Retro Thing

Montgomery Ward Super 8 Projector... In Avocado Green

Here's proof that there was a time when absolutely everything was for sale in avocado green.  I used to think that avocado was a color reserved for kitchen appliances and primary school counter tops (and avocados of course!), but here it is – a pea-soup & ivory colored Super 8 projector.

It's easy to forget that home movies weren't just the turf of spendy camera shops.  Regular department stores wanted in on the lucrative domestic cinema market.  This Montgomery Ward 866 projector simply has to be from the 70's (I'd welcome any confirmation of that) from the color scheme.  Of course the 70's were back when Super 8 was king.

It's quite compact, maybe about the size of a six pack of tall-boys (I'm thirsty as I write this - so kill me...).  The take up reel is neatly built in (though the hub is oddly for regular 8).  Montgomery Ward looks like they wanted to simplify projecting home movies with this affordable projector.

The threading is much simpler than most projectors, which makes me fear for the safety of any film I'd run through it.  All of those extra gears and spindles that you see on larger projectors are there to take the strain off of the film as it runs through the projection path.  Not the kind of thing I'd want to eliminate to reduce costs.

I can't run it because the rubber belt inside has rotted to bits.  Looking at the internals it's simplified compared to most projectors I've seen.  It's got forward and reverse as well as a still function – not totally commonplace features, especially in what was probably a pretty affordable projector in its day.

Since I have so many misgivings about the safety of this “monkey wards” projector (no wonder they went out of business in 2001!) I doubt that I'll ever run movies through it.  It doesn't look like I'll be missing much.  Check out the tiny lens.  The lamp is plenty big but not much light seems to make it out the front of the thing.

Sometimes department stores can sneak out something crazy and cool (see our post about the Sears Silvertone guitar), but in this case I think they should have saved their avocado green for a washing machine.

Related:

Marvelously Miniscule 35mm slide projector
Muplet cheapo projector
Bell + Howell antique screen
Bell + Howell oddball cassette projector

An Affordable Piece of Motion Picture History

Fred and Stephanie Marriott run a little shop in Hornsea crammed full of old books, cameras and model railway paraphernalia. Luckily, they also offer their wares on the Internet. The F. & S. Marriott Cine Catalogue offers a wonderfully esoteric selection of vintage motion picture cameras. One device in particular jumped out at me, a Cine-Kodak Eight Model 20 -- the first 8mm movie camera -- introduced in 1932 for the princely sum of $34.50.

The Cine-Kodak Eight featured a wind-up spring motor and a simple parallel viewfinder built into the handle on top of the case. Everything was completely manual -- you set the exposure by hand and fancy zoom lenses were still decades away. None of that mattered, because aspiring filmmakers suddenly had an affordable and compact camera to shoot home movies. It remained on the market until 1947.

Believe it or not, amateur movie makers started off using 35mm film, making it a hobby for well-heeled gadget fiends. There were many attempts to shrink the format, including 17.5mm, 9.5mm and 16mm Kodak film (now regarded as a fully professional format, thanks to dramatically improved modern film emulsions and optics).

Amateur filmmaking truly took off following the arrival of Double 8mm film in 1932 (it's also referred to as Regular 8mm or Standard 8mm). The format was based on 16mm film with twice the number of perforations. Two tiny 8mm film frames sit side-by-side on the reel. You exposed half of the film before flipping it over to expose the other half. After processing, the film gets sliced into two 25 foot long 8mm strips.

The Double 8mm format remained at the forefront of home movie making until 1965, when Kodak and Fuji unveiled the immensely popular cartridge-based Super 8 and Single 8 formats. These offered a 50% larger frame size than Double 8mm by shrinking the film sprocket holes. And, believe it or not, you can still purchase Double 8mm film today.

Explore the Marriott Online Cine Equipment Catalogue

related:
Movie Making With Fuji Single-8: Better than Kodak?
Soviet Super 8 Movie Cameras

ARRI Movie Camera Family Portrait

Wim Robberechts in Belgium sent us this amazing ARRI family portrait a few months ago. His company specializes in breathtaking aerial filming on HD and film.

ARRI is a German camera manufacturer with a long and distinguished history. They introduced the world's first cine camera with a rotating mirror viewfinder system in the 1936, and have produced thousands of professional motion picture cameras since. The sleek little ARRI 416 Super 16 camera (foreground) is their first all-new 16 mm design since 1976. It weighs a mere 5.5 kg, including camera, loaded magazine, viewfinder and video assist.

Wim Robberechts & Co
ARRI Group professional motion picture cameras

Kalart Movie Editor In Bright Red

The professional video world is excited about the development of the RED Camera - a film resolution digital video camera.  Lots of mystery surrounds the device, even after prototypes were unveiled.  My disappointment?   The actual camera isn't red.

There are lots of practical reasons to not have a bright red video camera (think of all the charging bulls it might attract!), but that doesn't mean that your editing equipment can't be!  Let's look back some 50 years to Kalart's 8mm film editor - in bright red plastic!  This is pretty daring - remember that photo equipment was almost always in serious  gun-metal finishes, or dour black.  What a great way to perk up the drudgery of editing your home movies!

The box promises that through editing you can transform your own films into polished "movieland" type productions with this simple device.  The Kalart even goes so far as to simplify advancing and rewinding the film by just using one crank.  Using a complicated internal mechanism, you use a single crank to move the film forwards and backwards.  To be honest, I find the single crank thing more confusing than anything - and the gimmickry that makes it work isn't always the most reliable.

So while the rest of the world waits for the RED camera to hit in a big way, I hope that some enterprising manufacturers of editing equipment are standing by with the red paint.

related:

Home Movie titling sets

Slate your movies - just like the pros!

DIY progressive scan camcorder

B&H Film home movie camera

A New Super 8 Film Cartridge From GK-Film

The Super 8 film format is now 42 years old and Kodak's product lineup is stronger than ever. Young filmmakers are often enthusiastic adoptees of the vintage format because of its distinctive look and the low cost of equipment, and the format remains popular for TV commercials and music videos. Unfortunately, looks can be deceiving; the Super 8 party might come to an end sooner than we expect.

No new cameras have been developed in the past twenty years, and Kodak's film division has seen a dramatic decrease in sales as consumers adopt digital technology. Fewer than 100,000 cartridges of Super 8 film are sold each year, down from over 17 million in the early 1980s.

There are several innovative little companies who could fill the void if Kodak stops production of Super 8 film, except for one awkward little problem: Kodak is the only company in the world that manufactures the little plastic Super 8 cartridge.

In an effort to reduce the industry's dependence on Kodak, GK-Film in Bielefeld, Germany decided to create a dramatically improved Super 8 cartridge. The new design is the brainchild of Gottfried Klose, the man who introduced Cinevia -- Fuji Velvia 50 daylight reversal film -- to Super 8 users throughout the world.

GK-Film used modern computer-based manufacturing techniques to create a cartridge that should outperform the ancient Kodapak design. It features a metal film pressure plate, replacing the low-quality plastic plate that pressed the film against the camera aperture in the Kodak design. This should offer noticeably better image stability and more consistent focus across the entire frame.

The new GK-Film Super 8 cartridge is currently undergoing testing and should hit the market in early 2008, loaded with amazingly sharp and vibrant Fuji Velvia 50D film. I can't wait!

Discover Cinevia Professional Super 8 Motion Picture Film
The official GK-Film Site
Kodak's current Super 8 film lineup

Underwater Moviemaking [Classic Retro Thing]

Thanks to computer-based editing, filmmaking is more popular today than it was ten years ago. To get you started, how about The Fujica AX100? It's a tiny Single-8 movie camera produced by Fuji in the early 1970s. It's easy to use, with an extremely fast F/1.1 lens for low-light shooting and one-button point-and-shoot filming. The AX100 uses Fuji Single-8 film cartridges, which are still available for $16 plus processing.

If you're really lucky, you might find one with the Fujica MarinePack 8 underwater housing (pictured after the jump). With its targeting sight, weird plastic fins, and suspicious looking lens holes, this is definitely not something to toss into your carry-on luggage.

The Fujica AX100 in its optional MarinePack underwater housing. When new, these were waterproof up to 40m (about 120ft). These days, I'd try it in the bathtub first. Perfect for re-enacting Jaws in your neighbor's pool.

Single-8 film cartridges in the USA (Single8.com)
Where can I get one? (Retro Enterprises Co., Tokyo)

[Originally featured in September 2005. The AX100 is one of my favorite motion picture cameras, and Single-8 film is now one of the cheapest formats to shoot.]

Soviet Super 8 Movie Cameras

Filmmaking was a surprisingly popular hobby in the USSR. As with many things in the Soviet era, making movies required a bit of planning and forethought. Equipment and film was expensive, so many people belonged to film clubs and were able to obtain film at a significant discount. Two major film manufacturers - Svema and Tasma - produced color and black & white cine film, although the color stocks were usually reserved for motion picture and television production. Each new Super 8 camera shipped with a handful of reloadable Super 8 film cartridges, so all you needed was a supply of raw film.

Several cameras - such as the Quarz 2x8 Super-3 above - did away with the cartridge completely and accepted Double Super 8 film on reels. Double Super 8 (DS8) is a hybrid format that uses 16mm wide film to capture Super 8 sized frames. One half of the film is exposed, the reels are flipped, and the other half is shot. The 16mm strip is cut into two 8mm-wide reels after processing. It was a clever system.

Over 200,000 clockwork Quarz DS8-3 cameras were produced between 1971 and 1983. They require no batteries, thanks to a quaint windup motor and a solar-powered selenium exposure meter. Apart from having to wind up the motor every 20 seconds or so, the camera was fairly well specified with an f1.8/9-38mm Meteor zoom lens. It offered 12, 18, 24, and 36 frame per second shooting speeds, along with a single frame mode for animation.

These cameras appear frequently on eBay, sold direct from Russia. Purchasing one is a bit of a gamble: it might have lived in a damp shed for several decades. Instead, I recommend a fellow by the name of Olex Kalynychenko in the Ukraine. He services the cameras he sells, so you know that yours will be in good running order when it arrives.

Visit Olex's Russian Camera Site

Tobin TVT-16: Low Cost 16mm Film to Video Transfer System

Tobin Cinema Systems is now shipping the TVT-16 16mm film to video transfer machine. While its $4200 price tag might seem a tad high at first glance, it is well within the budget of professional transfer facilities.

A significant difficulty faced by amateur filmmakers is the exorbitant cost of getting 16mm film scanned to video. Traditional Telecine transfer can cost up to $600 per hour, putting it out of reach for many budget-conscious movie makers. The TVT-16 should level the playing field a bit by reducing the cost of high-quality film transfers.

Unlike old-fashioned projector-based systems, the TVT-16 uses a built in CCD module to deliver frame-by-frame scanning in real time, without blended or blurred frames. It incorporates a custom macro lens assembly with a solid state LED light source that provides consistent illumination across the entire film frame.

The machine can be ordered with either an NTSC or PAL sensor module that outputs flicker-free video at either 752 or 768 pixel horizontal resolution. Supported transfer speeds include 24 and 16 fps (NTSC) or 25 and 16 2/3 fps (PAL). The maximum reel capacity is 2300 feet, giving one hour of running time. The company also manufactures several 8mm models.

Visit Tobin Cinema Systems for more info

The Bolex Bible

Shopping for a Bolex 16mm movie camera can be confusing, which makes Andrew Alden's £15 Bolex Bible an essential aid. You can pick up an early model H16 for a few hundred dollars, while a shiny new SBM will set you back around $4,400 plus the cost of a decent lens. Alden's book explains what the differences are, and what features you should look for when hunting for your dream camera. The £15 spiral bound book features 100 fact-filled A4-size pages and dozens of black & white photos that give an overview of the H16 body, lenses, motors and accessories. There's even a brief section on loading film.

The Bolex H16 is one of the most popular 16mm movie cameras ever made. The original H16 was introduced in 1935 and the modern spring-operated SBM model can still be purchased new. Bolex cameras remain extremely popular among film students and experimental filmmakers, because they're capable of capturing images that put sterile "High-Def" camcorders to shame. It's even possible to convert vintage cameras to shoot modern widescreen Super 16mm format.

By the way, Alden also runs the Bolex.co.uk site and offers a range of second-hand outfits at prices ranging from £450 ($900) to £1100 ($2200). If that's out of your price range, you could just pick up one of his basic black Bolex t-shirts and pretend. I won't tell.

The Bolex Bible

For Sale: Charlie Chaplin's Movie Camera

Christie's will be auctioning the Bell & Howell Model 2709 camera once owned by Charlie Chaplin on July 25, 2007 [update: It didn't meet the reserve bid]. It is expected to fetch between £70,000 and £90,000 ($140,000 to $180,000). The auction includes a copy of the original sale document indicating that the device was sold to Chaplin about a month after he founded Chaplin Studios Inc. with his brother Sydney in 1918. At the time, this state of the art device sold for $2,000 - about $31,000 in 2006 dollars.

The Bell & Howell 2709 was a hand-cranked 35mm camera that became the mainstay of Hollywood silent movie production upon its introduction in 1911. In fact, nearly every major Hollywood production of the era was shot on a 2709 or its competitor, the Mitchell Standard. Unbelievably, this model remained in production into the 1950s, although I suspect many of the later units were used for animation purposes, rather than hand-cranked live action.

Chaplin's company owned three other 2709s, but this camera is special because it was the only camera purchased by Chaplin himself -- one of the few Bell & Howell 2709s owned by an individual. It is very likely that this camera was used to shoot some of his most important work, including A Dog's Life (1918), Shoulder Arms (1918), The Kid (1921) and The Gold Rush (1924), since the studio possessed only one other Model 2709 during this period. It's also probable that the camera remained at Chaplin's side through the 1930s, when he continued to cling to silent film while others made the leap to sound. As a result, it could have played a role in the production of his highly regarded later works including City Lights (1931) and Modern Times (1936).

This auction lot includes the original camera, a selection of lenses, a Mitchell side-mount viewfinder, wooden legs and a pan-and-tilt head, along with four top-mount "Mickey Mouse Ears" 400 ft. Bell & Howell film magazines. Interestingly, the magazines aren't the originals that were shipped with the camera, for the simple reason that these were probably worn out from years of hard use.

It is hard to imagine any other vintage camera that had such an enormous impact on the film industry. Modern equipment is usually rented from companies such as Panavision because of its prohibitively high price, so the cameras remain largely anonymous. This particular machine had a far more organic relationship with its owner, since Chaplin and cinematographer Rollie Totheroh hand-cranked many thousands of feet of film through its magazines over the span of decades.

New Old Stock Chinon 8mm Movie Cameras

Jack Berg Sales is a wholesale liquidation company that offers a variety of strange electronic gadgets from the 1960s and 1970s. We first mentioned them several of years ago, and RT co-author Bohus just reminded me of their existence. Their prices are incredibly steep, but where else are you going to find brand new 8-track stereos with stacking turntables these days?

One device in particular caught my attention: A brand new Chinon Zoom 8 Movie Camera from 1963. It features a Chinon 9.5-30mm f/1.8 zoom lens, electric eye exposure and runs on 4 x AA batteries. This camera is several years older than Kodak's Super 8 cartridge format and uses "Regular 8" film on tiny 25-foot reels (available from John Schwind's International Film, prices start at about $10 for B&W). Strangely, it's mis-classified under "Video Equipment."

Classic 1960s Chinon Zoom 8 Millimeter Camera

Modern Stop Motion Animation

Super 8 movie cameras are exceedingly good at messing around with the fabric of the space time continuum. Most of them are capable of filming at a wide variety of speeds, making slow motion and time lapse sequences a piece of cake to shoot. All but the cheapest models offer a single-frame mode that's perfect for stop motion animation. The idea of dragging long strips of photosensitive plastic past a piece of glass might seem quaint these days, but modern consumer camcorders can't shoot at variable frame rates and while many can capture single frames, they can't automatically stitch them together to create an animation. You'll need an "old fashioned" $20 Super 8 camera for that.

There is hope for stop motion animators who want to shoot with digital equipment, thanks to modern digital still camera technology and some clever software. Programs like Stop Motion Pro are capable of controlling a wide variety of digital cameras, including some affordable point-and-shoot models. The program costs anywhere from $70 to $595, depending on the features you require. The basic package is suitable for hobbyists, while the more costly versions add uncompressed image storage, unlimited resolution and multi-monitor output.

Of course, there are literally dozens of programs that do similar things for both the PC and Macintosh. If you're a stop motion animator, feel free to share your favorites in the comments.

Stop Motion Pro animation software

Pclix LT100 Time-lapse Photography Controller

One of my favorite things about shooting Super 8 movies is that many S8 cameras include time-lapse controls so you can snap single frames with a variable delay. This lets you film "moving cloud" effects and accelerate other scenes at your whim and fancy.

The $139.95 Pclix LT100 makes it possible to add similar capabilities to a variety of modern digital cameras (it will also work with Super 8 movie cameras and film cameras equipped with an electrical 'contact' shutter release). In essence, photographers now have the ability to shoot incredibly high quality time-lapse movies using the full resolution of their modern DSLR cameras. The LT100 is an elegantly simple device that can run for a month straight on a single pair of alkaline AAA batteries. It offers 99 interval settings (ten of these can be user customized) and a bright red Instant Fire button.

A variety of control cables are available, starting at $12.95 for a generic contact switch closure cable and ranging up to $39.95 for a Canon N-3 infrared controller (which also allows the Pclix to function as a wireless remote control).

More about the Pclix LT100 time-lapse controller

Bolex Double Super 8 Movie Cameras: Surprisingly Affordable

The Bolex H-16 is one of the most popular 16mm cameras in the history of film. First introduced in the late 1930s, tens of thousands of these workhorse Swiss spring-drive cameras have been manufactured. If you're shying away from getting your hands on one because of the high price of 16mm film, consider purchasing a Double Super 8 (DS8) Bolex instead.

We briefly mentioned DS8 a few weeks ago; it's a hybrid format that uses 16mm wide film to capture Super 8 sized frames. One half of the film is exposed, the reels are flipped, and the other half is shot. The 16mm strip is cut into two 8mm reels after processing and can be projected or transferred as "normal" Super 8 film.

JK Camera modifies Bolex H-8 Standard 8mm cameras to accept DS8 film. A Bolex H8 Rex-3 camera body converted to Double Super 8  costs $445 with 10x TTL viewfinder. The sprocket holes are aligned with the center of the frame and enlarged film claws are installed. The reel spindles also have square adapters to accept 16mm film reels. The mod offers several key advantages: Super 8 has a significantly larger image area than the older Standard 8 format, a DS8 camera will provide more stable image registration (the frame won't jump and weave as much) and you'll get 4X longer running times than 16mm.

JK Camera's Bolex Page [DS8 cameras are at the bottom]
Affordable Bolex movie cameras

Yet Another Super 16 Movie Camera!

There have been a handful of Super 16 cameras announced recently, a reminder that film remains an excellent way to capture high-quality HD imagery. First came the camcorder-sized Aaton A-Minima (around $20,000), followed by the incredibly compact Ikonoskop A-Cam SP-16 ($ 6500) and the absolutely professional Arri 416 (about $49,000). Now it's Aaton's turn again with the new Xtera (price TBA).

The Xtera accepts 400 and 800-foot film magazines to streamline the production process. It offers a progressive-scan video-tap with 640 x 580 resolution (NTSC) to allow the director to follow the action. Best of all, the new camera is compatible with the magazines and viewfinders used in the Aaton XTR prod series, which will allow rental companies to integrate the new camera easily into their inventory. The camera also features an extremely accurate "micro steady" film transport and a direct-drive brushless motor.

The Aaton site is somewhat vague about exact technical details. The camera is apparently "the quietest Super 16 camera," with AatonCode time code for sound synchronization. How quiet? They're not telling. There is no mention of shooting speeds, although I would expect a versatile range to enable slow-motion and other effects. Perhaps most impressive, each 12V 3.8Ah NiMH battery pack is good for 4 hours of shooting.

Needless to say, this isn't the sort of equipment you'll find perched on an amateur's shoulder. It's pro-quality gear that is perfect for shooting TV, films and documentaries. So why is it featured on Retro Thing? Because it once again points out that film is still enjoying its time in the sun. And don't forget that new equipment causes a trickle-down effect. Prior models become less expensive to rent, allowing more indie filmmakers to make the jump from video to film.

Aaton Xtera Super 16 Motion Picture Camera