Super 8 sound cartridge

[Hanthx]

I know that we in the past have talked about sound cartridges, and etc...
but I have heard from some of my film pals that there is a company named Feranni (hoped I spelled that right) in Holland and Sakaria that have or are packing kodachrome 40 cartidges with film that has been striped with sound. Any ideas or answers anybody?
Thanks for any help
Scott
Super8Kid

[#Pedro]

what cardriges? Sound cardriges with the opening for the sound drive?
If it?s only the silent cardrige filled with striped film, it?s rather useless, because it?s much better to get the film striped after editing.
Pedro

[tom hardwick]

I'm not so sure Pedro. The post production sound track stripe that I've had applied (paste or Agfa F5) has never been as good as the prestriped stock sold by Kodak. Although it's more costly (because you discard so much of it on the cutting room floor) I still found that the quality of the sound made the investment well worth while.

Go for the prestriped every time, use a tape splicer to butt the two ends of the film together and you'll not be troubled by dropout.

tom.

[pcg]

Aside from the debate, does ANYONE know whether these cartridges are actually being manufactured & sold?

Pedro, you're closer to the action over there. Any idea?

/Pat

[#Pedro]

Pat, I?ve never heard of such cardriges. The only cardriges beside the Kodak I know are metal made silent cardriges (Kahl media, Germany) to refill at home. (I think Carlos is using them???) Perhaps it would be possible to load the K25 sound stock from the 200 ft reel. But I didn?t ever purchase such a cardrige, as the K40 here costs $9 incl. developing!!!

Tom, the sound quality of post striped film is really the best achievable. Well, the striping process is critical, the type of cement must be correct! There is cement around, which destroys the magnetic layer of the stripes!
The AGFA or ORWO stripe is spliced from a large magnetic tape. I personally know Mr Weberling (back in the 1980) and wathced teh process in his factory in Munich.
So you get a smooth magnetic surface even on a 0,8 or 0,45 mm stripe. The painted soundtrack of K40 is thicker in the middle and less thicker at it?s borders, due to the painting and drying process.

The point is, that if you use much prestriped stock in your projector, the sound head becomes abrased and gets the shape of this stripe. This way it reproduces a prestriped film better than a post striped, due to the better head contact. Playing a smooth post stiped film afterwards, the contact to the sound head is not good anymore (abrasion), and the reproduction sucks.
If you exchange the sound head and use only post striped material, you will get the best technical possible sound reproduction.

Amanzing is, that recording is less critical than playing. Even a soundtrack, recorded with an old head (open gap) will sound good when played back with a new head.
Exchanging sound heads is very easy and I know supplyers which have many many new Bauer, Beaulieu, Braun and Elmo heads, for about $45 each.

Pedro

[This message has been edited by #Pedro (edited January 30, 2001).]

[Alex]

I agree with Tom, prestriped film has more use and holds up better.

Also, Tape splicers are better & faster should allow for cleaner edit points....

However, I think in general video editing of Super-8 film is the way to go.

Alex

[This message has been edited by Alex (edited January 30, 2001).]

[tom hardwick]

Good points Pedro, and I can agree with a lot of what you say. I too have experienced the head wear you describe, and the head of my Noris Electronic Studio 2000 (remember them?) wore away so completely that it started to chizzel at the film's sound stripe, slowly peeling it off in front of my very eyes.

Oh thank God for video and it's sound track!

Anyway, I'd agree that post stripe is flatter from new and doesn't have the meniscus of paste (maker's original stripe) that is so obvious under the microscope. I always ran a new sound film a few times through the projector before recording, but of course the camera (an Elmo 240 SXL) had had to put up with the meniscus on the brand new film it was exposing.

Does this make sense guys?

tom.

[Hanthx]

The film I was mentioning was prestriped and loaded into a sound cartridge, not a silent cartridge. It was just a rumor I had heard, and hopefully someone out there could give some insight or information whether or not this is true.
Also...another note.
does anybody know whether or not kodak still has the molds for the sound cartridges, and the 200 foot cartidges?
Somebody knows somebody who knows something.
Scott

[pcg]

Scott,

That's a direct question for Martin Baumgarten. He'd know & you can find his email address on a number of S8 sites. This is an area that he's pursued for years. If you hear back from him (& he's usually quick to respond), share what you learn w/ us!

/Pat

[#Pedro]

Tom:
With Noris I?ve no expieriences, as the minimum light power for me is 150 W. The Bauer projectors I?m using since mid 1980 don?t have these problems, a worn head only shows a weak sound reproduction but does not destroy the film! I can tell you, that right from the beginning I used post striped filmes and even my very first films are in a good shape and the soundtrack is at it was new. The only problem I had was with a comercial Piccolo documentation film, which peeled the stripe. My home-striped films never had problems. Concerning the video soundtrack, I?m not so happy with it, because due to the tape speed of video,the quality is not better than a tape answering machine. HIFI quality only is achievable with with FM modulated soundtrack. And this soundtrack you only can edit together with the picture! But editing analog video means copying it, and copying degrees the picture quality even more. And for the one-man-studio at home, it?s very difficult to handle both at the same time, video editing and sound editing... I like it much more, to record and even overlay sound on two independend tracks of S8, wathing the already fixed original picture.
Pedro