Half sixteen

[Actor]

A while back there was a thread about "vista 8", a system where the 8mm film runs through the camera horizontally to achieve widescreen. I've searched for the thread and cannot find it. Anyway I suggested that a more viable way to achieve vista 8 would be to use regular double perf 16mm film and mask the gate so that only half the frame is exposed. Running the film through the camera twice would give a 3:2 aspect ratio with a frame size 1.5 times that of super8 at a cost less than super8. Imagine my surprise when I found the following on the 8mm film metadirectory.

http://lavender.fortunecity.com/lavende ... auges.html

Click on the link and toward the bottom of the page there is a description of precisely this system. It is called half 16.

[Herb Montes]

There was such a system made in France called Super-Huit. It used a modified 16mm camera with a masked gate. You can do something similar by using a Kodak Cine Special since they could use masks in the gate and holding the camera sideways. Projection would require a special prism to rotate the image.

Since double perf 16mm film is getting harder to find you might also use double regular 8mm film in a 16mm camera with a masked gate.

[Actor]

I don't shoot that much 16mm but the as of a couple of years ago double perf 16mm was still available from Kodak. You simply had to specify double perf otherwise your order would default to single perf. This could change and perhaps it has. As long as 16mm is available in double perf with the same emulsions as single perf the format has exciting possibilities.

John Schwind has double perf 16mm Fomapan.

Transfer with a 16mm workprinter should be just a matter of rotating the video camera 90 degrees and zooming in some more.

[mattias]

I suggested that a more viable way to achieve vista 8 would be to use regular double perf 16mm film and mask the gate so that only half the frame is exposed.

i was going to say "i suggested it first". ;-)

Imagine my surprise when I found the following on the 8mm film metadirectory...

...but that would've made me look kind of stupid it seems. i'll just stick to making films. at least you can add your personal touch even if all stories were already told thousands of years ago. :-)

/matt

[Andreas Wideroe]

I don't shoot that much 16mm but the as of a couple of years ago double perf 16mm was still available from Kodak. You simply had to specify double perf otherwise your order would default to single perf.

You can still get double perf 16mm when ordering from Kodak - atleast here in Norway. Simply tell them double perf or your order will default to single perf.

/Andreas

[newsuper8er]

TECHNISCOPE!

I am also very interested in this topic of only exposing half the frame at a time. I read somewhere that George Lucas did this with a 16mm camera when he shot his first feature; THX 1138. Thus doubling the ammount he could shoot and having his film in widescreen!

I believe it is called Techniscope.

And here is some information:

http://www.simplyweb.net/piranha/

http://jkor.com/peter/techniscope.html


Well it seems like a good idea, not sure how difficult it would be to modify a camera to fo this though. Hmmm . . imagine if you could do it with Super 8?? No i better not go down that road :roll: .

Steven.

[Herb Montes]

Techniscope is a 35mm film format where half the height of the standard frame is shot. It requires a camera that pulls down 2 perfs instead of 4.

[mattias]

how close to the film plane would the matte have to be to be sharp? i guess on a c-mount it's *very* close? i'm thinking of trying something with my keystone.

/matt

[Rob]

TECHNISCOPE!

I am also very interested in this topic of only exposing half the frame at a time. I read somewhere that George Lucas did this with a 16mm camera when he shot his first feature; THX 1138. Thus doubling the ammount he could shoot and having his film in widescreen!

I believe it is called Techniscope.

And here is some information:

http://www.simplyweb.net/piranha/

http://jkor.com/peter/techniscope.html


Well it seems like a good idea, not sure how difficult it would be to modify a camera to fo this though. Hmmm . . imagine if you could do it with Super 8?? No i better not go down that road :roll: .

Steven.

Pretty easy to do this on a Bolex H16 by putting in the film advance from an H8 and using film with Standard8 perforations. This will give a full width 16mm image but with only half the height. (The gate will need masking of course). People used to do this in the 1950s when using the Bolex stereocopic lens. In an unmodified H16 the lens renders the stereo pair as two tall narrow images side by side in the normal 16mm frame. By reducing the film advance by half, the images are rendered as two normal aspect ratio images side by side. The Bolex lens's focal length was 12.5mm (normal for a Standard8 lens) so the end result was a 3D camera in standard 8 format.

Rob

[jussi68]

"Pretty easy to do this on a Bolex H16 by putting in the film advance from an H8 and using film with Standard8 perforations."

Is there any way of doing this with double or single perf 16 mm?

[mattias]

with double perf you can just mask the gate and shoot the film twice, double 8 style. this means it becomes very difficult to project and almost impossible to edit on film, which leaves only telecine but that's what most of do anyway, isn't it? 6 minutes of widescreen footage on one 100' spool? this said i've been talking about this for two years and still haven't tried it out, so...

/matt

[Rob]

"Pretty easy to do this on a Bolex H16 by putting in the film advance from an H8 and using film with Standard8 perforations."

Is there any way of doing this with double or single perf 16 mm?

Nope. 16mm film has one perforation per frame. (on double perf 16mm there are perforations down both edges of the film but on each edge there is still only one perf per frame). To get the half frame pulldown you need two per frame and you get that by using Standard 8 film which has twice as many perforations as 16mm. Alternatively you could get 16mm film reperforated as Standard8. There is apparently somebody in London who does this. Search earlier posts on this forum for the details.

Rob

[studiocarter]

The Cine Kodak Special cameras I & II both will do 16mm half frames out of the box, no sweat. it was made for it. The start frame needen't even be marked. Put the mask in, there are two, one for the top half and one for the bottom half, and shoot, reload, rewind if you want first in a dark room or in a camera without using the gate, change the masks around, shoot the other half. Upon projection, the image will be in two parts, a top half and a bottom half. The two halfs may be taken apart in Premiere from a normal telecini of the 16mm film. It wouldn't even matter if one of the half wide 16mm images were upside down because of the reloading. The PC can flip the image easily. The projector could be masked and would need to be in order to see only one of the images. It will still only be a half height 16mm normal frame, but you WOULD get twice as many pictures from one roll, ie. 80 / foot instead of 40 / foot. It would be a very wide widescreen image. The same thing could be done sideways as there are half masks for a vertical split. Turn your TV sideways?
edit: wait a moment, if you reloaded the film after the first shoot, would it be upside down? Which mask would you use then? Ah well, it can be sorted out by drawing in the film gate with a fine tip sharpie marker. The mask is like right on the film.

[studiocarter]

Can you shoot 16mm film in a 35mm camera? If you could, you could insert a vertical mask in the 35mm camera to cover the area where there isn't any film, just to block ony stray light from bouncing around, and shoot two frames of 16mm at a time vertically, effectively doubeling the resolution of 16mm film. The camera would be used on it's side. A normal 35mm telecini, only used on the 16mm film would give you a file to rotate in Premiere or whatever.

If the vertical mask(s) were used in a Cine Kodak Special you would get the same thing only doubled 8mm vertically, and you could shoot the other half as well.

Herb, can you run 16mm in your 35mm camera?

[mattias]

wait a moment, if you reloaded the film after the first shoot, would it be upside down? Which mask would you use then?

yes. the same one. no rewinding. no mask shifting. no markings. super simple.

/matt