Duncan Brown

That brochure and many others are also available for free download at another part of the site in your first link: https://eclaircameras.wordpress.com/downloads/ (I donated scans of a lot of Eclair literature to them, though someone else provided that Soremec one) Duncan

Yeah, early/prototype version seems like the best guess at this point. Made by Aaton before they came up with the name "Alcan" - too bad Jean-Pierre isn't around to ask any more, but I wonder if some long-timer at Aaton might remember? Looks like they'd already settled on the "54" part of the name - anyone ever figure out the significance of that? 54mm long? 54g in weight? How about "Alcan" Duncan

Yeah you're missing the entire set of stuff on the end of the sloped-edge cap there. I wonder if that was some "clever" modification someone did during its long life? Mine does't have the fuse legend on the bottom plate, nor do I actually see a fuse anywhere. Does it have the normal run/stop switch and remote jack on the other side? Duncan

Listed on here: ...and with even more pictures on facebook: https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/1174311746609665/ Duncan

For a fellow cinematography.com member? Sure, 3 crisp $20 bills would do the trick. I'll PM you to set up some time/place to do the deal. Duncan

Neal, Then without even digging into stuff I know I have this motor that I was offering up as a package deal (but nobody ever replied!) I'd sell just the motor for $75 plus shipping but if you're anywhere near the Chicago area maybe we could avoid shipping. I live in Grayslake, work in Elk Grove Village, and go to Hyde Park a lot, so anywhere along any of those routes is easy. Duncan

OK let me see what my spares situation looks like and I'll post back here. The general idea is that since the motor is removable, you only need one motor no matter how many magazines you have. Obviously it would be a slightly quicker swap on a shoot if every magazine had its own motor. Also, they are made in 8.4V models (original) and 12V model (generally upgraded by a third party, later on, when people had started standardizing on 12V for cameras, and they came out with 12V capable camera motors.) Which are you looking for? Duncan

There are a fair number of replacements out there for the ubiquitous PX-13/PX-625 1.35V mercury battery used in about every SLR from that era, and I've seen them as meter batteries in some home movie cameras too. It's weird that your bigger battery isn't an exact multiple of 1.35V because that was the "natural" output voltage of that cell type. The big question is whether the meter depends on that exact voltage, or whether there's a voltage regulator built in, so it could actually tolerate a slightly higher voltage and still be accurate. (That's the issue with putting same-size alkaline replacements in old SLRs - then your meter is miscalibrated.) If you can answer that, it will guide your path a bit on what to do next. ("Use a handheld meter" is one possible answer, sadly!) A little googling doesn't tell me anything useful about that battery spec. Duncan

In the auto parts world a "core" is the broken thing you give back to the place you bought your rebuilt thing from (eg, a starter motor) so they can rebuild it and sell it to the next person, ad infinitum. Is that what you're looking for here? Because I have some working motors and some working magazines, if that's what you're interested in. Duncan

Yes, that ground glass is done the way you would have to do it for a permanently converted camera - if you were shooting regular 4:3, it would be offset to one side like that (and zoom lenses would be ill-advised if you planned to zoom them during a shot.) Which explains why my camera ground glass has the 4:3 centered within S16 markings - you'd be expected to switch the lens centering if you were shooting regular 16. Interesting, the various things people did with these cameras over the years! And thanks so much for the factory S16 NPR photos - as far as I have found, those are now the only ones on the internet! I'm still impressed with the lengths Van Diemen went to on that conversion - the legends precisely engraved, the area past the gate relieved on both sides, etc. I'm guessing it was done after Eclair had stopped producing the NPR? Or else you'd think they would have "borrowed" that idea for 16/S16 conversion on the fly. Duncan

Well it would certainly make sense for it to be their conversion, since they did the PL mount. But wow that's above and beyond, the level they would have had to disassemble it just to make those engravings is more work than some of the camera conversions I've seen out there. So did Eclair's S16 NPRs not have the feature where you could switch between standard and super 16? I'd love to see pictures of an actual factory S16 NPR... Duncan

Come on, you know you want it ? Duncan

Someone somewhere was asking me about NPR matte box brackets. I think it was someone that bought one of my NPRs on ebay that was missing that bracket, as so many of them are for some reason. I can't figure out who it was or on what platform we had that discussion. So in case it was here, or they end up here, there is actually someone selling one of them on ebay right now! Don't see that every day. https://www.ebay.com/itm/125727570517 (Once it sells or if the seller gives up trying, that link will die, which will suck when someone runs across this thread years from now, but whatchagonnado?) Duncan

Eddie emailed me the pics and since I can post more pics than he can I;m going to help him out and add them here. I asked him to add pictures of the gate, etc so I'll post those when I get them. Duncan

When you can find lots of adapters in one direction, and none in the other, it usually means there's a substantial difference in the FFD (flange focal distance) between the two mounts. You can add distance from a lens easily enough with an adapter, but subtracting it gets quite a bit trickier, especially when the mount hole sizes are very different. Hard to get a big EF lens, with an FFD of 44mm that distance away from the film plane of an Arri-S mount camera, whose much smaller diameter flange sits 52mm away. Duncan

Ring light? Side light from every possible angle? Backlight, if your subject is translucent? There's always an answer if you're desperate enough. Duncan

You might consider a macro bellows if you really want to get close! I've done a lot of stills work with the Canon FD 50mm and 100mm macro lenses, and you can definitely get close... but if you want to get microscopic, it's time to break out the bellows. You can extend any lens with one, but you'll be far happier with an actual macro lens for its flat field, etc. Duncan

I never saw any lamps inside the ACL motor, but I didn't get into the actual motor housing...as it looked hideously complicated to get in there. Lots of wires with no slack. But maybe it's time to dive in! (Since I seem to have somehow wrecked the circuitry anyway ? ) I have a lot of respect for that design... I'm sure Aapo has a lot of respect for how they packed it all in that space with decades-ago technology! I would have less respect for the design if it depended on two unreachable incandescent bulbs. Do keep us posted on the status of your repair! I did have a Perfectone NPR motor once that had two light bulbs where one normally is, and couldn't figure out what the second one was for... but those were just outside indicator lamps, nothing to do with the motor itself? Duncan

Most of those more-than-2-track digital recorders keep all the tracks separate in the digital files you can download off the device. If you need the actual device itself to do the playback then yeah, that's going to be harder to find. Duncan

Hey that's cool! Though as a film nerd who likes that kind of stuff it was a little disappointing that they only shot half a video and then repeated it? Duncan

I spent a bunch of time scanning and reassembling a 1962 Gordon Enterprises catalog. (Is it their first one?) It's copyrighted, and normally I won't scan and post copyrighted material (I create copyrighted stuff myself!), but my research says this one has expired. The first copyright term would have expired in 1990, and I can find no evidence whatsoever that they renewed it. (Nor, in fact that they registered it originally, but they'd still get their 28 years just by marking it copyrighted.) If someone from Alan Gordon wants to take issue with this, please contact me! Here is the monstrous, over 300MB, 600 dpi version: http://backglass.org/duncan/16mm/misc/gordon_enterprise_motion_picture_equipment_catalog_1962.pdf Here is the easier to download 100 dpi version, at 24MB, but a lot of the tiny print gets blurry at that resolution: http://backglass.org/duncan/16mm/misc/gordon_enterprise_motion_picture_equipment_catalog_1962_100.pdf Fascinating stuff. I'm still slogging through the 130 pages myself. I have some newer catalogs of theirs but I need to research the copyright status before I bother with all the scanning work. If I end up scanning them I'll post them here. Duncan

More scans... A massive wish book to drool over and wish you were back in 1967 (except if you were, you probably couldn't afford this stuff with your 1967 income!) http://backglass.org/duncan/bolex/bolex_reporter_16mm_product_buying_guide_196705.pdf The 100dpi version: http://backglass.org/duncan/bolex/bolex_reporter_16mm_product_buying_guide_196705_100.pdf A little brochure introducing the Zoom Relfex 8 in 1962: http://backglass.org/duncan/bolex/bolex_zoom_reflex_8_brochure_1962.pdf The 100 dpi version: http://backglass.org/duncan/bolex/bolex_zoom_reflex_8_brochure_1962_100.pdf I also stumbled across a scan I did of the user manual for the 160 Macrozoom years ago, just in the one resolution: http://backglass.org/duncan/bolex/bolex_paillard_160_macrozoom_instruction_manual.pdf Enjoy! Duncan

Pretty!!!! Duncan