark II/S35R, high speed, and Arriflex IICs. A guess based on what would have been availiable at the time. I've never seen photos of Japanese crews using BNCs. Oh, the two movies are 'Sword of Vengence' and 'Baby Carriage on the River Styx'. ---LV

---It's probably a charge for adding a nonstandard filter pack in the printer to compensate for the lack of orange masking. some labs do the same for printing B/W neg on color stock. ---LV

---Has any rental house bought the newer Iscovision lens? Let alone anyone actually using them http://iscooptic.de/isco_new_e/taking_lenses_e.html They seem fairly small. ---LV

---I think they're basicaly the same as Technovision. They both use the same Shiga anamorphic sections. 'The Interpreter' used lenses from both JDC and Technovision. So it would seem that there simply aren't as many sets of these lenses as there are of Panavision lenses. ---LV

--Way back when I was in school, I was expermenting with odd stocks. I had some Plus-X negative processed as reversal. Your description sounds like the results I got from that. The first developer did not process all of the silver, leaving behind enough silver to give a veil over everything. The negative emulsion is thicker than the reversal, so it didn't dry evenly leaving water marks. ---LV

---Not sure what happened there. Try the Widescreenmuseum site: the entrance page: http://widescreenmuseum.com/ aspect ratios: http://widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/apertures.htm Though there isn't much about Super 35, It's more concerned with the older version SuperScope. ---LV

---The way an ultrasonic splicer scrambles the emulsion, makes for a very visible splice. When I used to splice track negatives, I would use a bloop punch on the splice. An occasional visible splice in a print is acceptable. But splicing estar anamorphic original negative? For 16mm checker-board splicing, the scrambled emulsion in black leader negates the idea of invisible A&B roll splicing. Admittedly I did enjoy watching and listening the little spinning wheel come out to scramble and weld the film. ---LV

---Optical printing is more expensive than continuous contact. It's slower than contact. More lab time, more lab charge. An optically printed A/P will cost almost as much as the blow up I/P. An ultrasonic splicer won't give clean frameline splices for checker-board A&B rolls. & zero cutting won't give clean frame lines. ---LV

Agfa-Gaevert discontinued manufacturing motion picture camera stocks because they switched to estar base for all of their photo films. The only motion picture stocks they now manufacture are print stocks and sound track negative. No more Agfacolor. One needs to make an answer print from the original neg before making a blowup I/P. S16 and S35 A/Ps don't need to have a track. But they will still be printed by standard contact. ---LV

---Contact printing an answer print and a small number of release prints from a conformed 35mm or 16mm OCN, whether A-roll only or A&B rolls, is still the norm and less expensive than optical printing. ---LV

---the guillotine is the reflex mirror not the actual shutter. The quillotine swings into place when the shutter is closed , and out before the shutter opens. This set up will give you more light to the viewfinder. The eclair ACL has a similar set up. BNCRs and Panaflexes have seperate variable angle camera shutters and rotating reflex mirror shutters. ---LV

---Shooting with 7361 in the camera with uncoated lenses in the camera would give even more of a classic look, more like silents than talkies. Or at least an early newsreel look. EI 16. Pale skies and dark skins. The pale faces in silent movies were do to white make up. ---LV

---Or is it that it's this weeks hot new trend. Commercial clients can be quite trend addicted. ---LV

---the last three-strip technicolor films were made in 1955. Plus anamorphic lenses, except long focal lengths couldn't be used on the cameras because of the prism. CinemaScope helped speed up the demise of Three-strip. 'Black Narcissus' is the epitome of three-strip. 'Kismet' (non musical 40s version) is fine example of three-strip, but otherwise a mediocre film. The Powell-Pressberger Technicolor movies, most are photogaphed by Jack Cardiff, are among the best examples of three-strip. & Bela Lugosi's 'Scared to Death' seems to be the best example of Cinecolor floating around today. 'Gallant Bess' would be second. I usually wind watching 'Forbidden Planet' and 'Tora! Tora! Tora!' when they show up on Turner. Though my favorite part of the latter is the planes taking off from the Japanese carriers at dawn from 'I Bombed Pearl Harbor'. There's something about those exhaust flames. ---LV

The late lamented 7361 B/W reversal print film was a great camera film. Use it with an uncoated lens and get something that looks like snapshots from the 30s. Quite sharp and amazing latitude for reversal. 5360 autopositive is still around and gives interesting results. Estar base version has BH-1866 perfs. ---LV

A standard lens having a focal length equal to the diagonal is a rule of thumb in still photography. I've seen books on amateur movies from the 30s state thate one should film with a one inch lens in 16mm, project with a two inch lens and view from halfway between screen and projector so that one's viewing perspective matches the taking perspective. I've also come across recomendations that the proper viewing distance for a photo enlargement is the diagonal of the print. So the definition of normal/standard lens is based on perspective not angle of view. ---LV

The 1M mount (OST-18) has a flange depth of 57mm and a diameter of 47mm, which copares to the Arri st. mount's 52mm flange depth and diameter of 41mm. One can get PL adaptors for zooms: http://cgi.ebay.com/PL-mount-ZOOM-FOTON-OP...1QQcmdZViewItem I once saw an Australian built Pl adaptor for the primes. That was some time ago. Google Steve Morton in Australia. He was probably involved. Also it's possible to remove the anamorphic section of round fronts. Steve Morton would also know about that. ---LV

---They're close. I prefer the 9.5 because it's smaller and focuses closer. 150mm is too long for hand holding. All zooms of that vintage will breath when focusing. Zooms focus by changing the focal length. The 17.5-70/16-64mm is ang's first 16mm zoom from the early-mid50s. A break through lens at the time. I think Cinema Products must have gotten a good close out price on a load of them. The retro zoom is an afocal adaptor which converts it to 12.5-50mm. It has a fousing scale which cvers the one on the lens. A clever design feature. I suppose it's okay for B/W. ---LV

---NO. The non-reflex CP-16 has a C-mt. The CP/R has a flange depth of 1.5"/38mm compared to the C-mt's 17.52mm. The price one pays for a reflex mirror. ---LV