Jump to content

"Low Budget" 35mm Movie Cameras


Josh Vance

Recommended Posts

  • Premium Member

well, there is "loud" cameras and LOUD cameras. for example the Konvas is a loud camera (sounds like a industrial sewing machine or some kind of power tool) but the Cameflex is a LOUD camera (we used the camera running sound as a actor cue mark when shooting a short film. saved a lot of film that way, I just instructed the actor to listen when the camera starts running, then wait  about 1.5 seconds and start acting. Worked like a charm up to over 100ft away even with background noise present ?  it was silent film of course)

"loud" camera you can live with to some extent if shooting for example outdoors using tele lenses and some blimping. With the LOUD cameras you can't do much other than shoot MOS or do ADR

Edited by aapo lettinen
  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member
10 minutes ago, aapo lettinen said:

well, there is "loud" cameras and LOUD cameras. for example the Konvas is a loud camera (sounds like a industrial sewing machine or some kind of power tool) but the Cameflex is a LOUD camera (we used the camera running sound as a actor cue mark when shooting a short film. saved a lot of film that way, I just instructed the actor to listen when the camera starts running, then wait  about 1.5 seconds and start acting. Worked like a charm up to over 100ft away even with background noise present ?  it was silent film of course)

"loud" camera you can live with to some extent if shooting for example outdoors using tele lenses and some blimping. With the LOUD cameras you can't do much other than shoot MOS or do ADR

yep I needed to use a ear plug all the time on the camera side ear when shooting with the Cameflex. never need to do that with Konvas 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member
10 minutes ago, aapo lettinen said:

yep I needed to use a ear plug all the time on the camera side ear when shooting with the Cameflex. never need to do that with Konvas 

Interesting... I'd love to play with a Konvas some day. They're kinda difficult to find complete here. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hey Aapo,

Do you know what the image stability is like for the Konvas and Cameflex? Arri II is pretty good by reputation.  An enormous amount of material went to the big screen from Arri IIs, commonly intercut with material from pin registered cameras. 

Long time ago I did  registration tests for a couple of 16mm cameras (16BL and CPA).  Shot a grid of lines (byro pen on paper), rewound the film, rotated the paper about 3deg, shot the grid again. I don't know if the CP had a problem, but is showed what I had heard was the likely mode of instability for a non pin registered camera. The lines from the two exposures converge/diverge in a roughly sinusoidal rythm. The 16BL also matched the anticipated mode of behaviour, with tiny, almost imperceptible jitter. Don't know where that 16BL was in it's maintenance cycle.

You can get a good qualitative sense of the image stability this way. But I think it's probably easy to actually quantify for non pin registered cameras also, though I never did it. The lines need intervals or hash marks like a ruler, or you could maybe just use pieces of a tape measure etc. Marks show decimal increments of the frame or something easily scaleable later. Note the varying position of the line intersection. These distances, expressed as a fraction of the frame height or width (of the object) should be a legitimate expression of the image steadiness.

In 16mm the steadiness test can be shot on B&W, processed in a Lomo or bucket, looped and projected, but not many people have 35mm projectors. Maybe there is another way. Viewing the neg with an enlarger or improvising with a slide projector, or using a loupe. All one is doing is noting the extremes of the position shift of the line intersections

Edited by Gregg MacPherson
Added clarification.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just now, Gregg MacPherson said:

Hey Aapo,

Do you know what the image stability is like for the Konvas and Cameflex? Arri II is pretty good by reputation.  An enormous amount of material went to the big screen from Arri IIs, commonly intercut with material from pin registered cameras. 

Long time ago I did  registration tests for a couple of 16mm cameras (16BL and CPA).  Shot a grid of lines (byro pen on paper), rewound the film, rotated the paper about 3deg, shot the grid again. I don't know if the CP had a problem, but is showed what I had heard was the likely mode of instability for a non pin registered camera. The lines from the two exposures converge/diverge in a roughly sinusoidal rythm. The 16BL also matched the anticipated mode of behaviour, with tiny, almost imperceptible jitter. Don't know where that 16BL was in it's maintenance cycle.

You can get a good qualitative sense of the image stability this way. But I think it's probably easy to actually quantify for non pin registered cameras also, though I never did it. The lines need intervals or hash marks like a ruler, or you could maybe just use pieces of a tape measure etc. Marks show decimal increments of the frame or something easily scaleable later. Note the varying position of the line intersection. These distances, expressed as a fraction of the frame height or width (of the object) should be a legitimate expression of the image steadiness.

In 16mm the steadiness test can be shot on B&W, processed in a Lomo or bucket, looped and projected, but not many people have 35mm projectors. Maybe there is another way. Viewing the neg with an enlarger or improvising with a slide projector, or using a loupe. All one is doing is noting the extremes of the position shift of the line intersections

I did a test on a Konvas a while ago, not with a grid but with newsprint double-exposed. It was good, no jitter, at least on a normal sized screen. However, only one of the magazines worked perfectly. The other two obviously needed servicing and fresh oil.  So I conclude that the Konvas' registration depends very much on keeping the magazines in top shape.

  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...