Funky Gate

[manofthehill]

Hi all. NEWBIE alert.
Please see following (short!) clip:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccKOGfceyeA

I realize Youtube is not the best place to gauge quality. But I think it's good enough for my question. The three "hairs" along the edge of the frame. Upper Left & Right, and then Lower Right (big one).

Any ideas what this is? Serious problem? Must the gate be replaced? Cleaned?

The camera: Sankyo XL-600 S. Film stock: Kodachrome 40. Inexplicably waited 8 years before processing (so image is ungainly).

Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks!
-Chris H.

[Chris-B]

That is how mine looks when the projector gate gets really dirty.

Try cleaning around the projector gate with a wooden match. You can do this with the camera too. Don't push the match too far through the gate hole especially with the camera as you could damage something.

Just give both the camera and projector a clean around the four edges of the gate hole.

Hope you get some more shot soon.
Good luck!
Chris.

[Blue Audio Visual]

An easy way to tell whether the hairs are in the projector gate or were in the camera's gate when the footage was originally shot is to move the framing device on the projector up and down whilst viewing the footage. If the hairs/debris were in the camera you will see them start at the bottom of the frame and not extend into the top of the next frame (& vica versa). If you see the hair/whatever gunk it is on both the bottom and the top of the next frame (again, & vica versa) then it is in the projector.

You can normally tell just by looking anyway: if the hair/gunk is in the projector it can often be in sharper focus than the film (as the image has never been 'degraded' by being captured by tiny film grains). Equally, since the hair etc. will not be in exact same position as the film plane, you should be able to adjust the focus so that the hair is in sharp focus but the film is not.

Having said all of that, when I transfer other people's film I find that it is pretty common to see evidence of there having been crap in the camera gate when the footage was shot. The problem as I see it is that many people have their Super 8 cameras knocking around in the bottom of a cupboard for years, and just slam in a film without even thinking about cleaning the cartridge chamber and the gate.

Chris B's suggestion of using a match is the 'poor man's' version of using an orange stick to clean the gate. In my experience cheap matches can shed fibres of wood quite easily, whereas an orange stick being somewhat harder shouldn't do so.

Its good discipline to get into to regularly clean your projector anyway - they always attract dust due to convection caused by the fan/hot lamp, old film and splices can shed bits of debris here and there, and these foreign bodies risk scratching your film.

Equally it is important to keep your camera film chamber clean. I've seen a lot of potentially good footage screwed up by gunk in the camera gate extending significantly into the frame, but I guess that is one of the inherent problems with using such a small gauge.

[manofthehill]

Gosh, Chris and Bart. I appreciate the information. Yeah, whatever this is, it's in the camera (no projector involved here).

Bart's assertion was right: I aquired this cam in 1995 and only stuck abtteries in it for the first time in '99, when I filmed this stuff. Never cleaned the gate or poked around whatsoever.

We have a decent photo store nearby (actually INCREDIBLE photo store, just no longer any S8 stuff), and I will stop in to pick up some cleaning supplies.

I will spruce 'er up and shoot a roll of E64--maybe this weekend.

...will post soon. Thanks!
-Chris H.

[chachi]

I've bought super8 film off line From the Film Lab INC, which was in Allentown, PA. I just checked and I believe that same seller is still on ebay, but he is listed his location as BETHLEHEM, PA. Maybe he moved???

Anyhow, I have Super8 Filmmaking Magazines from the 70's that have this guys ad in them, so he must have really been into super8 at one time...

Is The Film Lab INC the same place you're talking about????

[manofthehill]

"Dan's Camera" is the name of the place in Allentown. Mostly all still photography, with their digital business growing significantly. But I'd not heard of "Film Lab INC," so I'll have to check them out.

Bethlehem borders A-town to the east. So if the business moved, it was only down the street.
-Chris H.

[BigBeaner]

Clean the gate with an orange stick, that's how the pro's do it and it's one of the first lessons to use. They aren't a lot of money.

[Blue Audio Visual]

Yeah, whatever this is, it's in the camera (no projector involved here).

How was it transferred? Whatever method you use there is always the possibility of dust contamination in the transfer device itself, so I don't think it is possible to say that it was definitely in the camera without checking it using a framing lever etc. as I said above.

I know it sounds really silly, but from my experiences doing semi-pro telecine it looks to me like contamination during the transfer process - I know that it is difficult to see due to the YouTube compression, but that wispy looking stuff on the bottom right seems sharper than the rest of the footage, and the shape of it is more reminiscent of crap building up in a projector rather than a camera gate. Or I could well be deluding myself...

[Mitch Perkins]

I know it sounds really silly, but from my experiences doing semi-pro telecine it looks to me like contamination during the transfer process - I know that it is difficult to see due to the YouTube compression, but that wispy looking stuff on the bottom right seems sharper than the rest of the footage, and the shape of it is more reminiscent of crap building up in a projector rather than a camera gate. Or I could well be deluding myself...

The wispy stuff appears to be jumping a bit though, indicating it's in the camera gate.

Mitch

[Blue Audio Visual]

When I do transfers I tend to see hairs/crud in the camera gate showing as static. They often (but by no means always) disappear when a new shot starts. Possibly this is because the camera has been stowed away in its bag and jolted about a bit, but I'm speculating wildly. When I see it jumping around it more often seems to be in the gate of the transfer machine that I use (which is a modified projector).

[Will2]

Nothing wrong with a little dirt. Heck, some people pay good money for that look in post.


8)

[Mitch Perkins]

When I see it jumping around it more often seems to be in the gate of the transfer machine that I use (which is a modified projector).

Surely not, if the whole chunk of gunk is jumping straight up and down, and in perfect tandem with the film image?

Mitch

[Blue Audio Visual]

Maybe the phrase "jumping around" wasn't the best choice of words for what I meant?

Fair enough, if the dirt/crud etc. is seen to "jump...straight up and down, and in perfect tandem with the film image" then you are looking at an in-camera contamination. I assume you mean that the registration error of the film frame and the image of the dirt move "in perfect tandem"? Another way of putting that would be to say that the two images (although possibly moving from the POV of the viewer due to poor registration) stay perfectly/almost perfectly still relative to each other. Clearly that could be nothing other than crudulent crappiness in the chamber. In any case, you could check that for sure using the method I outlined above.

What I should have said (acknowledging that I wasn't explicit enough & was probably sloppy in my choice of wording) was "When I see it suddenly jump into the frame during a shot it more often seems to be in the gate of the transfer machine.../...projector." At the very beginning of the YouTube footage posted above the wispy stuff on the bottom right doesn't seem to be there (although maybe that is just a compression artifact?).

My point is that a camera chamber is a pretty much closed system compared to a projector or TK machine, in that there is only a finite and relatively small amount of gunk that can be in the camera chamber. You can rely on the fact that the film in the cart will be pretty much free from contamination. With a projector or semi-pro transfer device the possibility of picking up dust from the feed is orders of magnitude greater. With genuinely pro systems greater measures are taken to lessen contamination, but obviously it can still happen. It seems more likely to me therefore that if the dust/crap/crud/gunk appears during a shot that it is more likely to have occurred during the viewing process than during the exposure process.

[manofthehill]

Yeah, whatever this is, it's in the camera (no projector involved here).

How was it transferred? Whatever method you use there is always the possibility of dust contamination in the transfer device itself, so I don't think it is possible to say that it was definitely in the camera without checking it using a framing lever etc. as I said above.

I should have mentioned that I simultaneously had another roll transferred elsewhere, and it had the same artifacts. (that footage, due to my cruelly waiting nearly a decade before processing, was not even worth posting).

So, I am pretty sure it's in the camera.

[manofthehill]

I do appreciate the discussion, guys. Thanks!

Where do I get an orange stick? A regular photography store, or is it a movie camera-specific thing?

Sorry for the ignorance, here. I just want to do everything I can to prepare before my next test roll.

-Chris H.