Films and Movies (Super8, 16mm, 32mm, video)

Some of the formats mentioned above have been claimed DEAD lately. So it might be advised to also take a look at the Dead Media topic, offspring of Bruce Sterling's Dead Media Project: http://www.spring.net/yapp-bin/restricted/read/cultures/20

ack!!!

Yesterday, I glued three 3min long Super 8 films together and watched 'em: Me building a folding boat together (late last summer) and gliding away on a lake, and two reels I filmed on the Easter weekend trip to Hamburg. It's really different than the Super 8 films my father filmed (later 60ies to Mid-80ies). I see different things, impressions, fragments, he filmed more the tourist sights, the folks, the people around him. I filmed tags and grafittis, shop windows, posterboards, totally different things. And on film they look so different, classic-age like, though that's only a month ago!

One of superstar's layouters is taking up the clue from me: After a biz meeting (the usual thing - brunch, champagne, barbecue -, highly efficient AND fun!), I showed some Super 8-movies. One was the home-made one mentioned in Response 3 (which by now is about three 3 min. reels longer...), and we watched one of the two Green Hornet-movies (Bruce Lee!). Perhaps I also showed one of the old family movies... Anyway, he just found a Bell & Howell camera, very much like what my father used when he took up filming in the Sixties. It's a very basic camera with few functions, but the results are great... The more sophisticated cameras require more attention to the effort and more involvement, which is contradicting my idea of using this as filmed diary. Ok, funky details can be great for special things (macro for extreme close-ups, heavy zooms, auto-"fire" for trickfilming), but it's nicer to carry a small and fun camera around amd be fast and willing to use it, than dragging the big iron around which is a bother to handle.

To bring us up to speed, I commented on another Collecting topic : We have hundreds of 16 mm spliced onto big reels. We even have the Hindenburg burning and the Coronation of George VI and Streamboat Willie, plus inumerable Betty Boop and Popeye reels. Alas, no, none of the news events were filmed by my Dad. However, as a Radio Amateur (Ham) he picked up the SOS from the sinking Moro Castle and they drove with my sisters in the car and me very large in my Mom to see it. It was that event that convinced him he needed to purchase the 16 mm camera. I used to help him develop it by cranking it back and forth in a double-chambered tank.

Yes, 16mm... I'd love to have that! Sometimes on fleamarkets, you find complete kits with camera, tripod and exchangeable lenses, like e.g. a Beaulieu. But too expensive for me... Super 8 cameras can be found for DM 5 (USD 3) to DM 120 (USD 70) over here on the fleamarkets, depending on what sellers know about it, and how good it is. THe Rollei super 8 I have was about DM 30 (USD 18), and I found another one - a mailorder cheapy, but with great functions + good lens - for DM 5! The Bauer I wanted to use to film the eclipse was a genuine "steal" at the DM 60 the guy wanted at the camera swap meet. It as single-frame shoting at freely setable intervals - mount on tripod, direct at object, switch on, and forget about it! Makes a very fast movie from slow actions... Would have been nice, but the cloud cover was so thick, you couldn't see a thing.

Tell me about this ship, Marcia.

I'm lusting after the new digital 8 format. Have you heard about it. It let's you use the old Hi 8 and 8 tapes to record digital stuff. And the cameras are all over the big discount stores.

For Alexander, who wondered about the Sinking of the Morro Castle, it was a passenger liner which was driven aground burning off the coast of New Jersey on September 11, 1934. Much detail and photos at http://home.pacbell.net/steamer/mocast.htm

Huh, Terry! That sent shivers down my spine! This is an analogue topic... Or was, until now... Friday, I filmed friends (did it the proper way - Super 8!) leaving the palais where they were united in happy matrimony - superstar had organized an Elvis-lookalike who melted down the rest of everybody's hearts with Love Me Tender, Now Or Never and Can't Help Falling In Love. Terry, I don't know (yet) about such things - though it were great would we have somthing like this, too. I still dream about webcasting... $%&�-budget!

Alexander, I will get you more information on the Morro Castle as soon as I can drag out the book pertaining to her (that URL I gave you was promising but went no further than that one page. Sorry!) I am making popcorn in anticipation of seeing your movie - I just have to see that Elvis impersonator...Speaking German, too? Amazing!

you know, i loved looking at my dad's films of us kids. then he got into slides and we'd have to watch slide shows of vacations and stuff, which was alright, it didn't bother me one bit. am not sure if he does video now, but i remember him dragging that big camera around the house chasing after us!

Sounds like my Dad...somewhere there is a movie of my in a little red bathing suit running into the Altantic and back again. I had naturally curly strawberry-blond hair and I was about 2 years old. (Yes, for all those out there wondering, it was in color.) There is a ghastly one of me fresh from hatching arriving home. I was all ears and eyes...and no hair. They can bury that one!

haha!! most films with me in it (that little anyway) were of me in my cloth diapers running away!! the camera scared me (and still does *grin*)

In my opinion, the only good camera is one focused on someone else and preferably held by me. I Understand..*smile*

i'm glad somebody does *grin*

The old family movies are moch loved by friends. They do not know any of the people in there but me, still, peeping back through all those decades is fun! Also, those silent movies are most enjoyable if you play some nice music with them. Last year, I preferred organ-style stuff from the Sixties, now I go for more exotica or lounge listening stuff.

Interesting idea... I recall one birthday party I had in my teens when my Dad got out my old home movies. I hid in the kitchen until I realized they were enjoying something that their families did not have - actual documentation of their grandparents as living and breathing individuals. All of our 16mm home movies were silent, fortunately, but somewhere out there is a record of me talking to my grandfather...an old shellac one...!

Alexander, your Email has been bouncing for several days. Have I been barred from your inbox or have you changed ISPs...please check on it...!

No, my mailbox has been full (6 MB) - I got loads of files for the mag (ads, pics, texts), and don't manage to manually delete them regularly enough to provide space for more mails... But it worked today, I saw.

Arrhem - sorry, too!

Quite alright...just concerned about you!!!