Rank Cintel Locations in the United States...

[Alex]

There are approximately five options when it comes to transferring Super-8 film to video.

Project the image on the wall and videotape it. (not recommended)

Purchase a relatively low cost film transfer to video system (under $2,000), but beware that you should own a very high quality video camera, a waveform & vectorscope, and a professional quality, NOT A CONSUMER TELEVISON MONITOR, a 13-inch professional television monitor costs between $500-$750 on the low end, (which should be good enough), to as much as $5,000 on the high end!

Find a local "mom & pop" shop who have been transferring home-movies for years...

Wait for scanning technology to advance to the point
where you could scan you super-8 movie in at a foot at a time...of course "wait" is the key word here...

The fifth option, the rank-cintel option, would probably be everyone's first choice if money was not an option, and if a rank cintel facility was located near you. But since money is a consideration, and the locations are few and far between,when to use a rank-cintel transfer option becomes an important issue.

I only use rank cintel for super-8 transfers to video because I have the capability to edit on beta-cam sp, and as a result, I want to try and achieve the highest possible quality transfer result I can.

However, because it does cost $150.00 an hour to as high as $350 an hour to transfer via rank-cintel, I have demured in transferring several hours of super-8 footage that I have shot over the years. So if wanting the highest quality signifcantly delays you, then perhaps that has to be considered in the overall quality equation.

I'd like this Rank Cintel topic post to be about who you have used for Super-8 rank cintel transfers, and who do you know does rank cintel transfers.

Please specify if your rank-cintel transfer knowledge is based on second hand information or
in-person experience.

I have used Film & Video Transfers in Northridge for Super-8 Rank Cintel Transfers, and The Post Group in Hollywood.

I "hear" that Yale labs in North Hollywood does Rank Cintel Transfers.

I saw Pro-8mm's rank cintel facility about 3-4 years ago, I hear they have expanded it and now have something like two or three rooms. Pro-8mm also does 16mm now! I don't know if they do 35mm. I think if you can do 16mm Rank Cintel transfers you can also do 35mm as well.

Foto-kem in Burbank owned a Super-8 gate as of 6-7 years ago, they may still have it.

One key bit of info. Not all places that offer Super-8 Rank Cintel transfer services own their own Super-8 gate! They must schedule a rental of a super-8 gate from the company called Rank Cintel.

Places that own their own Super-8 film Rank Cintel Gate can "waive" the $200-250 dollar a day rental fee that the Rank-Cintel company charges as a daily rental fee for post-production houses that regularly rent the Super-8 gate from them.

Perhaps it would be wise to mention whether or not you think the post-production facility owns their own Super-8 gate or not, and how that affected the quality and cost of the transfer.

[daveduck]

Well, part of this is ancient history, but...

In the early '80s, before our "who are you people!" Swedish lad was born, I used Super-8 to shoot four television commercials for a client that took "cheap" to new depths.

However, since these spots were destined for cable broadcast locally and not the Superbowl, I figured why not.

A fantastic Rank-Cintel transfer was done by a post-house in San Jose to 3/4" tape. I should add that I edited these on film, not tape, using those tiny 2-frame tape splices on a great metal splicer. Very precise. Sorry, can't remember the name of the place in San Jose. Maybe it will come to me later.

The transferred edit was then color corrected and dubbed to master broadcast copies for the client at BAVC in San Francisco, and the color guy seemed pretty impressed that the origin was Super 8. (Kodachrome.)

The client paid me $19.99, or whatever it was, and everyone was happy.

Contrast this to Pro8mm a year or so ago. I didn't think that their transfer (also Rank-Cintel) was as good, which was doubly surprising given their hype about being near-gods in the Super 8 transfer field. Overall I thought that the look was a little plastic, and the registration was so-so.

Of course, the registration issue could have been the camera's. And it's also possible that Pro8mm's 50 ASA neg stock isn't as sharp as Kodachrome, despite the obvious advantages of shooting neg. Anyway, I won't use them again, though it's unlikely I'll ever transfer Super 8 again, either. (In fact, I have a Goko Telecine machine that may be for sale soon... [img]wink.gif[/img] )

Back to editing now....

Dave

<font color="#a62a2a" size="1">[ June 19, 2002 07:42 PM: Message edited by: Daveduck ]</font>

[daveduck]

Versatile Video in Sunnyvale, CA was the transfer house. Have no idea whether they're still around.

DD

[Alex]

I visited Versatile Video back in the early-mid 80's! It was the turning point for me regarding Super-8.

I had just gotten a Super-8 Xenon Projector for our film club at CSUN around that time, had had a Super-8 film blown-up to 16mm at Interformat, (which at the time was located near or in San Francisco), and now I was at Versatile Video in SunnyVale CA seeing these gorgeous images of ocean waves crashing over a rocky beach front, images that had been transferred from Super-8!

The footage looked absolutely spectacular. Between the Xenon Projector and the quality of the Versatile Video transfer footage I got to see and my Super-8 to 16mm blow-up, I was convinced that Super-8 could open up a whole new world of opportunities for the creative filmmaker on a budget.

The only drawback back then was one-inch video editing cost between $300-$500 dollars an hour!

And I believe the Transfer costs back in the early 80's was between $300-$500 dollars an hour.

Thanks for bringing back the memory!

<font color="#a62a2a" size="1">[ September 08, 2002 02:24 AM: Message edited by: Alex ]</font>

[daveduck]

Ah, that halcyon, Lenny Lipton era.... [img]graemlins/cry.gif[/img]

[Alex]

and who can forget Super-8 Filmmaker Magazine!

I remember when it changed to Moving Images magazine...YECH!!! so that it could embrace video, and then the new hybrid magazine folded in a matter of months.

[Mike Buckles]

Anybody remember Cinemagic magazine? I used to love that one..still have some of my old issues.

[jamworks]

I am not a filmmaker now. But I have in my possession about nine reels of regular silent 8mm home movies (50 to 200 feet each) from my childhood days. These were "produced" by myself and a childhood friend. Recently, the two of us reunited, after 35 years of being out-of-touch. He requested that I provide him with copies of the movies on DVD, and offered to pay for it.

He may have nothing more in mind than watching the DVD on television. But I have a fantasy to make a bigger project out of this, considering the films will have to be digitized somehow. Possibly, I want something better than the mom and pop film-to-video transfer service. I would eventually like to use Apple's iMovie (probably) to play around with the raw footage on the fly, editing sequences, creating clips, etc. (Actually, I don't even have iMovie now; but I will when I buy my next iMac.)

I read Alex's discussion of Rank Cintel facilities, and that answers my questions about what is the highest quality approach and where to find services in the Los Angeles area.

In a personal communication, Alex responded to my posting on another forum, regarding the editing process. "I don't think you should go to DVD because DVD has such a complex compression scheme that when you reload it into the computer to edit it you really have no guarantee as to what you will end up with. . . . I say stick with Beta-Cam SP, Digital Betacam, or DV-CAM until you are absolutely done editing, then make your DVD."

So now I am getting in over my head, and perhaps dreaming of something that will cost too much. I can't realistically do any editing in the particular media (is that the right word?) mentioned by Alex, because I would have to pay an hourly fee for the use of an editing facility with the appropriate equipment (or so I assume).

Instead, I'll stick with the goal of getting a good transfer of the raw footage. Does anyone know what transfer media and/or formats are offered by those services? Is it still worthwhile to first go to one of the media mentioned by Alex, and then transfer to a DVD format? Or if I am not going to do any editing in the superior media, does that defeat the purpose?

Such a transer to a superior media could function as a master to be used again if DVD formats change before becoming standarized.

Can anyone give me an idea of how the Rank Cintel services charge, so I can estimate how much it might cost, considering I know the number of reels and the footage of each. Is there a set-up, or makeready charge, for each reel, plus a charge per foot?

Also, Alex, you mentioned waiting for technology that involves scanning a "foot at a time". I don't know how this works. Does each individual frame get scanned?

Does anybody think I am crazy to think of doing this with home movies?

Thanks.

[Alex]

Nope, you're not crazy.

I had the pleasure of editing "Uncle Bob's Home Movies" last year. This was a one hour edited piece that my client wanted as a tribute to growing up with Uncle Bob.

Uncle Bob had used a Kodak Brownie Camera to shoot with back in the 40's and 50's. Here we were 50 plus years later editing that film footage off of a high quality BetaCam SP tape that had been transferred at the Transfer Station/Film and Video Transfers in Northridge California.

He narrated the entire home movie so that it would have additional historic information.

My client even created an opening intro for Uncle Bob's home movies. At one point in the opening, we did a montage of Uncle Bob via some black and white still shots. Over the still shots, my client spoke about Uncle Bob via the magic of Voice over.

We finished the BW photo montage by compositing an old still photo of Uncle Bob holding his Brownie Camera.

The video camera pans down the BW still shot of Uncle Bob holding his brownie camera and ends up on a close-up of the brownie camera.

The video then cross dissolves to the exact same camera, fifty plus years later, being held in the same manner as it was in the still picture, and then the video camera pulls out to reveal my client in his own backyard, 50 plus years later as he continues telling the tale of Uncle Bob's home movies.

Film and Video Transfers probably has the best film to film transferred per hour efficiency of anyone around.

Figure that you will get between 1/2 hour to 40 minutes transferred per hour. You can save money by "prepping" the film yourself.

This means adding the front and back white leader to each reel that you send in. I recommend you not use the steel reels that have tiny hubs on them.

Make sure your reels are not bent, if the film rubs against the reel sides, it will add jitter to your transfer.

Most places will telecine prep your film for you for an additional charge, so you don't have to do this yourself if you don't want to.

I recommend Beta-Cam SP for archival purposes, but make a mini-dv transfer from the Beta-Cam SP and you can edit your project yourself via firewire in on many Non-linear Edit systems.

[Actor]

Moviestuff charges $15 / 50ft. He uses a system where he scans each frame individually at about one frame per second.

Pro8mm charges $325/lab hour. Figure 3 lab hours to transfer one hour of film. I think they have a 1/2 hour minimum.