Cost of stock and processing

Tom Law · August 4, 2009

Hi guys,

I'm shooting a film this November. I'm shooting on 16mm, i'm thinking of using 10 rolls of film (400ft). I'm hoping to use Fuji stock, one that has an ASA of around 150 - i'm not sure exactly of what they have to offer, i hear that have a new stock out that gives great vivid colours.

i was wondering if anyone can give me an approx cost of how much the film would cost, i;m a student, so maybe i could get a discount.

thanks,

Tom

p.s

I know this is a very general question, i'm actually directing the film not shooting it, but i want to get an idea of the costs.

Robert Sloan · August 4, 2009

I haven't seen Fuji's price catalog, but from everything I've heard they're comparable to Kodak. Here's the kodak film price catalog: http://motion.kodak.com/US/en/motion/Produ...ation/index.htm It looks like the comparable film price is about $141.92 a roll for either 100T or 200T 1/2 perf and 250D 1 perf--250D s perf is $2 and change more per roll; so multiply that by 10, and you've got $1,419.20 just in film stock. If this is for a STUDENT film, like at a film school of some kind, you can get a considerable discount(30%), but if this on your own, I'm not sure if you can get that. I'd talk to a sales rep about it.

After the raw stock purchase, then you have to think about processing fees. There's a film lab near me that does 16mm at $0.17 per foot, so 4000 x $0.17 = $680. From there, any number of costs could come up. Different labs charge for different things. If it's scanned at Hi-Res for a digital transfer to a hard drive for editing(which I would recommend for a student film/project), there are probably more fees associated with that. Sometimes you can work out a deal because you are a student to cover their processing fees at a full rate and get everything else comped. One of my friends actually did something insane and ran the negatives through a 16mm projector at a white wall, and recorded the projected image on a HDV camera. He had to invert the image, but it worked, in a sense. I wouldn't recommend that.

Basically, you just need to talk to a sales rep for both the film brand you want to use and the film lab you want to have your processing done at.

My initial estimate: At least $2,100.

Hope that helped.

David Rakoczy · August 4, 2009

Average $170 per 400ft roll and .11 cents per ft on processing. $6 per roll to prep for telecine.

Robert Houllahan · August 4, 2009

Fuji stock is usually less expensive then kodak I know that they had a student program at one point where 400' rolls of 16mm were about $100.00 ea. In general I think Fuji is 12-20% less than Kodak.

As for lab costs we have $0.17/foot for processing on the web site but give discounts over 1200' and for Student/Indie projects. So at Cinelab if you are a student with 4000' of film you will end up paying $0.12/foot for processing (all our pricing includes prep) which is $480.00 I think you will find most labs will have similar discounts for volume.

As for Video transfers we offer a Up-Rezzed Pro-ResHQ 1080P 24 frame transfer to disc for $0.20/foot (best light) or $0.25/foot (Scene-to-Scene) So a scene to scene would be $1000.00 We are doing an initial Student pricing offer for 2K DPX scans at $0.70/foot So 4000' would be 2800.00 for ungraded DPX files at 2K.

There are definitely allot of good deals to be had out there so don't just look at the list price.

-Rob-