Researching the famous Patterson bigfoot film

[John Adolfi]

Bill do you have the 2K scanned 16mm first generation footage posted somewhere for us to see what you are seeing?

[K Borowski]

Curious about this footage, I looked it up on YouTube, which only makes poor-quality imagery worse.

 

From what I saw, it looks, well, real enough.

 

My big problem is the obviously excessive shake and the mere fact of the matter that the cameraman clearly could have caught up with whatever it was.

 

Also, why didn't he keep following him?

 

 

If you watch what is, allegedly the entire contact print of the roll, there is some other ridiculous stuff on there, not conducive with being out in the woods to photograph nature.

 

Back on topic though, why isn't the original negative or reversal original available? Everything seems to be from bad dupes of the original.

 

When the footage is that poor, shakey, and out-of-focus to begin with, having access to the original, not a 4K of the original but the actual original would solve all of your questions, Bill.

 

If you can't get at the original, do you think that someone who does have access to it might be able to go in and actually measure the camera frame aperture size?

[Bill Munns]

John:

 

"Bill do you have the 2K scanned 16mm first generation footage posted somewhere for us to see what you are seeing? "

 

The best version of the film available to general public is on the Legend Meets Science TV Special DVD, in the Special Features section.

 

The 4K scan of the film I did in February was from a third (maybe fourth) generation copy in John Green's possession, and I did the scan to get a close to true full frame copy for an attempt at a photogrammetry analysis to build a 3D digital model of the Bluff Creek site. This scan was not any better in terms of showing the film's subject that the LMS DVD material shows. The scan was valuable to me, because the LMS footage is a version that was zoomed in on an optical printer, and thus is not full frame and didn't show the landscape objects sufficiently to do the photogrammetry analysis.

 

So this 4K scan served that purpose, moreso than to serve as analysis of the film's subject directly.

 

There is a wealth of film frame still material already widely circulated, but much of it is plagued by copy degradation, plus false detail induced by marco photography of individual frames (including 12 done by the Cibachrome process) which actually introduced a false sense of finer grain and detail which confuses the analysis.

 

One of my current areas of analysis is to try and sort out what detail is in fact reliable, and which stills from the film are indeed the truest in terms of what was captured in the camera original.

 

 

Karl:

 

"Also, why didn't he keep following him?"

 

On the behavior of the cameraman, Roger Patterson, there is a lot of discussion about what he did or should have done, but I personally don't like to participate in such discussions, preferring to stay with the more factual issues for now.

 

"Back on topic though, why isn't the original negative or reversal original available? Everything seems to be from bad dupes of the original."

 

The generally described explanation of the camera original is that it was included in a business venture, during a time when Roger was trying to publicize the film and show it in theaters, and this business venture apparently failed, its assets sold off in an auction. The camera original film was reportedly sold among those assets and now is reportedly in the possession of lawyers in Florida, representing the owner whom nobody has publicly identified. Occasionally there is talk of somebody trying to re-acquire the film for study but the stories generally report the asking price is "outrageous". I cannot confirm the truth of any of this, just saying this is what I have heard from multiple sources who have been interested in the film camera original for many years.

 

I, like many others, would like to see this original, but it does not appear likely I ever will.

 

I am currently doing research on the various copies and still frames, to try and sort out a genealogy of the copies, and see what may be the most reliable version for analysis. There is more work to be done.

 

Bill

[K Borowski]

Well, to be honest, if you are using a scan of a 4th generation copy, you are wasting your time.

 

Why aren't you able to view a direct duplicate copy?

 

As for doing a factual study, if you are really serious, you are going to need to get physical access to a duplicate, not something out of a DVD.

[Bill Munns]

Karl:

 

I am using many different image resources, the 4K scan simply being one of them.

 

I continue to look for opportunities to obtain better material, and that has been one of my main objectives, to both get better material and grade material objectively as to its merit or reliability in analysis.

 

I have been advised many times over the last year and a half that I am wasting my time, and I have ceased to pay attention to that advice, because I believe that I am in fact adding to the understanding of the film, and that is not a waste of time. The film, if nothing else, is a unique entity that has captivated people the world over, and seperating fact from misconception for such a curtural icon has merit as an endeavor for one's time.

 

. So it is with no disrespect to you that I choose not to take your advice.

 

Bill

[K Borowski]

Oh God, are you really lumping me in with a naysayer? I'm not a naysayer; I consider myself a brutal realist. I'm not saying that what you're doing isn't worthwhile; I'm saying it's not worthwhile if you half-ass it.

 

 

You don't understand. You can scan a 4th generation copy at 20K and it'll still be a 4th generation copy.

 

The footage I saw is so shakey, blury, and out of focus that it rivals a cell phone at times for image quality.

 

 

The problem with your approach is this: It isn't built on a solid foundation so it doesn't provide a definitive answer, even if you throw a million dollars into it.

 

You need, minimum of a 2nd generation copy to make this worse your while. A 4th gen. copy isn't even the resolution of DR8.

 

Also, guessing at camera lenses used, gate size, NOT solid science.

 

If you want to research this, you need to track down the dealer that rented this guy a camera (and threatened to arrest him, BTW, when he didn't return it on time) and find out what the lens was. Since the camera was rented, I think that finding out the gate dimensions of a Cine-Kodak 100 would be pretty solid.

 

Then you need to track down one of the five second generation copies of the footage.

 

Gleaming information off of a 4th generation copy further distorted by DVD (so, 5th generation really) is an utter waste of your time, and, by association, our time.

 

 

Why go through all this work that ultimately leads to NOTHING USEFUL? I'm sorry to be blunt, but as a proponent of the scientific method, you need a solid foundation to start out with. Then you need to test one variable at a time. Simple as that.

[K Borowski]

I continue to look for opportunities to obtain better material, and that has been one of my main objectives, to both get better material and grade material objectively as to its merit or reliability in analysis.

 

I would concentrate all of my resources here. If you don't have the time, money, influence or resources to get access to original material, you are very simply wasting all of our time.

[Anthony Schilling]

Are you sure it was a K100? I did see a special where a crew reshot the scene with a man in a suit with the "exact" type of camera used, it was a Bolex H16. But they could have just been going for regular 16mm?

[Bill Munns]

Karl:

 

Why are you speaking with such authority on matters you are merely assuming and in some cases are assuming incorrectly.

 

1. You have not seen frames from the film at varying copy generation levels, so you cannot appraise the quality of any copy I am referencing. I have 30 GB or more of data collected thus far, including 6K scans of ten frames from a true first generation contact printed copy among that inventory and I can see clearly what is lost and what remains intact as far as image data goes, among the varied levels of copying.

 

You probably do not know the difference between the zoomed in version and a full frame version (in so far as why the full frame version has useful data), or the difference between the Cibachromes and the Noll images, the Beckjord images,

 

Anything you see on Youtube is visual junk, and so far below the actual quality of the film as to be laughable.

 

2. You are confusing which copies are from film stock and which are from DVD format. I did not take my 4K scan from a DVD version.

 

3. You are clearly unaware of what I am looking at in the various film frames I am examining, so you cannot appraise the degree of which the image data in the frame is reliable, or what the margin of error may be. In the 4k scans, I am primarily looking at banding marks on trees, and landscape object positions, both of which are still very clear on that copy.

 

4. You are confusing my interest in the camera aperture of the example I posted herein with the K-100, which I have excellent camera aperture data on already, as to both dimension and shape, with ID marker. I have all the positive ID info I need on the K-100, both single lens and three lens turret models. I am trying to ID the Keystone K-50 magazine camera's ID aperture markings in my requets here.

 

 

I would have hoped by now that you might see I am trying to approach this thing from a rational and well reasoned, cautious manner, with consideration for the technical realities and some realistic basis of understanding about photography and cinematography.

 

My request for information in this forum is every bit as reasonable and factual as anyone elses, and if you feel its a waste of time, don't read it or post to it. But please do not judge for others who may want to continue posting information.

 

I am also a realist. My analysis of this film is based on realistic apparaisal of the film image data, with consideration for what data endures through the copying process and what data does not. That is actually one issue I am perhaps the first to actually study in a systematic way. People before me simply assumed, as you are doing, with no factual analysis, what image quality is or is not present, and you judge very poor examples (like the YouTube junk) as if it were as good as it gets, when it is a mere fraction of the true image quality and image data that exists.

 

So please lighten up.

 

Bill

Edited June 22, 2009 by Bill Munns

[Bill Munns]

Anthony:

 

I guess you were posting as I was writing.

 

The K-100 camera is confirmed as the actual camera used originally by the camera identification marks both on a true first generation contact print, and with recent filming tests with a k-100.

 

it was definitely not a Bolex used by patterson for the famous Bluff Creek footage,, although he may have used a Bolex for other filming of the documentary he was working on all that year.

 

Bill

[K Borowski]

Obviously YouTube is visual crap.

 

But, yeah, I do know what I am talking about. I've shot, processed, and contacted printed 16mm. Factually, 4th generation duplicates of 16mm have worse resolution, at least spatially, than a DR8 original does.

 

Why waste time collecting all of these data when an actual thorough bit of research of the rental house will probably provide you with a better answer?

 

 

All of the data on camera apertures are irrelevant when you can't determine which lens was used.

 

You can probably only guess, even with accurate DOF info, weather info for that day, and film stock info.

[John Sprung]

They might be rare as the magazine was generally sent in when the film was processed, and most were probably discarded.

 

It was a mail order thing. You sent the magazines to Kodak. They processed your film and mailed it back to you. The empty mags were inspected and re-loaded, then sold to another customer. These same mags were used in WWII aircraft gun cameras.

 

I did work with a K-100 once, it was a 100 ft. daylight spool camera, not a 50 ft. magazine camera.

 

 

 

 

-- J.S.

[Bill Munns]

Karl:

 

I do not dispute your knowledge of cinematography.

 

I am simply pointing out that you are making erronious assumptions about my work on this specific film.

 

Every step of copying a film reduces resolution and detail (as well as likely building up contrast), when the film is copied to the same size stock. Agreed. A 4th gen copy on 16mm stock is certainly a poor copy, agreed. But it still has image data, and if that image data included banding marks on a tree which vertically occupies more than half the frame, we can still reliably measure those banding marks on that tree, in relation to total frame height, and get some kind of measurement with a margin of error of maybe 1-2%

 

If you filmed an old Volkswagen Beetle well enough to read its license plate, on the camera original, after a 4th gen copy, you might lose the ability to read the license plate numbers but you can still tell it's a VW Bug, and not a Corvette. Some image data is still reliable, even after copying, for larger objects, and so I only use the 3rd or 4th gen copies of this film for gross objects (like the larger trees and logs) for scaling and position reference. But I am continuing to work toward getting access to far better versions, in true full frame format, so I can phase out the scan of the more copied version I now have.

 

Among the image material I have collected over the last year and a half, there is much of it which is the finest visual quality a Kodachrome II film stock can deliver, and i can claerly see detail like small branches at about 200 feet away, with diameters at about one line of resolution, and they are clearly identifiable.

 

So I am simply saying there is more quality image data in the film research materials (collectively) than you may be aware of, and i hope you will not judge the quality of material you have not personally inspected.

 

As I said, one of my goals is to actually clear up the whole issue of how much image quality is available in various copies or forms of this film, so people can go more easily to the good stuff and not mistake the bad stuff for the good.

 

I think that is a worthy goal for any film which is debated as much as this one has been for 42 years.

 

Also, I don't know why you referenced a rental house. I haven't discussed such, as much as I recall. The camera I am trying to ID is not a rental camera.

 

Bill

Edited June 22, 2009 by Bill Munns

[Tom Jensen]

You don't want to scan too clear of a copy or the original because in that Bigfoot is smoking a cigarette and holding a beer. Plus you can see the stitching on the costume. Better to keep it blurry. And didn't the original have something like 17 edits in it? And what about the feet. Nobody wants to address that.

Edited June 22, 2009 by Tom Jensen

[K Borowski]

Also, I don't know why you referenced a rental house. I haven't discussed such, as much as I recall. The camera I am trying to ID is not a rental camera.

 

According to the information I dug up upon cursory examination of this film, Patterson had to rent a camera for his documentary.

 

I'd start there, because I'd assume he rented the lens to go with it as well.

 

It makes sense that an amateur wouldn't own an expensive 16mm movie camera. Amateurs generally only shot 8mm and S8 film, unless they were rich or big-time film buffs.

 

16mm was/is a professional format.

[Bill Munns]

Tom:

 

"You don't want to scan too clear of a copy or the original because in that Bigfoot is smoking a cigarette and holding a beer. Plus you can see the stitching on the costume. Better to keep it blurry. And didn't the original have something like 17 edits in it? And what about the feet. Nobody wants to address that. "

 

You just don't want to give up, do you.

 

I noted above I have 6K scanned Tiffs of ten frames from a true first gen master contact printed version, at remarkable clarity. More may be coming.

 

The film, even the camera original, couldn't resolve "stitching" in a costume for a full body figure never larger than 1.5mm in image size in a frame. That is a laughable myth, that such detail can be seen, and I'm surprized you are buying into it. And in any fur costume, the stitching is on the "Inside". The fur is on the outside.

 

There is no proof the original has any edits in it. I have scanned resource of what edits look like, both glue and tape spliced edits and no one has ever shown proof that there is any actual edit in the film. This is just more Youtube Academy of Science rumor.

 

What about the feet? At their very largest, they are never more than 10 lines of resolution in total size, and the foot is reported to be 14.5" long. That's 1.5" for each line of resolution. And you think any difinitive evaluation can be made of a foot like shape that is composed of only ten lines of resolution in it's very best film image version, and anything you are looking at is at least 2 generations removed from that? Then you have the motion blur, because with a bipedal figure walking, the feet are among the fastest moving parts of the body, the most suspetable to motion blur, and that motion blur has never been properly studied in regard to the feet.

 

That's why I never debate the feet.

 

You are not bringing any useful knowledge to this discussion, just recycling the junk rumors that abound and do not hold up to any critical analysis or have any real proof to back then up. Can you spare us any more junk rumors passed off as "facts", please.

 

Bill

[Bill Munns]

Karl:

 

Roger Patterson rented the k-100 camera, with a 25mm lens on it, in May of 1967, and had it until about November of that year. Perviously he had used other cameras for his documentary as well. I have seen this footage and scanned frames from it, and found markedly different camera ID aperture shapes from the K-100.

 

But the lens on Roger's camera on Oct. 1967 does not have to be the one he rented five months before. As we all know, it's a C mount lens type camera, and there are lots of C mount lenses one could put on the camera, and changing from one to another is a matter of a minute or so. SO we cannot make any assumption what lens was on the camera that day, from a rental document of five months before.

 

There is no documentation about most of Roger's rentals during the year of 1967, when he filmed with several types of camera, none of which was owned by him. So not having documentation about getting another lens for the K-100 is well within the range of plausability. We are not talking about Birns & Sawyer, Mark Armstead, or Alan Gordon Ent. here, as a rental house. We are talking about some local camera rental place in Washington state, 42 years ago. Documentation is questionable at its very best. That is why I am trying to resolve lens issues by sterio-photogrammetry technology.

 

Second, the camera I keep trying to identify in this thread is not Roger's film and not shot with a K-100, and is not a rental camera. It is either one owned by John Green, or another John had access to and it is his statement that it's a Keystone K-50, but i an trying to verify that by Camera ID Markings if I can see what they look like on the Keystone.

 

Bill

Edited June 23, 2009 by Bill Munns

[Tom Jensen]

Well Bill you turned me around. I'm completely convinced that there is a giant apeman walking around the in the woods acting nothing like an animal and looking like a man strolling through the woods. Your analysis of the feet was incredible. Here I thought they looked like flat pieces of rubber that were sold to Patterson by a local merchant. I'm surprised there aren't more Bigfeet running around since a lot of breeding has gone on since 1967. Just think how many little Bigfoots there must be. There's probably a village. I'm surprised there is no recent evidence of Bigfoot. Unless of course there was only one of them but that wouldn't make sense. He had to have a mother and father didn't he? I never should have doubted you. How's the research coming. Discover anything new in the last 40 years? Here's a question; what evidence is there that Bigfoot exists. I mean besides the monster truck rallies.

[Bill Munns]

Tom:

 

Thank you for your humor.

 

Can we get back on topic now, cameras, lenses, that sort of stuff?

 

Bill

[K Borowski]

Second, the camera I keep trying to identify in this thread is not Roger's film and not shot with a K-100, and is not a rental camera. It is either one owned by John Green, or another John had access to and it is his statement that it's a Keystone K-50, but i an trying to verify that by Camera ID Markings if I can see what they look like on the Keystone.

 

Bill

 

Camera ID markings aren't standardized, like a timestamp on a video camera, they'd be dimples cut into the gate with a pocket knife or a piece of paper that was back-lit or front-lit in certain rare models.

 

So this line of study gets you nowhere too. . .

[K Borowski]

You don't want to scan too clear of a copy or the original because in that Bigfoot is smoking a cigarette and holding a beer.

 

Yeah, but what brands? Poor big tobacco can't use it as an advertising campaign anymore, but think of the potential for beer commercials!

 

"Bigfoot's Brew" anyone?

[K Borowski]

That's why I never debate the feet.

 

You are not bringing any useful knowledge to this discussion, just recycling the junk rumors that abound and do not hold up to any critical analysis or have any real proof to back then up. Can you spare us any more junk rumors passed off as "facts", please.

 

Bill

 

Now *you* are getting off-topic.

 

If you are doing a study, you shouldn't be trying to "prove" anything one way or another, sorry. . .

 

BTW, according to the research I've now done into this, even Patterson himself claimed that the creature was between 6 (~1.85) to 6-1/2 (~2) feet (m) tall originally. He changed his story to 7-1/2 feet (~230cm) later. That's only proof that he probably fished though ;-)

[John Adolfi]

Bill,

 

I apologize for this forum. I feel for you in trying to keep the conversation about lenses and film. The subject of Big Foot is such a distraction that many can't help but to comment on its existence or not. I claim to own a set of Chupacabra bones so I can relate to this type of controversy, but that is another topic thread on another forum. Come on guys give this man some slack and keep the thread's topic pure.

[K Borowski]

John: I'll thank you not to apologize on my behalf any more.

 

As for not being able to take a joke, maybe you and Bill should lighten up?

 

 

Despite my attempts at humor, I have tried to provide as much information as possible to the conversation.

 

I honestly think Bill's attempts are futile because of generation loss and the inability to definitively identify the lens used or a definitive aperture size.

[Tom Jensen]

Seriously, if you put a can of gasoline in Bigfoot's hand, wouldn't he look like he ran out of gas and was walking down the freeway looking over his shoulder for traffic? I mean if he were looking over his left shoulder.