alternatives to super8 ?

[Cranium]

I think you nailed it there.
Yeah the Beaulieu thing is pretty expensive, but it IS what everyone's talking about.

The only thing beyond that that I could see being useful is a DIRECT replacement for the Kodak 200ft. Maybe something with a torque motor on it that would work in ANY 200ft S8 camera. You wouldn't gain all the benefits of the Beaulieu setup, but it would still be worth it.

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Mikel Z

[bry]

Hi,
does the alternative have to be film?
I love film in so many aspects, like its look, the way you must carefully plan your shots and all those things, but there are some damn good things in the video market.

Have you seen the latest Star Wars trailer? Come on.... it's HD.

Of course you can't expect to take an HD camera and shoot with that look. They worked very hard to make better lenses, better storage supports and on and on, but it's a great medium anyway, and made to be used like a film camera!!!

If you're planning to shoot a feature in Super-8, maybe with the film and processing money you could rent an HD Camera. The HS tapes are very cheap when compared to film, too.

Bry

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[mattias]

> Have you seen the latest Star Wars trailer? Come on.... it's HD.

no, it's a digitally composited film where many of the plates were shot on hd. i'm sure you all see the difference.

anyway, i didn't really like the overall look of the trailer - way too computer gameish for my taste - but the live action stuff looked really bad even. not that episode 1 looked any better despite being shot on film, but that's beside the point. ;-)

/matt

[#Pedro]

I bought that new star wars version on video for accidence, thinking about reconstructing a S8 version that I have, 3 rolls with selected scened, all together over 1000 ft. To check chronological order and to record Stereo soundtrack to the film. But what a surprise! It had nothing to do with the original film of late 1970, it was a plastic-look video-game movie, I did not like at all and sold it quickly at ebay!
Pedro

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[8th Man]

Off-Topic:
There are companies that still release blown down films onto super8 in their complete forms in England. When I get back home to the States, I plan on buying a couple to see how the projected versions look compared to DVD. Some films are even in scope so I assume they'd require an anamorphic lens. That would be so cool, Ben Hur in super8 cinemascope.

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PRM

[#Pedro]

The British Derann prints are extremly sharp, just as a S8 original, and with high sound quality, I have some second hand ones. I believe they do every singular print directly from the 35 mm original and not that S8 contact prints of the 1970ies.
But they are costy! Projected they look very good, not comparable with any video or dvd projection, real cinema and not tv. They have many scope prints with stereo sound, a scope lens for the S8 projector is required, as well as a bright projector.
Pedro

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[gaspode]

where can you get these from?

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'It comes in Pints?!'

[Matt Pacini]

XL-S <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Courier, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by bry:
"....Have you seen the latest Star Wars trailer? Come on.... it's HD."
Bry

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>


Like I've said a million times before, (correctly guessing people would say the above statement when episode II comes out), Lucas has whole rooms full of programmers, writing proprietary code to make freakin' anything look like anything!

SW Episode 2 is absolutely no indication of what anybody else can do with HD (unless you have 100's of millions of dollars at your disposal) let alone low budget filmmakers like us.

If you read articles and interviews with top cinematographers, who have shot both film and HD, they all say that it's barely cheaper, if at all, to shoot with HD, and it's a total myth that you don't have to light, etc., shooting HD.

Film stock is a fraction of the budget on a big budget film, and you have the same amount of crew, because you're just swapping a film loader with a video engineer.
Add to that, the problems with B&W & LCD viewfinders, etc., and it's not all a walk in the park. There are lots of complaints from DP's who shoot both.
And the cameras cost MORE to buy than top film cameras, and around the same price to rent.
Clearly whatever HD is or isn't as far as quality compared to film, it's totally irrelevant for guys like us, because it's really expensive to shoot, regardless of the fact you're not buying film stock.
(The tape stock for these isn't exactly the same price as your VHS blanks you buy at Target either!)

Matt Pacini

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