Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Photographing your own snipes, etc.

This is topic Photographing your own snipes, etc. in forum Film-Yak at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by William Hooper (Member # 71) on 09-12-2003, 03:15 AM:

Didn't Scott Norwood say once that he was considering shooting some stuff on 16mm & printing it to 35mm for a theatre he worked?

I'm considering shooting something brief on 16mm like the theater's logo fade in, hold, & fade out, then having a lab do a blowup to 35mm.

Kodak's site is cryptic!
In the product catalog, what's the difference between
EASTMAN EXR Sound Recording Film 2378E and 3378E ?
Is 3378E 16mm ?
http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/products/lab/2378.shtml

Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 09-12-2003, 03:51 AM:

Why not hire, or even borrow if you can find somebody who has one, an Eyemo, Newman Sinclair or some other small, clockwork drive 35mm camera? It would probably be cheaper than blowing up 16mm.

Posted by Phil Hill (Member # 371) on 09-12-2003, 04:16 AM:

I agree Stephen, it is much cheaper and better to film it in 35mm.

I did this same sorta thing for drive-ins when I was in high school & college.

If you only want one or a few "prints", you can use reversal film instead of a negative stock for filming. That will also save you some bucks.

>>> Phil

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 09-12-2003, 06:32 AM:

It wasn't me. I've made lots of 35mm slides for theatre use (use Kodalith aka Ektagraphic HC, shoot black text on white background, develop at home, end result is white text on black background), but no snipes.

The "borrow an Eyemo from someone" idea is probably best, but a half-frame 35mm camera would probably work OK, too, if you can be satisfied with lousy registration and short (4.5') snipes.

The problem with 16mm blowups (in addition to the quality issue) is that they normally cost about $1-2 per 35mm foot and there is usually a fairly high lab minimum. This would be worthwhile for a feature or documentary with a high shooting ratio or where the smaller 16mm camera is an advantage, but not really economical for short lengths.

Check the prices from the trailer houses, too; the quality is usually better than what one could do at home on a budget. Tim Reed (aka Screen Attractions) recently did a custom snipe for me at a very reasonable price.

It looks like 3378E is on an ESTAR base, while 2378E is on acetate base. Not sure what's used most commonly now; hopefully John P. can comment. In the mid-'90s, the 16mm sound negatives that I had made were on acetate base, but that was before ESTAR became common.

Posted by Sean Weitzel (Member # 244) on 09-12-2003, 06:52 PM:

I did that once with my Eyemo. Built a crude light box and laser printed 3 or 4 sheets of white on black text. then stacked the paper so the black was extra thick. Mounted a 500W halogen work light in the light box and mounted the papers on the front. Then built a dimmer out of a 120v outlet and a kitchen dimmer knob. I put the eyemo on a tripod and aimed it at the light box on my desk. My goal was to run the camera at like 5 to 8 FPS and twist the dimmer slowly to bring the brightness up, then i'd dim it back down, stop the camera, backwind a few feet, change the text, start the camera again and twist the dimmer on again. This would create an in camera dissolve. Well, everything worked really cool except for two things. One, with the eyemo only having a rangefinder, the parallax error (even though i tried to be extra careful) caused the edge of the box to be seen in the extreme left of frame. and two, i didn't backwind far enough for the dissolves to work out perfectly. The one thing I was really worried about was exposure, but my trick of running the camera slow to achieve those extra few stops to white out the "letter" areas of the paper worked well. I think I was using 125 asa VNF and had it processed at A-1 in NY for something like 25 cents a foot. This was probably 6 or 7 years ago.

William, If you wanted to experiment with something like this, email me and we can work something out.

Posted by Manny Knowles (Member # 1171) on 09-12-2003, 07:24 PM:

If simple text is all you want you can do it in Flash and then probably send the file out to someplace like Cinema Concepts and get a high-quality output to 35mm.

I mention Flash because it is a vector graphics animation program so the resolution of such a file could be scaled up infinitely.

I've had CC do a lot of work for me (original 2D and 3D animation produced by them and video-to-film transfers). I haven't tried the Flash idea yet but it's on my to-do list.

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 09-12-2003, 09:10 PM:

Kodak's film ID numbering is all explained on the website:

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/support/h1/typesNamesNo.shtml

If the first digit is a "2", it is 35mm or larger ESTAR base.
If it is "3", it is smaller format ESTAR base.

A "5" is 35mm or larger triacetate base.
A "7" is smaller format triacetate base.

Kodak's website does have lots of information for budding filmmakers:

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/support/h1/

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/support/h2/

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/students/handbook/

Also, the ACVL Handbook:

http://www.acvl.org

Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 09-13-2003, 02:55 AM:

Sean wrote:

quote:

One, with the eyemo only having a rangefinder, the parallax error

One of the great things about a simple technology like film is that it's easy to improvise something to get round a problem.

There are several ways of avoiding the parallax problem. In a case like this, where the subject area is constant, you could set up the camera, unloaded, turn over the mech until the shutter is open, put a small light source, such as a torch bulb, inside the camera, on most cameras it's fairly easy to remove the pressure plate while you do this, and project an inage of the camera aperture onto the subject. Measure the distance from the film plane to the subject and focus by the scale on the lens. Lock off the camera mounting, load the stock, and you're ready to shoot.

Posted by Sean Weitzel (Member # 244) on 09-14-2003, 02:00 AM:

a neat idea! I'll have to remember to do that next time [Smile]

Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 09-14-2003, 03:34 AM:

A couple more tips:

If you lace up a few inches of clear film in your projector gate, and then draw around the aperture with a thin pen, or better still scribe with a needle, you can then put this film in the camera gate, and see the exact area of the projector aperture projected on the artwork as you align the camera.

If you produce your artwork by computer you don't need anamorphic lenses to produce 'scope versions; most decent graphics software will allow you to squeeze the image, and print out a pre-squeezed version.

Posted by Phil Hill (Member # 371) on 09-14-2003, 02:46 PM:

A cheap trick (sounds like an old rock group or a hooker) I've used for making sure things line up is to put some wax-paper or fish-paper at the film plane with the pressure plate removed. Light the set and focus the image on the paper. View with a dental mirror to make sure all is aligned by sticking the mirror in behind the paper. If you're really lucky, you'd have a ground-glass with a prism. [Smile]

>>> Phil

Posted by Don E. Nelson (Member # 1049) on 09-15-2003, 02:57 PM:

Thanks, I was just going to post this quwstion.

Posted by Tim Reed (Member # 137) on 10-12-2003, 03:05 PM:

quote:
I'm considering shooting something brief on 16mm like the theater's logo fade in, hold, & fade out, then having a lab do a blowup to 35mm.

No need for a blow-up. Drop us an email and tell us what you want.

Screen Attractions