[Frameworks] Digitizing Super 8

[David Tetzlaff]

> I have posted up here about a DIY HD telecine option with my 550D and still plan on building it but am swamped with work at the moment.

In my experience DIY telecine can work really well if the projector and camera are running at the same frame rate. Specifically, I've shot film projected from a standard Pageant onto matte white poster board using a 24fpsCanon HDV camcorder (AG-A1), and it came out lovely, no flicker.

So the trick would be finding a Super-8 projector that ran at a constant speed that matched one of the settings on the 550D, which I would guess would have to be 24fps or 25fps. I don't know Super-8 projectors well, but I would guess that most of them either don't have one of those speeds or don't hold speed well enough, but I would also guess that there are some higher end models that would fit the bill.

Anyway, if you can match projector and camera, you needn't worry about the rest of process. Set up the camera as close to the right side of the projector as possible, to minimize parallax, just in front of the lens to eliminate spill back into the video. It helps to have a photo-type '4-way' head so you can get the horizon straight to the film frame. Do some exposure tests, set exposure manually, and roll it. You may want to take a couple more runs, bracketing exposure. It will look better than you expect, and the client should be pleased.

But, as I may have mentioned before, when I introduced some real film into my production classes when I was teaching, I went with 16mm rather than Super-8 mainly because I knew the students would still be finishing in FCP and I could DIY transfer the 16mm easily and successfully while Super-8 would be a real problem...