Hello Craig.
I just took a two minute break from editing but I will give you a response in a few hours. You can put on email notification for this topic if you haven't already.
Good question!
What do most of you see as the most appropriate use of Super 8 today?
I was a big fan of Super 8 in the 70s as a teenager, made a few films and still own several cameras and projectors. I was even a judge at Al Nigrin's U.S. Super 8 festival at Rutgers in the early 90s, and I did an article on Super 8 for The Independent around the same time. I've even emailed with Lenny Lipton.
With all that said, I don't see a lot of mainstream applications for Super 8 today. Without prestriped sound cartridges and limited services for double-system, interviews for documentaries and dialogue for dramatic films seem to be out the door. With Mini DV camcorders selling for $350 and processed Kodachrome going for $20 a cartridge, there's no economic argument in favor of Super 8 as a "people's" medium any more. Brodksy and Treadyway in their 1980s book "Super 8 in the Video Age" basically said that if you could afford to make your film in 16mm or professional video, then not to use Super 8. Video costs have dropped through the floor since then while Super 8 services have dried up even more and costs have risen.
So is "art" and the occasional recreation of a home movie look in bigger films the only thing left?
I know this is a provocative question and I don't mean to start arguments, flames or rants, but I am curious what people think these days.
Hello Craig.
I just took a two minute break from editing but I will give you a response in a few hours. You can put on email notification for this topic if you haven't already.
Good question!
Think of a super-8 camera as a portable digital editing machine. Each cartridge of film can store 3600 images. If one desires, each image can be radically altered from the previous image. While a Super-8 camera can be radically altered frame by frame, it's actually considered a faux pas with digital camcorders to add any filtration when shooting beause the footage can never be made neutral again. With film, the look of the frame can be radically changed while not messing with the actual filtration of the image.
Single, frame, slow motion, stop motion, time-exposure...all instantly available, available in whatever order you like, instantly switcheable from one technique to another.
But wait, there's more! Several Super-8 film stocks are available in color, black & white, and negative. The multiple film choices are combined with the multiple filming options mentioned above, literally millions of creative options are available, and no software or need to upgrade or change software programs is necessary.
Imagine the portability of a non linear editing computer with a built in lens and film look, or just use a Super-8 camera.
The counter question I could ask you is how much money and time have the mini-dv throngs spent trying to make their digital footage look like film? The bigger question is why would someone with the ability to edit anything anyway they want exclude film from cinematic palette?
Why would anyone spend so much time trying to make digital look like film when all the film tools needed already exist and cost significanlty less than a non linear editing studio?
One of the obvious use for super8 is the use as flashback footage in a DV project. The project I'm working on now is being shot in DV, however, I'm planning to shoot the "flashback" sequences in Super8 because I believe the viewers would be throughly convinced it was a flashback rather than what I could create with FX in the editing suite.
Another idea would be to use super8 in the re-creation of historical events for documentries.
The obvious reason for using super 8 is a unique look that asolutely CANNOT be gotten with video regardless os what you do to it.Flashback footage,the likes of what we see in shows like Cold Case Files,music videos and the pseudo news footage like what was seen on the recent remake of Helter Skelter are particularly suited for super 8 use.
It is impossible to make video look like film.Any format.Anytime.There are some things that super 8 is the ONLY medium that works artistically.
DV represents the present, Film and Super-8 is like watching a story.
Reality TV versus storyline TV. I'd hate to only have one to choose from.
<font size="2" face="verdana, sans-serif">This applies to all film formats because those dancing patterns of grain that make up the film image behave more like the rods and cones of the eye than the stationary dot matrix pattern offered by interlace or progressive scanning of a video image.Originally posted by Alex:
DV represents the present, Film and Super-8 is like watching a story.
Reality TV versus storyline TV. I'd hate to only have one to choose from.
Moreover,the different stocks of film offer many more options for the artistic filmmaker than what is offered by video post production.
The super 8 film image is a truly unique image and there are creative options that simply cannot be achieved electronically.
You want to paint in acrylic,you use acrylic,water color use water color.
A fascinating thread! (Alex takes a rod and cone and waits to bop the next digital fanatic who comes along)
May I also add that true digital only exists via cathode ray projection or LCD display. I was told this by a digital photography forum. True digital cannot be displayed on paper, and by logical extension not on film either.
So why would anyone only want one of these two forms of artistic expression to exist?
Granted, Super 8 has a different look than video, and the "film look" has always been touted as an advantage of Super 8 over video. But is the "Super 8 look" really the "film look"? The "film look" of Hollywood film is based on color negative stock, which has more exposure latitude and thus more dynamic range than direct-projection reversal films like Kodachrome 40. Color negative is carefully "timed" for exposure and color balance when release prints are made. K40 is very contrasty and there is no opportunity for timing until you transfer to video (or blow up to 16 for prints if anybody still does that). I don't think the Super 8 "film look" is necessarily the same as the "film look" you get in a theater.
Again, I love Super 8. I'm just probing for thoughts.
In the italian fora we spent a lot of time to talk about the argument: super 8 vs. digital.
The answer is always the same: the super 8 looks better than the digital image.
I have an Elmo GS1200 HTI high power. In the august of 2003 my wife and I went to Turkey for two weeks. We were on a Kaikko (boat) with 8 others friends. I shot a film with my Canon DS8 and sync. sound.
In november the film (2 x 180 at 24 ft/s) was ready. I rented a little cinema for a night. I mounted my Elmo HTI in the "projector room"; it was connected to the hall professional amplifier...and the screnn was of 3,5 mt.
Well.. wat did you say Craig? the super 8 look doesn't appear like the real cinema?
My friends was astonished! They said " this is real cinema... nothing of similar with our digital cameras"
Ciao dall'Italia
Ugo
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