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Using print film in camera


james smyth

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I'm looking to use Kodak EXR 7386 in a camera to save costs on film stock. This is for a student project, so problems with color balance etc are okay to a certain extent. I was wondering if anyone would happen to know about what ASA/ISO this would be rated at? My professor says most color print stocks have an ASA around 12 or 16, but I can't find any resources that really say.

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well they are, execept it's to produce a positive not another negative.

 

Print stocks are negative stocks. You're making a negative of your original camera negative, which yields a positive.

 

The 12-16 EI is stretching it. I tested it once and got something more in the realm of 3-6. Unless you want to undercrank everything and shoot only outdoors in full sun, you probably won't have the stop for it. I'd stick with regular negative film, or if you need a print and want to be thrifty, reversal stocks.

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Hmm, I always assumed prints were made from negative originals.

Shoot a positive with a negative acting stock you get a negative, copy that on a negative acting stock and you get a positive..

 

BUT BUT

 

POsitive stock is contact printed a few inches from a 300+ watt bulb.. (I think I read somewhere thet the B&H printer used a DDB 750 watt bulb... So it will be VERY SLOW. Think T 1.4 in daylight.

 

The positive stock does not have the prity orange mask which means that it will not print well, as the mask literaly masks some sortcomings in the available colour dyes.

 

Print stock has positive pitch, so it may not run happly in the camera, and printing with it may be unstaedy.

 

The lab may have to stick a blank piece of Colour negative film, cut from a developed blank roll of 120 in the gel holder on the printer to get the light somwhere close to correct to make aprint.

 

POsitive stock os almost always Polyester, which will be a pain to edit. (unless you are scanning and editing as video)

 

By all means it is an interesting experiment, but .......

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I'm looking to use Kodak EXR 7386 in a camera to save costs on film stock. This is for a student project, so problems with color balance etc are okay to a certain extent. I was wondering if anyone would happen to know about what ASA/ISO this would be rated at? My professor says most color print stocks have an ASA around 12 or 16, but I can't find any resources that really say.

 

I know your question is about color print stock but, if you were shooting B&W you could push process to get back some of the speed. However this would increase the contrast and grain, which might be acceptable for artistic reasons :ph34r: Also some of the B&W printing stock is sensitive to the blue light only so the sky would render as the lightest value. Combined with hand cranking you might end up wit that real old time early cinematography look.... :blink: "The Battleship Potyomkin" perhaps?

 

"All claims subject to testing and verification. Not responsible damage to equipment, personal injury, death, or acts of God" :D

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If your object is to get something that can be projected straight out of the camera after processing, just use reversal. That's what it's made for! It's beautiful stock that produces fantastic contrast... just make sure you expose it properly. Not much latitude to fool around with!

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I know your question is about color print stock but, if you were shooting B&W you could push process to get back some of the speed. However this would increase the contrast and grain, which might be acceptable for artistic reasons

 

Why B&W? Are you not able to push color?

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...POsitive stock is contact printed a few inches from a 300+ watt bulb.. (I think I read somewhere thet the B&H printer used a DDB 750 watt bulb... So it will be VERY SLOW. ...

The old B&H J and D printers used a weird CWY 300 watt lamp, the newer C and Panel printers used a CTS/CTT 1000 watt or CYS 1200 watt, or a 1200 watt newer halogen replacement. However these latter printers were very inefficient for light output because of the complex system of dichroic mirrors and the need to have the light bulb filament totally out of focus to prevent exposure nonuniformity, and were run at reduced voltage to make the lamps more stable and long-lived. And this is for printing at anywhere up to 960 feet per minute so the exposure time is short. So the print stock isn't quite as deadly slow as you might think, though it is in the single digits.

 

One approach I was playing with for a while was exposing color positive print stock in a camera through a very strong yellow filter such as a #12. This exposed only the red and green sensitive (cyan and magenta forming) layers. After normal color positive type processing you can print it on B&W positive stock and get nearly normal contrast. This is because the B&W stock is only blue sensitive, so it is only seeing what is normally the unwanted impurities in the color dyes, so the contrast (gamma) is in effect reduced to a small percentage of normal. So a gamma=4 stock approaches a gamma=.6 or more or less normal B&W negative contrast. It is still very slow though and the scale is short.

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My professor says most color print stocks have an ASA around 12 or 16, but I can't find any resources that really say.

 

Reversal print stocks would have been in that range.

Makes me suspect that your professor's experience on the subject is reading a very old Lenny Lipton book.

 

7361 B/W reversal was around EI16 and gave a beautiful image.

I've also shot an Anscochrome print stock that was EI25.

Ektachrome print was supposedly EI12.

The color print films would have been similar to ECO.

But that's all in the past.

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Also some of the B&W printing stock is sensitive to the blue light only so the sky would render as the lightest value. Combined with hand cranking you might end up wit that real old time early cinematography look.... :blink: "The Battleship Potyomkin" perhaps?

 

Hand cranking did not give inconsistant exposures as it does with the contemporary travesty of it.

In 'Alexander Nevskii', Tisse handcranked shots of people wielding prop weapons where overcranked the upswing and under cranked the down swing, while changing the shutter to keep the exposure consistant.

That sugestion is an insult to a generation of cameramen.

 

Also B/W print film is normally processed in a positive developer, thus yielding a high gamma.

Forcing the development would yield a contrastier image, eliminating middle tone.

 

It can de developed in a negative bath which will yield a gamma in the normal negative range, but with an EI of around 1.5.

 

Quick: how are fleshtones reproduced on a blue sensitive stock?

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Are print stocks B wind or A wind? I know from common knowledge that films designed to be run through cameras are B wind.

Most print stock if single perf is A Wind. Although users of Panel printers used to buy equal quantities of both A and B Wind in order to make prints in both forward and reverse, for about double the productivity. The prints made in the opposite direction would be rewound before processing, in order to get the sound track in the right place to accept sound track redeveloper application for a silver plus dye track.

 

The wind can be changed by rewinding the roll before exposure, of course. You need to be careful doing this if using 3000 to 6000 foot rolls.

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In 'Alexander Nevskii', Tisse handcranked shots of people wielding prop weapons where overcranked the upswing and under cranked the down swing, while changing the shutter to keep the exposure consistant.

That sugestion is an insult to a generation of cameramen.

 

My apologies for the unintended insult. Let me assure you that I have nothing but respect for the pioneers of cinematography. However I was referring not so much to changes in exposure but rather the apparent under cranking that "sometimes" resulted from the fatiguing of the camera operators arm on longer takes.

 

The flickering of the image seen in "some" films may have been due to any number of things, including the age and condition of the print. I am sure that results back in the day varied for the same reasons they do today; technical and artistic competence. Never the less I'd like to think that consistent exposer over time is easier to obtain with a good motor, as opposed to keeping time by humming your favorite tune.

 

Forcing the development would yield a contrastier image, eliminating middle tone.

 

Yes it would, and Iwrote: "However this would increase the contrast and grain, which might be acceptable for artistic reasons"

 

Quick: how are fleshtones reproduced on a blue sensitive stock?

 

In the beginning... there was blue sensitive stock.... shortly there after came make artists with green lipstick.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Why B&W? Are you not able to push color?

 

You can push color, though probably not as far, but then you have to pay the lab extra money to do it. B&W you can push in at home using your own chemistry.

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However I was referring not so much to changes in exposure but rather the apparent under cranking that "sometimes" resulted from the fatiguing of the camera operators arm on longer takes.

 

I think that was more of a deliberate style than an accident.

If you come across ancient manuals, you'll find they sometimes recommend cranking the projector faster than the camera.

 

In the beginning... there was blue sensitive stock.... shortly there after came make artists with green lipstick.

 

Clown white make up.

Continental Europe seemed to prefer the darker faces.

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I think that was more of a deliberate style than an accident.

If you come across ancient manuals, you'll find they sometimes recommend cranking the projector faster than the camera.

Clown white make up.

Continental Europe seemed to prefer the darker faces.

 

 

I'd love to get a look some those old tomes. I used to haunt the stacks of the library at m old university in Hawaii, but the earliest material I could find was from the thirties. It's funny because even in those books they referred to earlier cinematic techniques as being obsolete :o

 

http://www.ntm.cz/data/sbirky-foto/lumieruv-kinematograf.jpg

 

I'm working on a project now where I need to reference early techniques as they are integral to the story. I'm talking about duplicating some of the early work by Muybridge and Edison.

 

http://images.google.com/images?q=Muybridg...es&ct=title

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