Color Negative VS Normal film

[thesurflab]

I am a super novice so bare with me.

I have been buying my film from super8sound.com and it is color negative.

I just bought some K40 and it has the pictures looking great right after development.

Why does super8sound sell color negative? What are the benefits of color negative?

Thanks

[steve hyde]

color negative is not for projection. Color reversal (positive) is for projection. Color negatives have more exposure lattitude meaning you can get a balanced exposure when you are faced with bright highlights and dark shadows. Color negatives require telecine to make the images into a positive. Telecine is the process of transferring film footage to video tape or some other digital intermidiary before printing the positive image to film. (there are many methods for doing this)

Check out this website:

http://www.onsuper8.org


have fun

Steve

[ekta-clone]

I am a super novice so bare with me.

I have been buying my film from super8sound.com and it is color negative.

I just bought some K40 and it has the pictures looking great right after development.

Why does super8sound sell color negative? What are the benefits of color negative?

Thanks

It is easier to shoot with negative because it forgives exposure errors so much.

For exmple, when you meter for reversal film (like K40) you have to meter very precise, because you are making your final image IN CAMERA, and if you give it 1/2 stops more exposure, your image will end up brighter by 1/2 stops.

With negative it doesn't matter that much, because your final image can be made brighter or darker as you wish. Negative film captures much bigger range of tones than you use in the final product (print or telecine), so you can chose a "section" from this bigger range by adjusting the printer lamp, or setting the shadows and highlights in different ways during telecine process.

For example, with negative, if you have the wrong metering by one stop, and overexpose the film by one stop, it doesn't really matter, you can print it down a bit and get the same image as if you exposed properly (well not identical, overexposure and underexposure have their characteristics) You can even print it down by two stops and still get a good image, depending on the film stock.
you can also miss your exposure by one stop down, and underexpose it, print it up and get a nice image, a bit lower in contrast, slight color cast to shadows, but it still works.

I never feel relaxed with reversal, I can't just take the camera, and shoot around, I have to watch for exposure carefully. But I love reversal because seeing a negative is not as rewarding as seeing reversal (I can't see negative with my own eyes)

With negative I can be sure that I'll get the image, even if I miss the exposure slightly in both ways (preferably overexpose it) and If I'm not sure if I metered it properly, I can always ad one extra stop just to be sure, and it won't ruin the image.