What type of ASA film for 16 fps camera ?

[JDRM]

Hi everyone,
I've got an old double 8mm movie camera from the late 50's still in good working order. The exposure dial has a max setting of 16 fps. The manual states it will work with any double 8mm but later goes on to say it was designed for use with daylight color film ASA 10m. I'm a bit new to all of this and have been digging around, you dont get colour film ASA 10 anymore, am I ok to try black and white ASA 10 instead? Also, could I use Ektachrome 100 ASA or 50 ASA (for double 8's) on this type of cam?

Sorry if these are dumb questions...!!
Jacobs

[JDRM]

It's a Wollensak 8mm Model 43 by the way, here is a pic of it and the exposure dial

[jpolzfuss]

The exposure dial has a max setting of 16 fps.

Maybe you're confusing "f-stop" with "frames per second" here?

ASA 10m.

I hope that the "m" is a typo...

... In any case: There are "sun-glases" for cameras called "ND-filters" ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutral_density_filter ). So - at least when manually setting the f-stop - you can use any film with "too much ASA".

Jörg

[JDRM]

I did get f-stop and fps mixed up in my original message yes, and the "m" was indeed a typo (not a great start to my first ever thread!). Thanks for your info re the "sunglasses" I will look into this more and see what I can find.

[jpolzfuss]

Hi,

I finally managed to take a look at your photo. Simply ignore the "hazy, ..."-remarks on your camera and set the correct f-stop. To know the correct f-stop, you'll either have to use an external exposure-meter or a table like this one:

ORWO.jpg

The "UP 21" in the attachment has 100ASA and if you're shooting at 16fps ("expos./s" in the attachment), you should be able to shoot without ND-filter - except for extreme conditions like very bright sunlight at the beach (with the water reflecting the sun). So when using a film with only 50 ASA, you might even be able to work without ND-filters in all situations...

Jörg

[JDRM]

Thanks Jörg, really appreciate this chart - am going to go through it and will let you know how I get on. I have hope for 50 ASA and maybe even 100 too because my father used this cam in the early 80's to shoot me as a toddler and this was long after Colour ASA 10 had been discontinued (my grandmother shot with ASA 10 until the early 60's when I assume she stopped because it was discontinued and she was never very "techy"). I dont have the original films with me, only the dvd's they were transferred to but the colour is fine, maybe a little oversaturated in some scenes but generally fine, he even moved the camera slowly whilst the manual says to always keep it still and remained pretty good. I assume he would have shot with Kodachrome 25 back then, though I'm not sure, he's too old now to remember. We lived in a very small town at the time, not sure how well stocked up they would've have been. I've ordered some B&W ASA 10 film from here in London which I have found at Sendean Cameras (not exactly cheap) and will try that first before hitting the town with ASA 50.
Cheers

[cameratech]

Just be aware that the B&W ASA 10 stuff is not 'normal' film stock, but high contrast orthochromatic film (Kodak 7363), sensitive to the blue/green spectrum but not red/orange. I bought some from the Widescreen Centre when I first started playing with R8, and was rather surprised by the results! It's very fine-grained, with incredible detail and very punchy contrast, but skin tones in shadow for example turned out very dark. I'd love to try it again now that I know a little more, I suspect it suits certain subjects and conditions better than others, and needs careful metering.

[JDRM]

Thanks, it's good to have comments from someone who have used exactly the same type of stock as I'm intending to. Will watch out for those blues and greens, maybe shoot some scenes in an urban environment at first. I wonder if your fstop setting might have had something to do with the dark skin tones in the shadows. I'm planning to shoot some this weekend, I guess I'll find out soon! By the way, in all my research I discovered they still produce 9.5mm film and the place is actually in Australia - not sure if you've ever played with that format. Think it's amazing that you can still get hold of that stuff today, quite a few 9.5mm camera still around too.

[Will2]

Is that a spool load or a cartridge load camera?

[JDRM]

The Wollensak I have is a spool load camera