Super 8 Film Stock

Trying to wade through the world of super 8 film is not an easy task.  The first thing that I wanted to learn was more about film stock.  Doing some initial research I found that the reels are usually sold in 50 foot lengths.  Ok, so 50 feet, but how much is that in the finished run time?  I was talking it over with my husband and we calculated it ourselves...

50 feet means that the total length of the reel in mm is 15,240

If each frame is 4mm tall then there are 3,810 frames in the total reel

3,810 total frames @ 24 fps means each reel lasts 158 seconds or a little over 2.5 minutes

wait, that can't be right.

We recalculated it, and sure enough, we came back with the same result. I always knew that film was expensive to shoot but... WOW! $16 for 2.5 minutes. And that is just for the film itself, no processing or transferring.

Allow me a slight tangent.

We aren't used to the world of film anymore where EVERY frame is important, something to be savored.  Digital is cheap, both in expense and, if you don't mind me being a bit elitist for a second here, in quality.  I say that because with digital, now everyone everyone can be a photographer or a videographer.  Don't get me wrong, I think that this change has done many many amazing things, but there is a small part of me that loathes the digital age.

I say as I blog. Just kidding, love you computers. Don't turn against me!

In any case I think I have decided to go ahead with the project, at least as a test. Amazon is usually the first place that I look at least to compare prices while shopping, but it appears that they only sell one type, and it is black and white.  I really wanted color so I kept going.  Just by doing a search on google I came across the always dependable B&H website.  They have many different options, but I think that the one that I would like to try is the Ektachrome 100D Super 8 Silent Film (50'). It is $15.96 plus shipping per reel.  Hopefully 100 feet will be enough for a solid test!

Ektachrome 100D Super 8 Silent Film (50')

Found Friday

The thing I love most about found photos is the sense of mystery they stir up.  Some mysteries were quite literally stirred up with the release of a collection of mug shots from Sydney, Australia that were taken between 1910 and 1930.

NPR has a very interesting article about the collection of mug shots. The article brings about one very interesting point: It goes without saying that these are not like today's mug shots. For one, because unlike today's criminals, many of these people had never before been photographed. Posing for a portrait was kind of a big deal. Not only can these pictures be appreciated on an artistic level, but they are also just so intriguing, like something out of a movie. Very intriguing indeed!

Full NPR article here


The plot thickens! From the official record:

Mug shot of Hazel McGuinness, Central Police Station, Sydney, 26 July 1929

Special Photograph no. D32 (Drug Bureau photograph).

Hazel McGuinness was charged along with her mother Ada McGuiness with having cocaine (in substantial quantities) illegally in her possession. Police described a raid on the McGuinnesses' Darlinghurst house during which the mother Ada threw a hand bag containing packets of cocaine to her daughter, shouting, 'Run Hazel!'. Despite that, detectives spoke up for Hazel McGuinness in court, arguing that she had been led into crime by her mother ('the most evil woman in Sydney') who had raised her in 'an atmosphere of immorality and dope'. Hazel was given a suspended sentence.

Ada, Hazel's mother

This picture is one of a series of around 2500 "special photographs" taken by New South Wales Police Department photographers between 1910 and 1930. These "special photographs" were mostly taken in the cells at the Central Police Station, Sydney and are, as curator Peter Doyle explains, of "men and women recently plucked from the street, often still animated by the dramas surrounding their apprehension". Doyle suggests that, compared with the subjects of prison mug shots, "the subjects of the Special Photographs seem to have been allowed - perhaps invited - to position and compose themselves for the camera as they liked. Their photographic identity thus seems constructed out of a potent alchemy of inborn disposition, personal history, learned habits and idiosyncrasies, chosen personal style (haircut, clothing, accessories) and physical characteristics."

Yosemite in the fall with my Yashica-D

Meet my Cameras - part 2

I had been talking about experimenting with different film formats for some time, so for my birthday a few years ago the husband got me a sweet little Yashica-D. When I first started thinking about broadening my horizons into medium format film, I had in mind one of the new Holga type cameras, so when I opened up the box and saw this I was completely blown away, and a little intimidated.

Here was this vintage camera without a modern convenience to be found. Sure, in theory, I could figure out all on my own the appropriate f-stop and shutter speed to use depending on the light level, but my memory was a pretty fuzzy on the process. I had gotten so lazy with digital cameras that so easily slip back into automatic mode that I wasn't sure that I could take a decent photo without help from a computer. And on top of that I had to wonder if this puppy would actually work at all. Ebay sellers make no real guarantees with this sort of thing.

So I tried it out. And it worked! To this day it seems like some sort of miracle that I can make this thing take pictures. But it is so much fun to use and definitely not without its own learning curve. My first roll I never developed prints of because I thought of it as really just a test, so my first ever shot on is still only in negative form. Here is a somewhat diluted version of the first shot - I just scanned the negative and then inverted the colors.

Through the Viewfinder

On my quest to figure out the world of super 8 film, I stumbled across a photography technique called "Through the Viewfinder" or TtV.  In this method, the photographer basically takes a digital picture looking through the viewfinder of another camera. The end result gives the look and feel of an old style film camera, without the cost of film and with the immediacy of digital. It is a pretty intriguing process, albeit a bit silly looking on the part of the photographer. The flickr pool has some beautiful shots though, and the process seems simple enough. I do have my own TRL camera at home so maybe I will have to give it a try.